Communication ethics in dark times and more useful work to understand undocumentedness

Hannah Arendt’s work and her ambition to frame the foundations of human rights are, no doubt, valuable when conducting research about undocumentedness in the contemporary world.

Today I’d like to share three tips, real good sources of inspiration, with you.

First, the book Communication ethics in dark times by Ronald C. Arnett, published in 2013 (Southern Illinois University). Through this book one gets a crash course in Hannah Arendt’s Rhetoric of Warning and Hope, which is also the book’s subtitle. Arnett offers an accessible examination of fifteen of Arendt’s major scholarly works. One of my favourite quotes is the following:

Arendt emphasizes that in classical education the question was not how to be a good person but how to do something good for the world in which one lives. The key was existence, not the self. The “self” stands at the centre of “moral” questions, and the “world” stands at the centre of “political” life. Political life requires the price the price of participation and remains in contrast to isolation and the refusal to be part of the decision making. The call of participation, however, does require solitude that permits silent dialogue with the self: “No moral, individual and personal standards of conduct will ever be able to excuse us from collective responsibility.” (p 177).

 

Secondly, take a look t a link I got from Julieta Talavera, in a comment on this page, about the NY State Leadership Council [http://www.nysylc.org] a youth organization acting in New York City (se http://www.nydreamact.org for more specific information). Julieta also wrote: ”New York State is super active about the DREAM act and hopefully It’s going to be an example for other states”.

 

Thirdly I’d like to refer to a blog by the researcher Nando Sigona, where he among other things presents the result from a study where undocumented migrant children in the UK were interviewed. It is shown that every aspect of the life is influences by the immigration status of the children. About 65000 of the 120 000 undocumented children were born in the UK, of the remaining children most came to the UK at a very early age. These children are actually not migrants. Many are staying, they cannot be deported. Here it is: http://nandosigona.wordpress.com/2012/05/15/no-way-out-no-way-in-key-findings/

Anna