Trust and the change in the migration paradigm

Abstract

Nourredine Affaya asks how the Maghrebi emigrant experiences his or her identity dialectics. To what degree has the identity obsession created distortions and misfortunes? It is a symbolic and existential crisis, a crisis of meaning and of values, in which language is the vector and the body, the space which incarnates this aspect of the crisis. In this sense, the immigrant manages his or her memberships, combining inherited registers (that which is familiar) and new experiences (that which is unfamiliar). Now, the problem which isposed in all cultures and subcultures, even within a selfsame culture, is that of recognition, and in relation to the immigration phenomenon, the unequal relationships between Europe and the Maghreb must be taken into account. Naming the Other is a cultural and political question. In this aspect, the countries of admittance have to become involved rather than being, as all too often occurs, an uneasy and even hostile spectator. How can trust be established in situations of complexity, in which the ritualisation of difference hinders the present interculturality? To answer this question, the author questions the role of cultural intermediaries and their responsibility for disconnecting spaces and reconnecting them.