Description
Children migrate for different reasons, including fleeing persecution with or without adult family members. Scholars in International Relations (IR) have highlighted not only how the international constructs children, but also how children construct and “shape global politics”. However, methodological constraints make it challenging to access children’s perceptions on international issues, such as forced displacement, and asylum. This article answers the question: “how do children perceive the concept of asylum?” By combining the literature on children in IR and visual methods, we explain how Venezuelan migrant children in Brazil express their displacement and welcoming experiences in their drawings. We analysed 58 drawings by Venezuelan children, produced on the border, as part of the Brazilian Public Defender’s Union (DPU), virtual exhibition “Fronteiras da Infância: Migração e Refúgio sob o olhar da criança” (Borders of Childhood: Migration and Asylum under the gaze of the child). Venezuelan migrant children tend to be silenced as triple victims: non-adults, forcibly displaced, and not from countries in the Global North. This article allows us to see how children deconstruct the concept of asylum by reinforcing happy images from their home country (Venezuela) and representing their welcome in Brazil as part of cooperation between Brazil and Venezuela.
