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Corona experiences,
life-worlds, and (non-)movement between the regions
A month further into the ongoing
infringements and impediments upon everyday lives across the world, this
is our second installment of texts on corona experiences in and between
the life-worlds of ZMO’s regions of study – and of course our own
respective life-worlds in and around Berlin. As we have been keeping on
observing, in diverse ways and through different kinds of connections and
from near and far, what has been going on; counting the costs and
yearning to stop counting the cost of lives; worried about work and food,
and worried about the elderly (parents especially); listening in to radio
debates and watching TV reports, directly from the regions. How long will
the corona experience haunt us, and determine our lives? These are
questions we share with friends and colleagues abroad, knowing that that
lives and living conditions are very different indeed – and knowing that
the diverse ways of handling the crisis by governments can make all the
difference for people’s lives.
These accounts here are illuminating, for some cases and countries, the
dangerous dynamics of perpetuation of difference and social inequality –
through suspicion, fear, and othering – and for others, the possible
potentials of social peace and isolation in newly found quiet spaces. Still
others are engaging in comparative endeavors across time and space, and
showing us historical experiences elsewhere in relation to ours today.
What is there to be learned, if anything? What might be the unexpected –
and even unintended – benefits of having had to face the challenges
people are facing and coming to terms with, in different ways and with
very different tools and provisions.
The accounts here are embedded in regional perspectives, close to the
people who are challenged, and sensitive to the pathways of experience
caused or exacerbated by corona effects. But in particular, beyond texts
in different languages that are reflecting also (in part, at least) the
range of regional experience, these accounts employ a variety of formats
and genres for their narratives conveying experience: photographs and
visuals, social media, audio clips and oral accounts.
May some of the deep-felt currency and immediacy of the experiences
caught and portrayed here reach you, dear readers, and make you think about
your own corona experiences in relation to them. All contributions that
have reached us so far are listed below and on our Website.
Kai Kresse, ZMO vice director for
research
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