Conversations about migration are often inside the box: numbers, causes, effect on the economy, how to prevent it. This podcast unboxes migration. It opens up questions on movement and justice and disrupts conventional thinking to better understand how mobility, in all its forms, is a necessary part of all our lives.
Our approach is creative, making connections between different types of movement, going beyond the human and across time. It is also critical, challenging assumptions and prioritising justice, as well as conceptual and research driven (we are academics after all!). We call this ‘The Bristol Approach’ to migration and mobilities.
Join Bridget Anderson (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Bridget-Anderson-8389513e-c870-4a7f-8dbe-8370d3188c5a/), Director of Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/) (MMB), to open the migration box with a diverse group of guests. In each episode we invite two experts from different corners of the world to bring us their ideas on movement. Expect lively conversation – and perhaps some arguments too! – about all things migration and mobilities.
Read more on our Migration Unboxed (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/on-the-record/migration-unboxed/) webpage.
Credits:
Presented by Bridget Anderson (https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/persons/bridget-anderson)
Produced by Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/)
Edited by Melissa FitzGerald – X @Melissafitzg (https://x.com/Melissafitzg)
Music by Olly Shaw – ollyshawmusic.com (https://ollyshawmusic.com/)
Follow us on:
@MiMoBristol (https://x.com/MiMoBristol)
LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/migration-mobilities-bristol/posts/?feedView=all)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/mmbuob/)
Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562809302733)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
What are the connections between the politics of race and the politics of migration? In this episode we unbox migration further by acknowledging the integral role played by racial discourses in creating narratives that divide migrant from citizen. MMB's Co-Director, Jo Crow, stands in as our host in this conversation between two guests bringing a wealth of experience and original thinking in migration research from both sides of the Atlantic. Cat Ramírez from the University of California Santa Cruz offers us the US perspective and MMB's very own founding Director Bridget Anderson speaks from the UK and European experience. Together the three tackle questions about labour and precarity, assimilation vs integration, US/UK similarities and differences, and whether those researchers and activists defending 'migrant communities' can still end up perpetuating racist stereotyping.
For further reading on some of the topics discussed in this episode please see the links below.
Bios:
Jo Crow (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Jo-Crow-863f72cf-7725-4236-b748-36e818ff37c3/) is Professor of Latin American Studies and Co-Director of MMB at the University of Bristol.
Cat Ramírez (https://catherinesramirez.com/bio/) is Professor of Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Bridget Anderson (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Bridget-Anderson-8389513e-c870-4a7f-8dbe-8370d3188c5a/) is Professor of Migration, Mobilities and Citizenship and founding Director of MMB at the University of Bristol. In September 2026 Bridget will be leaving Bristol to take on the directorship of the new Migration Futures Institute at Goldsmiths, University of London.
Further reading:
Cat's book on assimilation: Assimilation: An Alternative History (https://www.ucpress.edu/books/assimilation/paper) (University of California Press 2020).
MMB's book on rethinking migration: Rethinking Migration: Challenging Borders, Citizenship and Race (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/rethinking-migration/) edited by Bridget Anderson (University of Bristol Press 2025) - open access.
MMB blog series: Race, Nation and Migration (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/mmbblog/previous-mmb-blog-series/race-nation-and-migration/) (2021).
MMB blog series: Reframing Conversations (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/reframing-conversations/) (2026).
Cat's blogpost for MMB on 'Imagining proximity, building infrastructure' is forthcoming in July 2026. Search for it on the MMB blog (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/mmbblog/).
Credits:
Produced by Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/) (MMB)
Recorded in University of Bristol studios by Jonathan Scott
Edited by Melissa FitzGerald – X @melissafitzg (https://x.com/Melissafitzg)
Music by Olly Shaw – ollyshawmusic.com (https://ollyshawmusic.com/)
Follow us on:
Bluesky - @mmbuob.bsky.social (https://bsky.app/profile/mmbuob.bsky.social)
LinkedIn – Migration Mobilities Bristol (MMB) (https://www.linkedin.com/company/migration-mobilities-bristol/posts/?feedView=all)
Instagram – mmbuob (https://www.instagram.com/mmbuob/)
Facebook – Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562809302733)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
16 Jun 2025
Rethinking migration: the 'Bristol Approach'
Host Bridget Anderson interviews Natasha Carver, Lucy Donkin, Florian Scheding, and Brendan Smith about their interdisciplinary approach to migration, mobilities, borders, and citizenship, revealing new perspectives on the movement of people, goods, and ideas in this interview.
7 Apr 2025
The good, the bad and the migrant?
In academia there is a lot of debate about whether immigration controls are inherently unjust. But the focus of everyday conversations about migration and asylum is less on the ethics of borders, and more on the morality of migrants. In this episode our host Bridget Anderson is joined by anthropologists Miriam Ticktin and Juan Zhang to unbox how ideas of vulnerability and deservingness work with understandings of migration and mobility, and what the implications are for politics.
Bios:
Bridget Anderson (https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/persons/bridget-anderson) is Director of MMB and Professor of Migration, Mobilities and Citizenship at the University of Bristol. She is the author of Us and Them: The Dangerous Politics of Immigration Controls (https://global.oup.com/academic/product/us-and-them-9780199691593?cc=us&lang=en&).
Miriam Ticktin (https://www.gc.cuny.edu/people/miriam-ticktin) is Professor of Anthropology and Director of the Center for Place, Culture and Politics at the City University of New York. She writes on migration, borders, humanitarianism, and racial and gendered inequalities. She is MMB's Bristol Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professor in 2025 - read more here (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/bristol-benjamin-meaker-distinguished-visiting-professorship-2025/).
Juan Zhang (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Juan-Zhang-47bb008d-d834-4515-9ba5-7bbdbcdcfa44/) is Senior Lecturer in Anthropology at the University of Bristol and researchers borders and transnational migration, with a particular focus on the Asian borderlands, cross-border cultural politics and China.
Further links for the episode:
Miriam's book: Casualties of Care: Immigration and the Politics of Humanitarianism in France (https://academic.oup.com/california-scholarship-online/book/28538?login=false). Her most recent book, Against Innocence: Undoing and Remaking the World (https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/A/bo258749433.html), is forthcoming with University of Chicago Press.
Juan's chapter: 'Why Can’t Chinese Citizens Go Home? Spoiled Citizenship and Stigmatized Returns in Pandemic Times' in Rethinking Migration: Challenging Borders, Citizenship and Race (https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/rethinking-migration) (2025).
Credits:
Produced by Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/) (MMB)
Edited by Melissa FitzGerald – X @melissafitzg (https://x.com/Melissafitzg)
Music by Olly Shaw – ollyshawmusic.com (https://ollyshawmusic.com/)
Follow us on:
Bluesky - @mmbuob.bsky.social (https://bsky.app/profile/mmbuob.bsky.social)
LinkedIn – Migration Mobilities Bristol (MMB) (https://www.linkedin.com/company/migration-mobilities-bristol/posts/?feedView=all)
Instagram – mmbuob (https://www.instagram.com/mmbuob/)
Facebook – Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562809302733)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
3 Feb 2025
How do people become 'migrants'?
In this episode we ask, how do people become migrantized, and what does this tell us about both migration and citizenship? Bridget invites guests Janine Dahinden and Manoj Dias-Abey to discuss these questions from their different disciplinary perspectives. As a social anthropologist and professor of transnational studies, Janine understands ‘migranticization’ as sets of performative practices that ascribe migratory status to certain people and bodies. Manoj, as a socio-legal scholar, considers how such processes shape the laws and regulations created by state institutions.
In bringing together these different approaches our guests raise questions about how race, class and concepts of skill play into migrantization. They also ask whether the academic gaze should, in fact, focus more on 'demigrantizing' people by recognising how certain laws, such as those regulating labour migration, impact on citizens more widely.
Bios:
Bridget Anderson (https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/persons/bridget-anderson) is Director of Migration Mobilities Bristol (MMB) and Professor of Migration, Mobilities and Citizenship at the University of Bristol. She is the author of Us and Them: The Dangerous Politics of Immigration Controls (https://global.oup.com/academic/product/us-and-them-9780199691593?cc=us&lang=en&) (Oxford University Press, 2013).
Janine Dahinden (https://www.janinedahinden.net/) is Professor of Transnational Studies at the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland. Her research focuses on (de)migranticization, mobility, transnationalisation and boundary making.
Manoj Dias-Abey (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Manoj-Dias-Abey-ebcbc502-7648-4e26-adc0-f9a8f659546b/) is Senior Lecturer in the University of Bristol Law School. His current research investigates how Britain thinks about and regulates labour migration, and how this has changed over time.
Further links for the episode:
Janine’s article on ‘Migranticization (https://zenodo.org/records/7185990#.ZEED9PzP02z)’.
Manoj’s chapter on ‘The Aliens Order 1920, the “Work Permit” and the Making of the National Labour Market’ in the MMB edited volume Rethinking Migration: Challenging Borders, Citizenship and Race (https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/rethinking-migration) (available 17th February 2025).
Credits:
Produced by Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/) (MMB)
Edited by Melissa FitzGerald – X @melissafitzg (https://x.com/Melissafitzg)
Music by Olly Shaw – ollyshawmusic.com (https://ollyshawmusic.com/)
Follow us on:
Bluesky - @mmbuob.bsky.social (https://bsky.app/profile/mmbuob.bsky.social)
LinkedIn – Migration Mobilities Bristol (MMB) (https://www.linkedin.com/company/migration-mobilities-bristol/posts/?feedView=all)
Instagram – mmbuob (https://www.instagram.com/mmbuob/)
Facebook – Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562809302733)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
4 Nov 2024
How does visuality help us understand movement?
Images are crucial to how ideas and feelings about migrants circulate. In this episode, host Bridget Anderson invites her guests Victoria Hattam and Nariman Massoumi to explore how visual representation relates to the politics of migration. They discuss photographs, film scenes and everyday sights (and sounds!) that open up their thinking on movement and challenge the stereotypical images of migration in the media. Broadening our approach to visual representation can unsettle presumptions about who should and shouldn’t move.
Bios:
Bridget Anderson (https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/persons/bridget-anderson) is Director of Migration Mobilities Bristol (MMB) and Professor of Migration, Mobilities and Citizenship at the University of Bristol. She is the author of Us and Them: The Dangerous Politics of Immigration Controls (https://global.oup.com/academic/product/us-and-them-9780199691593?cc=us&lang=en&).
Victoria Hattam (https://www.newschool.edu/nssr/faculty/Victoria-Hattam/) is Professor of Politics at the New School for Social Research, New York. She works at the intersection of visual and material culture, global political economy, and bordering. Victoria was MMB’s Leverhulme Visiting Professor (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/leverhulme-visiting-professorship/) in 2023-24.
Nariman Massoumi (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Nariman-Massoumi-4793cc76-0b95-4cd4-94ea-a8fc62b5b48b/) is Senior Lecturer in Film and Television at the University of Bristol and coordinator of the MMB research challenge Representation, Belonging, Futures (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/research/imagination-belonging-futures/). His latest film is ‘Pouring Water on Troubled Oil (https://etudoverdade.com.br/en/filme/51564-Pouring-Water-on-Troubled-Oil)’ (2023).
Further links for this episode:
Blogposts by Victoria and Nariman on Dover and Calais: Borderland Infrastructures (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/borderland-infrastructures/).
Blogpost on Victoria and Nariman’s workshop on visuality: Bordering Bristol: looking to see (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/2024/07/24/bordering-bristol-looking-to-see/).
Recordings of Victoria’s Leverhulme lectures, and her image of the landing mat fence on the US-Mexico border: Leverhulme Visiting Professorship (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/leverhulme-visiting-professorship/).
Credits:
Produced by Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/) (MMB)
Edited by Melissa FitzGerald – X @melissafitzg (https://x.com/Melissafitzg)
Music by Olly Shaw – ollyshawmusic.com (https://ollyshawmusic.com/)
Follow us:
@MiMoBristol (https://x.com/MiMoBristol)
LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/104720564/admin/dashboard/)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/mmbuob/)
Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562809302733)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
30 Sept 2024
What is 'migration' and why unbox it?
Host Bridget Anderson asks guests Nandita Sharma and Tim Cole what they think of when they hear the word ‘migration’. Humans have always moved so when and why does moving become described as ‘migrating’? What might we miss if we just accept the term ‘migration’ without questioning it? In this lively conversation, taking us across different histories, landscapes, species and state systems, Bridget, Nandita and Tim take on the challenge of unboxing migration and show why this matters for making a more just world.
Bios:
Bridget Anderson (https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/persons/bridget-anderson) is Director of Migration Mobilities Bristol and Professor of Migration, Mobilities and Citizenship at the University of Bristol. She is the author of Us and Them: The Dangerous Politics of Immigration Controls (https://global.oup.com/academic/product/us-and-them-9780199691593?cc=us&lang=en&) (Oxford University Press, 2013).
Nandita Sharma (https://sociology.manoa.hawaii.edu/nandita-sharma/#:~:text=I%20have%20no%20regrets!%20As%20an) is Professor of Sociology at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. She is an activist scholar whose research is shaped by the social movements she is involved in. Nandita was a Bristol Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professor (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/meaker/) with MMB in 2022.
Tim Cole (https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Tim-Cole-7e176567-189f-4f5e-b62e-c6a3e7d5e84a/) is Professor of Social History at the University of Bristol. His research ranges across social, landscape and environmental histories with a focus on the Holocaust.
Further links for this episode:
Nandita Sharma’s book Home Rule: National Sovereignty and the Separation of Natives and Migrants (https://www.dukeupress.edu/home-rule) (Duke University Press, 2020).
MMB’s Race, Nation and Migration (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/mmbblog/previous-mmb-blog-series/race-nation-and-migration/) blog series.
‘Invasive Others: Plants? People? Pathogens? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpe-_R28ba4&t=71s)’ – an interview with Miriam Ticktin on MMB Insights and Sounds.
The (de)Bordering plot (https://debordering.blogs.bristol.ac.uk/) at the University of Bristol.
Credits:
Produced by Migration Mobilities Bristol (https://migration.bristol.ac.uk/)
Edited by Melissa FitzGerald – X @Melissafitzg (https://x.com/Melissafitzg)
Music by Olly Shaw – ollyshawmusic.com (https://ollyshawmusic.com/)
Follow us on:
@MiMoBristol (https://x.com/MiMoBristol)
LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/migration-mobilities-bristol/posts/?feedView=all)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/mmbuob/)
Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562809302733)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
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