An Emotional Field: A Workshop on Migration, Anger and Emotions
Emotions in the Field
In December 2025, the two ERC projects ANGLE and SOLID hosted the collaborative workshop ANGER/ MIGRATION at the Department of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen. During the workshop, research assistant and multimodal anthropologist Arendse Reeh collected participants’ reflections and audio recordings on migration, anger, and emotion in the field.
These materials were developed into different multimodal pieces – Starting with the Collective piece – Emotions in the Field in which participants’ voices were woven together to explore how emotional experiences in migration fieldwork have shaped their research. All participants responded to the same prompt: “Please reflect on and recall an emotional episode from your fieldwork on migration that has had an impact on your work as a researcher.”
The voices of the participants in this piece are edited together to collectively tell a story about emotion in the field; therefore, not all contextual details from their individual accounts are included in the final audio. The participant’s voices in the collective audio-piece are as follows:
Nabil Ferdaoussi, Doctoral Researcher, HUMA Institute for Humanities in Africa Université Internationale de Rabat.
PhD candidate Jaafar Dirie, University of Toronto.
Myriam Dalal, Research Associate, Migrant Futures Institute-Goldsmiths, University of London.
Associate Professor Mariam Darchiashvili, Ilia State University.
Sophie Schmalenberger, University of Duisburg-Essen / Aarhus University.
Jason De León, professor of anthropology and Chicana, Chicano, and Central American studies at the University of California, Los Angeles.
PhD candidate Jaafar Dirie, University of Toronto.
Atreyee Sen, Professor, Department of Anthropology at the University of Copenhagen.
The workshop inspired me to reflect on the multiplicities of individual anger and collective rage that vitalises sites and spaces occupied by migrants or migration politics. Whether its ordinary people’s protest on immigration issues, or the anger of families who have lost their children to the hazardous migration process, rage seeps into public spheres as well as intimate, domestic spaces. It animates social relationships between migrants, maps itself onto the trails of rescue ships at sea, creates friction in migrant economies, and layers itself onto urban graffiti. The spectrum of anger that can be generated by human movement within and across borders piqued my interest. It encouraged me to think more about my interest in ‘amplified anger’, the central concept of ANGLE, and that is described below.
Current History(forthcoming), ‘Perspectives’, ‘Amplified anger, protest cultures and digital activism in contemporary South Asia’
‘As smartphone takes centrestage in South Asia as the source of knowledge about world geopolitics, digital rage, or the circulation of anger through online activities, has started to create thriving virtual communities. In 2025, Oxford University Press declared ‘ragebait’ as its word of the year. It is defined as online content deliberately designed to provoke outrage. These ragebaits are typically posted in order to increase traffic to a controversial webpage or social media content. Toxic tech, such as incel-led manospheres where men are baited to rage about women’s liberation, have raised questions about the ethical regulation of such online activities. Against the backdrop of this age of rage, I bring forth a concept of ‘amplified anger’. It refers to the ways in which anger travels from online debates onto street-based protests; and then returns to the virtual world to further fortify online protest cultures (from art, music, and posters, to disseminating information and coordinating strategies for demonstrations). ‘Amplified anger’ allows individuals to constantly connect to collective rage through online networks, which often act as incubators of protest. It also shifts between simmering and smouldering rage, depending on the intensity of injustice experienced by various socio-political groups.’
A Broken Arm
In this sound piece, A Broken Arm, professor Dennis Rodgers reflects on violence in the field and our differing contextual relationships to violence.
Dennis Rodgers, MESOPOLHIS laboratory (UMR 7064), A*Midex Foundation Excellence Research Chair, Aix-Marseille University, France.
Matthew Alexander Halkes Carey, Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology at the University of Copenhagen.
The workshop made me more aware than before that the kinds of explosive or performative anger that Atreyee and I proposed to explore in the ANGLE project only cover a fairly limited range of the kind of negative emotions we intuitively associate with anger in its broadest sense. Many of the presentations given the different researchers addressed what we might consider related affects such as frustration, irritation (in its phenomenological sense), etc. So whilst many researchers felt a sense of anger in the field, they had a hard time pointing to it in their ethnography. This, I think opens up for a range of reflections. First, is the question of who expresses anger primarily one of positionality? Is performative anger in some cases a privilege of the powerful, or at least the socially secure? I think the data doesn’t really support this kind of an assumption, as oppressed or subaltern groups often do express direct anger (see Atreyee’s research), but it does support the idea that not everybody can afford to be angry. When can a refugee really allow themselves to be explosively angry without risking expulsion? Or a poor black person in the United States, without risking death by cop? This made me think that we need to pay closer attention to the relationship between positionality, context and the kinds of anger one can express.
Somali Hospitality| Reflections from Copenhagen
PhD candidate Jaafar Dirie, University of Toronto.
As we see what’s happening in America now, specifically the scapegoating of Somalis in Minnesota, I wanted to share my experience in Denmark in December of 2025. I was invited to the University of Copenhagen to present at a workshop that examined migration and anger, where I presented some of the findings from my PhD dissertation research on Tahriib(irregular migration) from Somaliland to Europe.
The faculty, researchers, and students who organized the workshop were incredibly kind, welcoming, and hospitable throughout my stay. Prof. Stepputat invited me over to his home and shared old Somali music on vinyl records, Prof. Simonsen took me to lunch at the university and gifted me her favourite organic chocolate to take back to my wife and kids. But what I would really like to share is my experience with the Somali community in Copenhagen.
When I landed in Copenhagen on Thursday December 4th 2025, I saw a Somali worker, greeted him, and asked if there were any masjids he would recommend for Friday prayer. He suggested Masjid Tawid, the Somali masjid in the city. So the next day, I asked to be excused from the workshop so I could go to Jummah (Friday congregational) prayer and hopped on the bus and made my way to the masjid.
When I reached there I sat down and I asked the young man sitting next to me if there were any good Somali restaurants in the area. He said yes, there was one downstairs, and then said he would take me after the prayer. After we finished praying, he simply asked me, “Do you want chicken meal or a goat meal?”
I said, it’s okay, can you just show me the restaurant? Then he clarified, “it’s not an actual restaurant but it’s mothers cooking for the masjid,” and told me not to worry, just to tell him whether I wanted chicken or meat.
So I said whichever was available and ready.
He left and came back 10 minutes later with both chicken and meat and said, “Take the one you prefer.”
When I asked how I could pay, he said, “You’re a guest, you don’t pay.”
His name was Mustafa.
I knew the type, so I didn’t argue and we started chatting, and he introduced me to the other members of the congregation and we spent about half an hour chatting. After we were done, he said, “Let’s go,” and I’m thinking, go where? But I assumed maybe we were going to grab some coffee or that he would take me to the bus stop.
As soon as we left the masjid, he said, “I want to invite you over to my house for some tea so we can get to know each other.
At that point, I was thinking I needed to get back to the workshop, but I didn’t want to offend the brother who was inviting me to his home and telling me he wanted to get to know me. So I hesitantly agreed.
While we were on our way there, he called his wife and said, “I met a brother who is visiting from America,” ( happens all the time as a Canadian travelling), and told her we were coming to the house.
We got there and lunch was already prepared for us. Lovely healthy green salad, Somali rice and meat, juice, and tea all set out. Mustafa and I looked at each other, and then he apologized and told his wife we had just eaten, so he poured me some tea and gave me some chocolate.
We chatted for about 30 minutes, and the sun was setting already and it was close to prayer time again so he said, “Let’s go to the masjid to catch the prayer.” Then he added, “We can go to the same masjids, or I can show you some other masjids.”
Pressed for time, and knowing the masjid we had just come from was nearby and that I knew how to take transit back to the university, I opted for the same Somali masjid.
Once we entered the masjid, he again began introducing me to some of the elders and said, “This is our guest.”
One of the elders corrected him and said, “He is not a guest; this is as much his place as it is ours.”
At this point, I was honestly overwhelmed by the hospitality.
So we prayed the Maghreb prayer, and now I was really anxious because I needed to get back to the workshop, and I was also concerned the organizers might be worried about me.
After prayer, I told him I really had to get going and tried to say bye to him.
He asked, “Do you want me to drop you off?”
Without missing a beat, again, one of the older congregants interrupted him and said, “You shouldn’t ask if he wants you to drop him off. You should say, ‘Let me take you.’”
At this point, I was honestly blushing and humbled.
So he said, “Yes, that’s right, let me take you.”
I tried to resist, but to no avail.
So we were driving back to the university, and I asked him if he could hotspot me so I could message the Prof. Simonsen and let them know I was okay and heading back.
He said ‘Okay’ , but then asked if I had a SIM card. I said no, I was only there for a week.
He said, “Great! I have an extra SIM card you can borrow.”
Now this was getting to be too much, and I was profusely refusing, saying no, it’s okay.
He responded, “Jaafar, you don’t understand. You will be doing me a favour. I’m paying for this SIM card that I got with a promotion discount for a new phone, and it’s unlimited calling and unlimited data, and I’m being charged but I have no need for it. You’ll be doing me a favour by using it, so you must take it.”
At that point, I realized I didn’t really have a choice and so I took the sim card from him.
As we pulled into the university, he asked when my workshop would be over, and I told him Saturday would be the last day.
He said great and asked where I was staying, then told me he would come pick me up Sunday at noon from my hotel.
I told him great, we could meet on Sunday, but that he didn’t need to pick me up because I could take the bus… of course he refused.
Over the next few days, he introduced me to the board members of the masjid, some of the youth, and other congregants, and took me out several times to eat with them.
On Sunday, I met the president of the board, Jama, a bike enthusiast with a lovely warm smile who had been in Denmark since the early 90s. He invited me to dinner, and the next evening he took me out to eat, showed me around the city, and gave me a tour of the grand masjid in Copenhagen.
We spent hours just chatting about life as immigrants, international politics, our families, and Somaliland.
On my last night, Mustafa and Abdirahman, a young Somali congregant whom I had met over the previous few days, took me out for dinner and coffee, gave me a tour of another small Somali community centre, and then dropped me back off at the hotel.
The whole time they kept saying they were sorry for not being hospitable enough and telling me to come back so they could take me sightseeing in the summer… not hospitable???
I was overwhelmed — truly overwhelmed, by the hospitality, generosity, and love I received.
These are the Somalis. This is our culture.
I am Somali. I know the beauty, kindness, and dignity of my people. But experiencing it so intensely in this context, while simultaneously watching Somalis be maligned and scapegoated on national television in the US, and being at a conference on ‘Anger and Migration’ was jarring. The narrative about us is so often wrong. The reality is that our communities are built on hospitality, dignity, faith, and profound generosity. And I’m grateful I had the chance to witness and experience that reality so clearly this week.
A Man Screaming
Karina Horsti, Department of Social Sciences and Philosophy University Lecturer at the University of Jyväskylä, reflects on an emotional moment from her fieldwork in Berlin.
Anja Simonsen, Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology
A researcher’s initial anger:
“It had been 8 years since I had left the house of her grandparents in Somaliland, whom I referred to as Hooyo and Aabo. In that house, Amran and I had spent endless hours together during the time of my fieldwork. She was a young, intelligent and beautiful woman, who was studying to become a teacher back in 2013, just like her aunt Salaado before her. Amran had invited me into her life, involving me in the news of friends, and her dreams for the future. One day in late 2020, Amran sent me a voice message telling me that she was travelling to Turkey and that she would reach out to me when she got there. It was unclear to me what she would be doing in Turkey, and I asked if she would be studying there. She never replied, but 6 months later, as I was scrolling through my social media, I saw that Amran had posted a picture of her and her mother with a beautiful cake with the letters ‘goodbye and good luck’ on it. I reached out to Amran to ask about the picture, and she wrote that she was going to Qubros [Cyprus] the next day. Excited on her behalf that she got to travel, I asked her what she would be doing there. Via a voice mail from the airport, she greeted me and said that first, she would visit the university, and then she would go and see the ‘UNHCR camp’. This was the moment I realised that she was not simply visiting Cyprus but doing tahriib.
To this day, I am unsure whether writing that she would visit the university was a way to soften the blow of the message that she knew would break my heart. I had spent the last 8 years studying, sharing stories and conducting interviews on the many difficulties that this journey could entail: from rape to torture and death. Amran had seen the way I would sometimes have nightmares, dreaming that my brothers had decided to do tahriib and after spending all night trying to find them, I would wake up feeling mentally exhausted. Amran was with me on the day we went swimming in the ocean in Berbera and met the two young women who were practising their swimming skills as a way to increase their chances of surviving tahriib. She had, I felt, been part of my journey of collecting data on tahriib, and despite the many horrific stories we had heard, she had decided to leave.
Her reaction had been the opposite of Abdirahman’s. His story was introduced in Chap. 2, and we initially met because he had wanted to leave on tahriib. But as the research process progressed and he turned into more of a research assistant than an interlocutor, he changed his mind. Not because I had tried to convince him not to go but because he realised the harshness of doing tahriib.
… So why would Amran do this? I initially felt worried and angry: why would this loving, intelligent, beautiful human being put herself in such a difficult situation? Had she not learned anything from the journey I felt was not only mine but ours? Why was her solution so different to mine and Abdirahman’s despite being con fronted with the same information?”
Quote from: Simonsen, Anja. Tahriib – Journeys into the Unknown: An Ethnography of Uncertainty in Migration. 1st ed., Springer International Publishing AG, 2023, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-27821-1. Page 207-208.
Come Back On Deck When You Can Smile
A final fieldnote story on migration and sea rescue from Rebecca Solovej, PhD Fellow at the Department of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen.