Everyday Struggle and Emerging Agencies in Camp Life: The Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh
摘要
Decades of oppression and systematic discrimination in Rakhine State, Burma/Myanmar, have rendered the Rohingya people a relatively marginalised, subjugated and dominated category. Besides, they could not build any cognisable form of resistance against Burma/Myanmar’s state’s atrocities, which took place at regular intervals. Even after they migrated to Bangladesh and started life as refugees, they have been treated as outsiders, temporary residents, illegal Bormaiya (people of Burma) and dangerous to the local host society. They have remained confined within the camp, officially prohibited from engaging in any work outside, and denied the opportunity to develop their skills, faculties, and agency. Therefore, the Rohingya were leading their lives by counting days to return to their “land of birth,” provided that the conditions in Rakhine State would improve. However, the situation turned into a dramatic one, getting from bad to worse following the military coup in 2021 and hopes for returning to the land of birth became blurred gradually. Against the background, the Rohingya people residing in overcrowded temporary refugee camps in south-eastern Bangladesh are exploring their agencies despite their everyday struggle in camp life. This chapter presents ethnographic narratives that illustrate the daily struggle of the Rohingya people living in the camps, highlighting their emerging agency, which holds the potential to reshape their future. This chapter offers an empirically grounded analysis of how enhanced digital literacy serves as a transformative tool and an emerging agency for improving the lives of Rohingya refugees in the camps in Bangladesh.