Tempus Disiectum: Hauntology and Fractured Chronotopes in the Narratives of Migrant Deviance

This article develops hauntology as a central lens to understand deviance among young migrants who arrived in Italy as unaccompanied minors. Based on qualitative narrative interviews, the study analyzes how fractured temporalities, spectral returns, and foreclosed futures constrain identity formation and render crime a narratively available response. Rather than treating deviance as a rational choice or reactive behavior, it is framed as a haunted enactment – arising as one contingent response within disrupted chronotopes where biographical progression is suspended. While supported by selected concepts from narrative identity and critical criminology, the analysis centrally builds on hauntology to map how temporal and spatial dislocations shape the affective and symbolic logic of criminal behavior. Findings suggest that policy responses must address not only structural marginalization, but also the disrupted narrative conditions that prevent migrants from constructing coherent future selves. This requires long-term stability, legal recognition, and the restoration of livable, forward-oriented temporalities.