Interview with Paola Schierano

Les Mahorais en métropole : mobilité et institutionnalisation d’une communauté en marge de l'histoire

chercheuses et chercheurs de demain, entretiens FMSH

Paola Schierano is an Italian anthropologist from the city of Turin who holds a doctorate in cultural and social anthropology from the University of Milano-Bicocca. Her dissertation focuses on the evolution of Mahoran mobility to Reunion Island; more specifically, on the dynamics of adaptation of this community to the social fabric of Reunion Island as well as to the identity reformulations triggered by mobility.

Winner of the Atlas programme, discover her interview (in French) :

Paola conducted a one-year field study in 2018-2019, with return trips to Mayotte, allowing her to better know and understand the place of departure and the place of reception of this community. This research is part of a broader reflection on European overseas territories and in particular on the ultra peripheral regions of Europe. A reflection started in 2015 after a long experience of mobility on the island of Tenerife, in the Spanish archipelago of the Canaries where Paola has two years, between 2012 and 2014.

The researcher is a laureate of the Atlas Italy-France 2022 program. She has been awarded a three-month mobility grant, financed by the Fondation Maison des sciences de l'Homme and the Fondation Luigi Einaudi di Torin, for her research project entitled: "The Mahorais in metropolitan France: mobility and institutionalization of a community on the bangs of history".

This stay of the Atlas programme allowed me to be hosted in the political anthropology laboratory of the École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS). This encouraged exchanges and relationships with colleagues and personalities from the academic world. I was able to enrich my reflections on my research subject but also on other subjects. This stay also gave me the opportunity to participate in seminars, workshops and training sessions dedicated to visiting researchers. Obviously, the economic support linked to the grant also allowed me to live well here in France, to be able to move around and especially to be able to focus on the objectives of my field.