Mobility Humanities

As Noel B. Salazar maintains, anthropology, which straddles social sciences and humanities, provides distinct perspectives on mobility research by dismantling concepts and theories that presume unitary cultures in fixed places. This brief contribution considers two facets of such an anthropological approach to mobilities: imagination and scale. Imagination can be used not only as a subject but also as a method of studying mobility. In particular, the “following” methods of mobility research require imaginative mobilities, which are linked to the representation of mobility in works of literature and art, making it a key area of research within the field of mobility humanities. Furthermore, the concept of scale presents a significant methodological challenge in mobility studies. If mobility research employs a multiscalar approach to mobilities, it becomes evident that the transnational scale is manifested within the national scale. Additionally, it becomes clear that mobility at one scale can coexist with immobility at another, challenging the binary opposition of immobility and mobility. In this context, the new mobilities paradigm challenges the normalisation of stasis as well as the naturalisation of movement. Scrutinising notions of imagination and scale utilised in the anthropological approach to mobilities can defy preconceived assumptions in much mobility research that is based on such binaries.