TY - JOUR

T1 - Welcome to Britain: The Cultural Politics of Asylum.

AU - Tyler, I.

N1 - RAE_import_type : Journal article RAE_uoa_type : Sociology

PY - 2006/5

Y1 - 2006/5

N2 - Questions of asylum and immigration have taken centre stage in national and international debate and figure prominently in the domestic political agendas of wealthy states and nations. In Australia, Europe and the US, harsh and punitive asylum and immigration laws are being enacted incrementally and asylum-seekers are subject increasingly to detention. Through a focus on the detention of asylum-seekers in the UK, this article makes a critical intervention in current theoretical debates around asylum.Focusing on the writing of Giorgio Agamben, this article suggests that within political and cultural theory, there has been a turn to the figure of the asylum-seeker (and the refugee) as a trope for theorizing the political constitution of the present. By opening up a critical dialogue between humanitarian, media studies and abstract theoretical accounts of immigration detention, this article produces a critique of the ways in which theory appropriates the figure of the asylum-seeker.

AB - Questions of asylum and immigration have taken centre stage in national and international debate and figure prominently in the domestic political agendas of wealthy states and nations. In Australia, Europe and the US, harsh and punitive asylum and immigration laws are being enacted incrementally and asylum-seekers are subject increasingly to detention. Through a focus on the detention of asylum-seekers in the UK, this article makes a critical intervention in current theoretical debates around asylum.Focusing on the writing of Giorgio Agamben, this article suggests that within political and cultural theory, there has been a turn to the figure of the asylum-seeker (and the refugee) as a trope for theorizing the political constitution of the present. By opening up a critical dialogue between humanitarian, media studies and abstract theoretical accounts of immigration detention, this article produces a critique of the ways in which theory appropriates the figure of the asylum-seeker.

KW - abjection • asylum-seeker • critical and cultural theory • Giorgio Agamben • humanitarian • immigration • Judith Butler • refugee • Sara Ahmed

U2 - 10.1177/1367549406063163

DO - 10.1177/1367549406063163

M3 - Journal article

VL - 9

SP - 185

EP - 202

JO - European Journal of Cultural Studies

JF - European Journal of Cultural Studies

SN - 1460-3551

IS - 2

ER -