Translating sanctuary: Politics of solidarity in a bilingual and plurinational context

This paper explores the rescaling of sanctuary to the national scale, distinct from the state scale. While scholarship has largely focussed on how sanctuary, hospitality and citizenship are provided at city scales, we analyse how substate nations respond to people seeking sanctuary by focussing on the case of Wales, an officially bilingual nation (multilingual in practice) within a plurinational state. By unpacking different meanings of Nation of Sanctuary (NoS)/Cenedl Noddfa (CN) in English and Welsh, we demonstrate the importance of adopting a ‘national gaze’ for complex, nuanced and heterogeneous understandings, rather than singular and homogenous assumptions (often associated with national perspectives). In interrogating etymology and meanings of sanctuary and delving into the (subtly) different meanings of lloches and noddfa, we illustrate the nuances and complexities of sanctuary politics and practices in a bilingual nation. This highlights the significance of considering the presence of competing, contrasting or complementary understandings of sanctuary in multilingual nations along with the various histories, cultures and ideas of belonging that shape sanctuary practices, rather than leaving translation as an afterthought. In uncovering the complexities and different meanings of NoS/CN, we develop a novel perspective on understandings of host/guest relations and provide an alternative way of understanding this dyadic distinction central to extant hospitality scholarship.