“Belonging to a ‘Lost’ Island: Sovereignty, Memory, and Landscape on Imbros”

The 1923 Treaty of Lausanne established the present borders between Greece and Turkey and led to a compulsory population exchange that transformed all aspects of life in the region. The Orthodox Greeks of Istanbul and the Aegean islands of Imbros and Tenedos, and the Muslims of Western Thrace were exempted from the compulsory expulsion. My research covers the experiences of those who stayed on Imbros and those who were displaced after 1923. This workshop explores forgotten and remembered aspects of the past by tracing the shifting topography of the landscape. I will focus on state practices of dispossession and on local resistance to dominant narratives and policies. My research incorporates ethnographic fieldwork on Imbros and in Athens from 2022-23.