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Helen Taylor, Refugees, the State and the Concept of Home, Refugee Survey Quarterly, Volume 32, Issue 2, June 2013, Pages 130–152, https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdt004
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Abstract
Although home is central to any understanding of displacement, the concept has not been explored as fully as possible in forced migration literature. This may be due, at least in part, to the pervasive logic of the nation-state, which views migrants as a threat to the national and ‘natural’ order. Viewing refugees as a problem to be solved or ignored, as objects rather than subjects, leads to a preoccupation with determining their belonging to a “home” or “host” nation in order to normalise them. However, such Othering rhetoric denies the agency of individual refugees, at the same time as ignoring the complexity and diversity of the meaning of home, especially for those who have experienced displacement. This article moves beyond a “here” or “there” dichotomy to explore the lived experience of home for Cypriots living in protracted exile in London, since political unrest and partition forced them to leave Cyprus in the 1960s and 1970s. The article proposes one possible way of understanding the multi-faceted and often contradictory meaning of home by focusing on four key themes – the spatial, temporal, material and relational home – both before and during exile.