Cultural Politics: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Date: 

Wednesday, February 13, 2019, 6:00pm to 7:30pm

Location: 

CGIS Knafel Building, 1737 Cambridge Street, Bowie-Vernon Room (K262)

"What Do We Owe 'Outsiders'? The Challenge of Managing Large Scale Distress Migration"

Speaker:

Jacqueline Bhabha, Faculty Associate. Professor of the Practice of Health and Human Rights, Department of Global Health and Population; Director of Research, François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; Jeremiah Smith Jr. Lecturer on Law, Harvard Law School.

Contact:

Ilana Freedman
ifreedman@g.harvard.edu

Chairs:

Panagiotis Roilos, Faculty Associate. George Seferis Professor of Modern Greek Studies, Department of the Classics; Professor of Comparative Literature, Department of Comparative Literature, Harvard University.

Dimitrios Yatromanolakis, Associate Professor, Department of Classics, Department of Anthropology, and the Humanities Center, The Johns Hopkins University.

Abstract:

It has become something of a truism to say that migration is “the” moral issue of our time. But what are the moral considerations at stake? With cosmopolitans and communitarians locked in battle, with all major world religions firmly committed to an expansive notion of “hospitality”, but rich democracies sliding into increasing, voter- fueled xenophobia, the morality of our obligations to “outsiders” appears fiercely contested. The presentation will address these issues, placing them within the context of international legal obligations and current policy debates over improved migration management.