Refugee publicness through rhizomatic alternative media

<p dir="ltr">This paper explores the idea of publicness, the process of becoming public, as a means of redressing the ambivalent position occupied by those going through the asylum system in relationship to the normative Habermasian public sphere. Through asylum claims and bids for citizenship people going through the asylum system seek entry to normative polities, yet are legally and culturally excluded from them. The paper in particular considers alternative creative communication practices employed by cultural and community institutions that seek to subvert this exclusion. I argue that we need a more flexible conception of how communication occurs in and around such publics to critically accommodate these tensions. The study draws on participant observation in community centres offering creative mediation activities in North East England and South Wales in 2019-2020.</p>