Alix Didier Sarrouy, integrated researcher at INET-md, authors the article “Harmonising Forced Interculturality: Music, (Im)mobility and Belonging Among Hazara Afghan Unaccompanied Minors in Sweden“, published in open access by the Journal of Intercultural Studies.
Abstract:
The arrival of unaccompanied Afghan minors in Sweden during the 2014–2015 European refugee crisis highlights the challenges of forced migration and conditional belonging. This article examines how participation in the Dream Orchestra, a symphonic music education initiative in Gothenburg, mediates experiences of instability and conditional belonging among young Hazara Afghan men who arrived as unaccompanied minors in 2015. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, the study explores how participants navigate fragmented migration trajectories through the need to ‘keep moving to stay’, and how collective, embodied musical practices foster affective regulation, kinship, and psychosocial resources. The analysis foregrounds music education as a form of cultural mediation through which young refugees negotiate everyday life under conditions of forced interculturality. The article contributes to debates on refugee (im)mobility, interculturality, and community music education by showing how inclusive cultural practices can support identity negotiation, emotional balance, and situated forms of social integration.