Eleanor Paynter

I am inviting participations for a workshop on resisting #authoritarianism in #CentralAmerica.

The workshop is planned to be held at the LASA congress in Paris, France, in May 2026.

#academia #research #advocacy #ElSalvador #Nicaragua

It would be more honest if more people would say "I am doing OK amidst the horrors being suffered by others." It's actually not true that everything is terrible for everyone right now. We're living under unequally distributed fascism.

Emergency in Transit gives a timely, self-reflective, and remarkably critical account of the "immigration emergency", from Africa to Italy.

Colleagues considering @eleanorbpaynter.net's book for their autumn courses can find out more in our review 👇

blogs.law.ox.ac.uk/border-crimi...

Emergency in Transit by Eleanor Paynter - Paper Scholarship is a powerful tool for changing how people think, plan, and govern. By giving voice to bright minds and bold ideas, we seek to foster understanding and drive progressive change.

Hello! For colleagues planning those fall courses, here's a shameless reminder 🧵 that my book Emergency in Transit is out in the world, free to download, and eager to appear on your syllabi! 1/
www.ucpress.edu/books/emerge... @ucpress.bsky.social

Thanks so much, Giusi! And glad to be connected here!

AI isn't magic. AI is land, real estate, and energy.

The Supreme Court prepares to end voting rights as we know it And they don't want you to notice.

Everyone in DC knows that if you want to hide something, announce it on a Friday in August. Better yet, make it nearly impossible to track down.

That's exactly what SCOTUS did last week. But the news is too staggering to hide for long: SCOTUS has decided it's time to destroy the Voting Rights Act.

Still relevant, on this kind of rapid third country deportation agreement
@theconversation.com
theconversation.com/supreme-cour...

UK/France: Agreement on the Prevention of Dangerous Journeys [CS France No.2/2025] This treaty was presented to Parliament in August 2025.

Finally, the text of the UK/France migration treaty

Some comments 1/

www.gov.uk/government/p...

There needs to be a political push for a right to an offline life. Like require the existence a paper form and a way to unsubscribe by post

‘We didn’t vote for Chat GPT’: Swedish PM under fire for using AI in role Tech experts criticise Ulf Kristersson as newspaper accuses him of falling for ‘the oligarchs’ AI psychosis’ The Swedish prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, has come under fire after admitting that he regularly consults AI tools for a second opinion in his role running the country. Kristersson, whose Moderate party leads Sweden’s centre-right coalition government, said he used tools including Chat GPT and the French service LeChat. His colleagues also used AI in their daily work, he said. Continue reading...

‘We didn’t vote for Chat GPT’: Swedish PM under fire for using AI in role

... She challenges readers not only to rethink how to conceptualize migration but also to listen, remember, & witness” (in the European Journal of Life Writing) 10/ ejlw.eu/article/view...

Violetta Ravagnoli focuses on life writing aspects: “Paynter’s skillful blending of theoretical rigor with ethnographic & narrative insight makes the book both analytically rich & emotionally resonant... 9/

Emergency in transit: witnessing migration in the colonial present Published in Ethnic and Racial Studies (Ahead of Print, 2025)

Ayşe Şanli writes @ersjournal.com "Emergency in Transit is a profound contribution to scholarship on migration, cultural studies, and racial justice, and will undoubtedly become a key text for scholars and practitioners alike” 8/
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Book Review: Emergency in Transit: Witnessing Migration In

..., and anyone interested in how contemporary migration and the borderscapes are reproduced via this emergencification of migration” 7/ blogs.law.ox.ac.uk/border-crimi...

@janicaezz.bsky.social (whom I also had the pleasure of seeing present at IMISCOE last month!) writes @bordercrim.bsky.social “This is a testimony to the development of alternative visions of mobility and belonging, and thus a groundbreaking new resource for researchers, authors, activists... 6/

Three great reviews are already out, and I share with gratitude to the authors for their careful, thoughtful readings: 5/

Part 1 focuses on immediate questions of arrival and reception, at sea and in centers and camps

Part 2 looks at longer term questions of belonging & rights in an environment nevertheless shaped by emergency politics & the colonial present, via labor & (in)visibility in urban/rural spaces 4/

Emergency in Transit uses forms of testimony (via ethnography & media anlys) to argue that what we call a migration/border/refugee "emergency" is better understood as an apparatus that relies on witnessing to reproduce colonial dynamics & racialize migrants, shaping lives at & well beyond borders 3/

If you're planning a course or unit on asylum, migrant reception, testimony, borders and coloniality, Mediterranean crossings, racial politics in Italy, or migration ethnography, check out Emergency in Transit!

& pls reach out if you want to talk about the possibility of a visit / zoom 2/

Emergency in Transit by Eleanor Paynter - Paper Scholarship is a powerful tool for changing how people think, plan, and govern. By giving voice to bright minds and bold ideas, we seek to foster understanding and drive progressive change.

Hello! For colleagues planning those fall courses, here's a shameless reminder 🧵 that my book Emergency in Transit is out in the world, free to download, and eager to appear on your syllabi! 1/
www.ucpress.edu/books/emerge... @ucpress.bsky.social

Black Mediterranean hauntings: border violence, burial, and anti-racist care work in Strange Fish This article explores forms of haunting that shape lives and livelihoods in the Mediterranean, recognising the sea as a site of movement, labour, and death. The Mediterranean is now widely understo...

Now online @culturalstudies.bsky.social

"Black Mediterranean hauntings: border violence, burial & anti-racist care work in Strange Fish"

recognizing death at sea as not strictly a migration issue but quotidian reality entangled in Qs of labor & social justice
www.tandfonline.com/eprint/YKUZU... 1/

...starting with the
@culturalstudies.bsky.social
issue intro www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
"Bodies that haunt: rethinking the political economy of racialised death"

Emily Mitamura & Rachmi Diyah Larasati 4/

I'm thrilled that this article is part of the "bodies that haunt" issue of
@culturalstudies.bsky.social
edited by Emily Mitamura and Diyah Larasati

Check out the other articles in the issue as they come online... 3/

In the piece I read Giulia Bertoluzzi's documentary Strange Fish, on the work of fishermen in Zarzis, Tunisia, who have rescued migrants and buried the dead since the early 2000s

It's a film I consistently show and cite for its portrayal of anti-racist care work in response to border violence 2/

Black Mediterranean hauntings: border violence, burial, and anti-racist care work in Strange Fish This article explores forms of haunting that shape lives and livelihoods in the Mediterranean, recognising the sea as a site of movement, labour, and death. The Mediterranean is now widely understo...

Now online @culturalstudies.bsky.social

"Black Mediterranean hauntings: border violence, burial & anti-racist care work in Strange Fish"

recognizing death at sea as not strictly a migration issue but quotidian reality entangled in Qs of labor & social justice
www.tandfonline.com/eprint/YKUZU... 1/

Seven suspected tuberculosis cases at Tacoma ICE processing facility The KING 5 Investigators discovered seven suspected cases of TB at the Northwest ICE Processing Center, confirmed by the Washington State Department of Health.

ICE detention facilities violate basic civil rights, but they also pose a threat to public health.

At least 7 confirmed cases of tuberculosis have been discovered at an ICE facility in Tacoma.

One of the confirmed cases had been transferred to Alaska, where the ACLU has reported 35 cases

Frontex unlawfully shared thousands of people's personal data with Europol Under the banner of fighting migrant smuggling, Frontex has collected, and unlawfully siphoned to Europol, personal data for years—quietly drawing thousands of migrants, as well as EU citizens aiding ...

For years, human rights advocates have warned of the criminalisation of migrants & activists at Europe’s borders.
With @balkanizator.bsky.social & @lolahierro.bsky.social we shed light on the opaque role of Frontex and Europol in drawing thousands into this dragnet.
wearesolomon.com/mag/format/i...

Palestine: As mass starvation spreads across Gaza, our colleagues and communities we work with are wasting away | Doctors Without Borders / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF ... Over 100 humanitarian groups, including MSF, urge governments to act as starvation spreads in Gaza.

Doctors Without Borders joins more than 100 organizations to sounding the alarm that lifesaving aid must enter #Gaza.

www.doctorswithoutborders.ca/palestine-as...