Abstract
How to capture the subjectivities of social actors in social science researches? How to make sense of the structures of feelings, rather than merely reproducing and analysing the structures? Such questions divulge a perennial challenge to the researches and writings of our times. While many of us may resort to the conventional ways of seeing and doing research and writings and implement formulaic frameworks, this special issue may provide the reasons and resources to take the bull by the horns! Or, is it yet another wishful thinking of the commissioning editor of the journal? The answer lies in the reception of the special issue upon publication. Hence, for the moment, it is worth clinging to the promises and possibilities.
By curating and discussing footloose culture, this special issue promises to enter into the realm of under-explored migrants’ subjectivities. Empirically girded, the papers augur well for refreshing departures from the conventional ways of seeing. Thus, it responds to the methodological, conceptual and theoretical imperatives of the twenty-first century. An exceptional and desirable kind of cosmopolitanism of approach arises in the conversation between the global and vernacular contexts. As a result, there is a possibility of outwitting the global hegemony as far as a discourse on migrants’ subjectivity is concerned. Despite this, there may be instances of the unreflective mimesis of certain vantage points, analytical optics, and even the nature of the research questions. That is expected for there is the general academic predisposition to the given, the comfort of the familiar and an anxious attempt to be read and accepted by the peers in the global south. This combination too adds to the novelty of this special issue, in which anxiety and aspiration unfold at once.
A special issue of this journal in the recent past had a thematic focus on the context of the pandemic. This special issue tends to become a significant rejoinder in which migrants’ subjective experiences and trajectories of mobility are central. In the broader scholarship, the migrants have appeared as cogs in the machinery of political economy. As a necessary change, the cogs are seemingly more than merely neutral units of analysis in this special issue. The complex vortex of feelings pertaining to the migrants unspool, which may be persuasively identified with the various conceptual cognates such as affect, emotions, disposition and even psyche. A gamut of possible thinking further arises in the context of essays in the special issue. Mediated and mediatized, structurally determined and agentially flexible, and other such intermediaries of orthodox kind, play equally important roles in the performative context of the migrants. If a larger-than-life reality sui generis is pivotal, so is the mundane and banal of everyday life. The qualitative distinction of this special issue is indeed expressive of the juxtaposition of the seemingly incoherent. Reading subjectivities inevitably solicits such intellectual daredevilry.
This is envisaged that the special issue persuades and provokes at once. The consequent curiosity shall be an apt reward for the guest editors and the authors. I shall place on record a word of gratitude to the special issue editors for guiding the authors towards timely submissions of the papers following the journal style guide. The due peer review demanded arduous revision process, and the authors along with the guest editors fulfilled the requirements in a commendably professional spirit.
Lastly, the board of the editorial assistants of the journal was recently reconstituted. In a short span of time, with due training, the assistants have managed to bring their first assignment, that is, the special issue, to a satisfactory success. I thank Antara, Apoorv and Sifat for their tireless work that they have enthusiastically performed, and will continue to accomplish during their tenure.