Labour Migration, Diasporic Intimacy and Belonging in Maren Wickwire’s Documentary Together Apart

Abstract

Maren Wickwire’s documentary film Together Apart explores institutional discrimination against migrant workers in Cyprus through the personal narratives of its Filipina protagonists. At the same time, the film brings attention to the women’s intimate relationships formed in the diaspora. By analyzing how these moments of diasporic intimacy challenge the logics of institutional discrimination, this paper seeks to re-evaluate heteronormative understandings of attachment. The paper explores, first, institutional discrimination against migrants in Cyprus, second, the (unfortunately) negligible contribution of Cypriot films and films about Cyprus so far in addressing this issue, third, the significance of Wickwire’s cross-border filmmaking practices, and lastly, it calls into question conventional logics of family, belonging and nationhood that fuel discrimination by demonstrating the border-defying powers of diasporic intimacy in Together Apart.