“Which Data Am I?”. The Making of Migrants' Scattered Subjectivities and the Impossibility of Giving an Account of Oneself

Abstract

This paper interrogates the making of digital subjectivities that stem from the multiple data extractions that migrants experience. It argues that the digitalisation of the border regime does not produce data doubles as discrete and intelligible objects of knowledge; rather, it generates scattered digital subjectivities. Relatedly, it contends that the scattered dimension of subjectivities indexes modes of violence beyond blatant law infringements: migrants are haunted by traces that disrupt their journeys. The paper starts by taking stock of scholarship on digital borders and migration, illustrating the pitfall of analyses that assume a discrete digital subject. Focusing on the French-Italian border, the article moves on by reconstructing the production of scattered digital migrant subjectivities. The third section shifts from digital subjectivities as an object of knowledge towards the effects of extractive processes on migrants: it shows that migrants feel disintegrated and unable to give an account of themselves, that is, of putting order in their life. It concludes by arguing that an analysis of the digitalisation of the border regime should investigate jointly the production of scattered digital subjectivities and the effects of disintegration that it generates on migrants.