Pandemic Geographies: An Ethnographic Enquiry into the Dynamics of Everyday Space During Covid-19 in India

Objectives: To understand the notion of space/place and landscape in the context of mobility during the COVID-19 pandemic using a comparative analysis of a metropolitan city and a suburban town. Method: A mobile auto-ethnographic methodology was deployed to generate data by the first author during his travel on the 14th and 15th of June 2020, from his residence in New Delhi to Purnea - a sub-urban town in Bihar in the eastern part of India. Findings: Social distancing and contact tracing shaped a new spatial reality in the city of origin, the destination town and the mediating mobile spaces of transit. Mobility of people while regulated and channelized, opens new ways of making sense of space/place and landscape. Cab service providers in the metropolitan city of Delhi negotiated the pandemic induced geography of city-space through the abstract space of maps and routes. People on the train formed social bubbles to evade contact with the fellow travelers. The relationship between the metropolitan city and the small town was redefined. The small towns viewed metropolitan cities with suspicion, disdain and fear where bodies were seen as potential virus carriers that had to be contained and quarantined. The sub-urban station authorities followed stricter norms to manage the movement of potential infected bodies. Family members stigmatized and dissociated with the moved-in body through quarantine at home. The study reveals how people react to changes in space and movement, and give new meanings to it during an epidemic outbreak. Novelty: The study contributes to the literature on COVID-19 by focusing on mobility and movement during the pandemic between two locations of different scales and regions, and the dynamics that unfold. Keywords: Everyday space, Mobility, India, COVID-19