The paper is based on a multi-sited ethnographic research project that Eda Farsakoglu conducted for her PhD project with Iranian queers seeking refugee status in the transit migratory space of Turkey. It poses the following questions: How are refugee claims of Iranian queers processed by decision makers in Turkey and how do Iranian queer refugee applicants adopt to, negotiate with, and resist against the constraints set by governmentalities of asylum and border regimes? Focusing on intra-group social hierarchies among Iranian queer refugee claimants and mobility-related strategies of their support workers, the author argues that the international refugee regime closes the westbound doors to those Iranian queers who deviate from the dominant sexual identity narratives, expected migratory trajectories, and essentialist legal logics.
Eda Farsakoglu is a Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology and an affiliate of Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University.
Date: 20 April 2016
Time: 15.15-17.00
Place: Room 226