Abstract:
This paper presents case studies of Sri Lankans who were confined in lockdown in the
Brussels Capital Region (BCR) during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. It does so
through research that Sri Lankan students produced within the framework of an
explorative study conducted from March until May 2020. The study revolved around an
exercise in rhythmanalysis as part of a course on Urban Anthropology at the KU Leuven
Faculty of Architecture. It involved 73 Master students as well as the respective
respondents that each of them had selected among their countrymen residing in the BCR.
The assignment was to document how the COVID-19 pandemic evolved in Belgium and
their home country, to observe how that progression affected residents’ behaviour and
public life in both contexts, and to record what usage the respondents made of social
media to stay in touch with people back home.
The first section of this paper reviews Lefebvre’s rhythmanalysis theory and various ways
in which it has been interpreted over the years. The second section describes how the
theory was applied within the said Urban Anthropology course, how the methodology of
the 2020 assignment was adapted to the COVID-19 context and what contextual
information emerged from the amalgamated research outputs. The next three sections
specify how the three Sri Lankan students handled the assignment. One reiterates the
progression of the COVID-19 situation in the BCR and Colombo based on media reports
and the students’ participant observation in public life. The next presents the students’
observations ‘as seen from the window’ i.e., from the limited perspective they had left on
neighbourly life amidst lockdown. A third one details observations derived in
collaboration with their respective respondents from recording and examining the
respondent’s online behaviour over 72 hours.
The last section of the paper assesses how the Sri Lankan observations mesh with overall
outcomes of the study and what the research revealed about the level of adaptation that
voluntary migrants achieved amidst confinement in the BCR. As part of their final
reflections, the authors appraise the added value of the exercise as a whole and of
rhytmanalysis as a research tool in particular.
