Necro Mobilities: The Politics of Death, Burial, and Repatriation in Migratory Settings

This paper examines what happens to migrant bodies after they die. It argues that the governance of the dead is intimately tied to the construction of the nation and the enactment of sovereign power. Through a comparative study of the mortuary practices of ethno-religious minorities in Europe, it highlights the ways that death structures political membership and identity. Based on multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Berlin and Istanbul, it shows how the corpse functions as a political object by structuring claims about citizenship, belonging, and collective identity. By tracing the actors, networks, and institutions that determine the movement of dead bodies within and across international borders, it analyzes how relations between authority, territory, and populations are managed at a transnational level. It demonstrates that in contexts where the boundaries of the nation and its demos are contested, burial decisions are political decisions. Drawing on interviews and participant observation with bereaved families, Muslim undertakers, government officials, religious leaders, and representatives of funeral aid societies, it shows how decisions about where and how to be buried are linked to larger political struggles over the meaning of home and homeland. While burial in Europe offers a symbolically powerful means for migrants and their children to assert political membership and foster a sense of belonging, the widespread practice of posthumous repatriation to countries of origin illustrates the continued importance of transnational ties and serves as an indictment of an exclusionary socio-political order.