On February 16th, the Swedish Secretariat for Gender Research published an interview with one of the speakers for A Second Home, Fataneh Farahani, where we can learn more about her research on hospitality.
“Her research project concerns the concept of hospitality in relation to migration and aims to examine the political, philosophical and cultural aspects of hospitality towards migrants in Europe through empirical research. By understanding hospitality as a set of shifting relationships that involves continuous processes of inclusion and exclusion, the study aims to examine the conditionality of hospitality and the power asymmetries between those who are constructed as the ‘host’ and the ‘guest’.
– The conditionality of hospitality demands the setting of some limits beyond which ‘the guest’, cannot trespass. However, the risk of transgression by the guest can turn a hospitable host into an inhospitable one, she explains.
According to Fataneh Farahani, racialised immigrants are expected to be thankful. As an example, she reminds me that I earlier in our meeting complained about the café we are in playing (loud) Christmas music although it is only 24 November. She says she too noticed the music, but that she would have never brought it up.
– You always have to watch out. It feels like you’re forever indebted and always have to show thankfulness. It is like an ever-increasing interest rate, and I wonder if one can ever pay it back.”
Read the whole interview here: Interview with Fataneh Farahani on the website for the Swedish Secretariat for Gender Research
GLOBAL MEDIA CAFÉ: A SECOND HOME 