“A country full of snow”: Spanish migrants in Switzerland and their engagement with places, memories, and personal migratory history

One of the migrants interviewed for this study believed that Switzerland must be “a country full of snow.” Other migrants described their engagement with places, memories, and personal migratory history in less poetic but nonetheless meaningful ways. This paper analyses the spatial accounts of Spanish guest workers in Switzerland. It shows that places are connected to meaning, memories, and stories that are experienced through emotions. The paper proposes a look at migrants’ emotional attachment to places to gain insight into engagement with the social context where the migrants live. Two types of places are discussed: places of identification, which point towards migrants’ identification with values, stories, and illusions of and about Switzerland; and places of daily action, which are constituted through migrants’ everyday lives and which become a locus to analyse migrants’ involvement in their social neighbourhood. Emotions are a key term used to analyse migrants’ notions about these places and how they “feel” about them. Focussing on emotions helps in analysing not only migrants’ attachment to these places but also the meanings that are inscribed into these places.