Adresse visiteur
Laboratoire d'Anthropologie des Mondes Contemporains
Avenue Jeanne, 44
Bâtiment S
Bureau S12.218
1050 Bruxelles
Belgique
Adresse courrier
Université libre de Bruxelles
Avenue Franklin Roosevelt, 50 - CP 124
1050 Bruxelles
Belgique
Master in Cultural Sociology, Master 120, Masarykova Univerzita (Czech Republic), graduated with honours
Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences, University of the Philippines, cum laude
materiality, visuality, home, migration, cultural sociology, visual anthropology, art history
[English]
Home objects: materiality and mobility of Belgian-Vietnamese couples
This research project locates the everyday lived experiences of migrants through the “homing” lens, material culture, conjugal mixedness and mobility. It delves deeper into how cultural worldviews are appropriated, reproduced and negotiated through objects in display in the homes of Belgian-Vietnamese mixed couples and how the objects’ agency simultaneously displays, expresses and narrates their biographies and identities. This mutually constitutive process depicts how objects carry social meanings through the ways in which they are transformed and recontextualized throughout the life course of the couple and in effect, shape relationships and practices. It also underpins how mobility and immobility enable and constrain certain home-making practices that affect ways of feeling and belonging, and the way migrants view their past, present and future homes. These entanglements of people and things diversify perspectives on migration studies and lead to insights on routes, connections and ambiguities in everyday social life.
Keywords: material culture, home, mobility, conjugal mixedness, migration, objects
[French]
Objets domestiques : mobilité et matérialité des couples belgo-vietnamiens
Ce projet de recherche analyse les expériences quotidiennes des migrants au prisme du "homing" (Boccagni, 2017), de la culture matérielle, de la mixité conjugale et de la mobilité. Il approfondit la manière dont les visions culturelles du monde sont appropriées, reproduites et négociées au travers les objets exposés dans les maisons des couples belgo-vietnamiens et comment l'"agency" des objets affiche, exprime et raconte simultanément leurs biographies et identités. Ce processus mutuellement constitutif montre comment les objets sont porteurs de significations sociales à travers la façon dont ils sont transformés et recontextualisés tout au long de la vie du couple et, par la suite, façonnent les relations et les pratiques. Il souligne également la manière dont la mobilité et l'immobilité permettent et limitent certaines pratiques de construction du "home" qui affectent les sentiments et l'appartenance, ainsi que la manière dont les migrants considèrent leur(s) "home(s)" dans le passé, à l'heure actuelle et dans le futur. Ces enchevêtrements de personnes et d'objets diversifient les perspectives des études sur la migration et permettent de mieux comprendre les itinéraires, les liens et les ambiguïtés de la vie sociale quotidienne.
Mots clés: culture matérielle, "home", mobilité, mixité conjugale, migration, objets
Selected publications:
Marilla, A. (2021). Mobile homes, mobile objects: Mobility and materiality in Vietnamese- Belgian couples ‘homing’ practices. In Tangled Mobilities, A. Fresnoza-Flot & G. Liu- Farrer. (eds.). Berghahn's Worlds in Motion Series (accepted for publication).
Marilla, A. (2020). Migration and the search for home: Mapping domestic space in migrants’ everyday lives. Sage: Cultural Sociology. doi:10.1177/1749975520905539
Marilla, A. (2018). Dean Worcester’s Fantasy Islands. Routledge: Visual Anthropology. doi: 10.1080/08949468.2018.1428026
Marilla, A. (2015). Reading colonial visuality: A history depicted in Esteban Villanueva’s Basi Revolt paintings (1821), Interpretative Studies on Southeast Asian Culture. In Interpretative Studies on Southeast Asian Culture (pp. 27-58). Bangkok, Thailand: Institute of Thai Studies, Chulalongkorn University.
Oral presentations during conferences:
Marilla, A. (2020). Home objects and routes: Mobility and materiality in the everyday life of Vietnamese women in mixed marriages. Paper session presented at Femmes et mobilité(s) en contextes migratoires-Séminaire Anthropologie à Bruxelles-Brussels Anthropology (ABBA) (7 February 2020: Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium).
Marilla, A. (2020). The “balikbayan” box: Home-making through objects in mobility. Paper session accepted at International Conference on Philippine Studies (ICOPHIL) (21-23 September 2020: Alicante, Spain).
Marilla, A. (2020). Mobility and materiality: Home objects of Belgo-Vietnamese mixed couples. Paper session accepted at RAI Anthropology and Geography: Dialogues Past, Present and Future (4-7 June 2020: Royal Anthropological Institute, London).
Marilla, A. (2020). Revisiting the Worcester photographic archive in the National Geographic Magazine. Paper session accepted at International Conference on Philippine Studies (ICOPHIL) (21-23 September 2020: Alicante, Spain).
Marilla, A. (2019). Migrations et cultures: mobilité des couples Belgo-Vietnamiens. Paper session presented at Structure de recherche interdisciplinaire sur le genre (STRIGES) Journée Doctorale (28 May 2019: Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium).
Marilla, A. (2019). Visualizing “home” here and there: Vietnamese-Belgian couples’ material and symbolic social performances in the domestic and public spaces. Paper session presented at EuroSEAS Conference-European Association for Southeast Asian Studies (10-13 September 2019: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Germany).
Marilla, A. (2019). Mothering from a distance: Renegotiating ‘home’ and gender in transnational mothering practices among Filipino migrant workers. Paper session presented at International Symposium HomING Displacement, suspension, projections and achievements in making home on the move (3-4 June 2019: University of Trento, Italy).
Marilla, A. (2018). Gender in the workplace: The case of state universities in the Philippines. Paper session presented at National Conference on Women’s and Gender Studies (24 August 2018: Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines).
Marilla, A. (2018). Visualizing colonial myth: Philippine photographs in the early history of The National Geographic Magazine. Paper session presented at The Asian Conference on Cultural Studies (8-10 June 2018: Art Center Kobe, Japan).
Marilla, A. (2014). Reading colonial visuality: A history depicted in Esteban Villanueva’s Basi Revolt paintings (1821). Paper session presented at Empowering Network
for International Thai and Southeast Asian Studies Conference (5 August 2014: Chulalongkorn University, Thailand).