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Waiting is an inescapable part of life in modern societies. We all wait, albeit differently and for different reasons. What does it mean to wait for a long period of time? How do people narrate their waiting? Waiting is about the senses. If you do not sense it, there is no waiting. We sense waiting in the form of boredom, despair, anxiety and restlessness, but also anticipation and hope. Prolonged waiting is like insomnia – a state of wakefulness, a kind of mood, an emotional state. But it is also about politics; affecting and affected by gender, citizenship, class, and race.
Blending ethnography, philosophy, poetry, art, and fiction, this book is a collection of works by scholars, visual artists, writers, architects and curators, exploring different forms of waiting in diverse geographical contexts, and the enduring effects of history, power, class, and coloniality.
Frontmatter 1
Contents 5
Preface 9
Prelude I. The Weight of Waiting 13
Waiting 27
Care to Wait 33
The Sea is Mohammad al-Khatib's 51
Sandhours 57
Prelude II. Stolen Time 65
Undocumented: The Architecture of Migrant Detention 71
Remain 81
Arriving to Depart 89
Refugees Welcome? 97
Asymmetries 105
Prelude III. Waiting among Dead Trees 113
Ecologies of Waiting: Stories of a Vacant Land 117
after the blast: near silence, rising 129
Prelude IV. Standing in Line 137
Queues 141
The Distance from Here 143
Waiting in Queues under Dictatorship 151
Our Silence will Swell Like a Mountain 157
A Tenuous Case of Trust 171
Contributors 181