This talk looks at undocumented Bangladeshi, Indian, and Pakistani low-class male migrants working as flexible agricultural labourers in Greece. It analyses the role of various identifiers and histories of encounters that they internalise and embody as borders in the neutral transition space of Greece. They are marked by migrant precarity due to their undocumented status & by a flattened South Asian racialised masculine identity. Collectively othered, they struggle with internal divisions caused by colonial & post-colonial encounters, national identities, religion, & masculine expectations.

How do relational hierarchies of masculinities operate within this disparate group of men as borders? What role does the Greek state and their Greek employers play in reinforcing borders among their male workers? Does masculine encounters and masculine negotiations bring ruptures in border-making?

Speaker

Reena Kukreja is Assistant Professor in the Department of Global Development Studies at Queen’s University. She is cross-appointed to the Department of Gender Studies and the Cultural Studies Program at Queen’s University. She divides time between teaching, research, and filmmaking. She has published in journals such as Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Modern Asian Studies, Journal of Intercultural Studies, and Men & Masculinities. Her research interests include migration and development, marriage migration, South Asian masculinities, political economy, caste, and trafficking.