Annual Conference 2025

     

(Re)Mapping Mobility: Migration, Thresholds, and the Politics of (Dis)Placement

 

19 June 2025 (as part of Refugee Week)

 

The Migration and Mobilities Research Network (MMRN) hosted its 2025 Annual Conference on 19 June at Edinburgh Napier University’s Merchiston Campus. Centred on the theme "(Re)Mapping Mobility: Migration, Thresholds, and the Politics of (Dis)Placement", the conference brought together researchers, practitioners, artists, and activists to reflect on the shifting contours of migration in an era marked by uncertainty, precarity, and resistance. Together, we examined how people experience and navigate the thresholds of displacement – from legal limbo and policy barriers to questions of belonging and endurance.

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Highlights included a powerful keynote by Professor Julia O’Connell Davidson (University of Bristol), who invited participants to rethink the category of the ‘human’ through the figures of migrants, exiles, slaves, and criminals. The morning also featured screenings of two compelling short documentaries – Voices from Ipswich and Car Wash – followed by a Q&A with filmmakers Brook and Miki.

 

Across three panel sessions, speakers explored themes such as the politics of welcome, temporalities of exile, institutional harm, and grassroots mental health initiatives. The day concluded with a collective reflection on how scholarship, storytelling, and practice can challenge dominant migration narratives and support more just and humane responses.

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The conference was organised by the MMRN with generous support from the Social Sciences Subject Group at Edinburgh Napier University and was chaired by Kiril Sharapov.

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Conference report​​​​​​

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 Conference programme including paper abstracts

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