This article investigates online connection and disconnection practices among migrants and asylum seekers. It draws from an ethnography of three Sicilian reception centres that hosted migrants and asylum seekers between September and November 2020. We show how migrants, driven by different migratory motivations, enact different mobile connection and disconnection practices. We argue that these are characterised by the different affective meanings that migrants and asylum seekers attach to mobile connection and disconnection and by the different value they place on the public and private dimensions of their lives. By offering a multifaceted portrait of the mobile connection and disconnection practices of different categories of migrants, this article also contributes to: (1) media and migration studies, by showing that there are substantial differences in online connection practices and smartphone use between asylum seekers and migrants and (2) to disconnection studies, by highlighting the nuances that exist within disconnection practices among non-privileged social groups, such as migrants and asylum seekers. We show that they cannot afford to practise typically Western, urban and elitist forms of disconnection; however, they too are able to practise specific forms of disconnection, paradoxically afforded by staying connected. The article aims to contextualise and situate disconnection studies within different social, political, cultural and geographic contexts.

中文翻译：

---

“与智能手机断开连接是我没有的特权”：西西里岛三个移民接待中心的移民和寻求庇护者的移动连接和断开连接实践


本文调查了移民和寻求庇护者之间的在线连接和断开连接的做法。它取材于 2020 年 9 月至 11 月期间接待移民和寻求庇护者的三个西西里接待中心的人种志。我们展示了移民如何在不同的移民动机驱动下采取不同的移动连接和断开连接做法。我们认为，这些特征的特点是移民和寻求庇护者对移动连接和断开连接赋予不同的情感含义，以及他们对生活的公共和私人维度的不同重视。通过对不同类别移民的移动连接和断开连接做法进行多方面的描述，本文还有助于：(1) 媒体和移民研究，表明寻求庇护者和寻求庇护者之间的在线连接做法和智能手机使用存在显着差异。 (2) 脱节研究，强调非特权社会群体（例如移民和寻求庇护者）脱节做法中存在的细微差别。我们表明，他们无法承受典型的西方、城市和精英形式的脱节；然而，他们也能够实践特定形式的断开连接，矛盾的是，通过保持联系来实现。本文旨在将脱节研究置于不同的社会、政治、文化和地理背景下。