Martin Demant Frederiksen (Department of Anthropology and Ethnography, University of Aarhus, Denmark)
Treacherous horizons: Hope and confinement among youth on the Georgian Black Sea coast
The city Batumi is tugged in between the mountains of Adjara and the shores of the Black Sea. As Georgia gained independence from the Soviet Union in the early nineties, Batumi went from being a Soviet borderland to becoming a gate to the West; a new opening of mobility and possibility. As socio-economic decline set its mark on the country from the early nineties and onwards, this passageway to an imagined elsewhere became an even stronger image. In terms of mobility however, ‘the west’ – and the hopes and dreams associated with it - has become limited to other Black Sea countries namely Turkey and Ukraine, as these are some of the only countries to which Georgian citizens can freely travel. Migration to these two countries (as well as Russia before the August 2008 war, and to a lesser degree to Greece) has been immense within recent years, but the actual possibilities of getting a ‘proper job’ when away has been limited, leaving many young people wary of leaving at all, although having strong desires to do so.
In this paper I explore the Black Sea as a social horizon that signifies confinement rather than openness and use this image to explore experiences of possibility and restraint among young unemployed and underemployed men in Batumi. Central to the discussion is the concept of hope and the ways in which such young men negotiate their (lack of) possibilities.
Treacherous horizons: Hope and confinement among youth on the Georgian Black Sea coast
The city Batumi is tugged in between the mountains of Adjara and the shores of the Black Sea. As Georgia gained independence from the Soviet Union in the early nineties, Batumi went from being a Soviet borderland to becoming a gate to the West; a new opening of mobility and possibility. As socio-economic decline set its mark on the country from the early nineties and onwards, this passageway to an imagined elsewhere became an even stronger image. In terms of mobility however, ‘the west’ – and the hopes and dreams associated with it - has become limited to other Black Sea countries namely Turkey and Ukraine, as these are some of the only countries to which Georgian citizens can freely travel. Migration to these two countries (as well as Russia before the August 2008 war, and to a lesser degree to Greece) has been immense within recent years, but the actual possibilities of getting a ‘proper job’ when away has been limited, leaving many young people wary of leaving at all, although having strong desires to do so.
In this paper I explore the Black Sea as a social horizon that signifies confinement rather than openness and use this image to explore experiences of possibility and restraint among young unemployed and underemployed men in Batumi. Central to the discussion is the concept of hope and the ways in which such young men negotiate their (lack of) possibilities.
