ABSTRACT
The most dramatic stories of refugee experience are the stories of flight. As the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) explains, "refugees have to move if they are to save their lives or preserve their freedom". Yet the consequences of flight often shape the political reality of refugee experience as one of stasis. Stuck in camps, sometimes for generations, as we have seen with the experience of Palestinians expelled in 1948, refugees are marked by their loss of mobility and autonomy and their struggle to circumvent the limitations. The story of flight is central to the imaginary of the refugee who needs to be able to hold on to a sense of agency and of movement toward a destiny, however paradoxical may seem, given the precarity of the civilian in flight. Thus, human rights narratives attempts to counter the dehumanization of rights abuse and the stories of refugees compensate for the loss of agency.
