Migration, interculturality and popular religiosity

Abstract

Migration is a complex problem that involves many aspects of the socio-cultural life of a people placed in necessary interaction with another or other cultures where the migrant settles definitively. In these processes of uprooting, transit and integration, the term multiculturalism makes explicit reference to the plural quality of the social environments involved, but ethically it does not imply any position in favor of reciprocal interaction between the different stakeholders, which is inherent in the proposal of interculturality.

In this sense, we emphasize that human mobility is not only physical mobility, but also symbolic, it migrates with ideas, customs and religiosity, an essential reference of identity for migrants in the new social contexts where they are inserted. Popular religious expressions, beyond their roots as such, stand as identity referents and point of reference of for what is known and proper against the adversity and hostility of a discriminatory environment and, at the same time, as anchor points for integration in the new context where the migrant is finally inserted.