Travelling people and things : the creation of differentiated mobilities in a world on the move.

Abstract

This short paper will just try and pick apart a couple of examples to reveal how mobilities are both differentiated and differentiate among people. That is they are both a function of social status but also help enact social status. Slightly against the implication above I will also show that it is not just that digital is fast and materials mo0ving are slow, but rather that all speeds depend upon material things that come to shape them, and that all forms of movment increasingly interact with forms of data and informational realms. For the sake of symmetry the paper will look at two flows of people each of around 220 persons per year: the movement of the ‘floating population’ of migrant workers in China, and the mass tourism market of the Mediterranean. In so doing with will ask about how we think about ‘dwelling’ in a mobile world – what changes with our senses of self and place as the world is on the move. It will look at the assemblage of materials, media and bodies that enables mobility and also comes to define relative subject positions. It will suggest we can see emotional or ‘affective unities’ grouping travellers together.