Anchored in exclusion: negotiating hybrid identities and blended belonging in Lebanon’s young refugee communities

This paper examines how protracted displacement and layered exclusion shape the identity formation among Palestinian and Syrian refugee youth in Lebanon. Drawing on 50 in-depth interviews and grounded in theories of hybridity, structural liminality, and social anchoring, the study explores how these young refugees navigate life in a society that positions them as permanent outsiders. Rather than experiencing identity as fixed or fully recoverable, participants describe a constant negotiation between inherited cultural identities and the exclusionary realities of their host environment. This paper introduces the concept of ‘blended belonging’ to describe the adaptive yet fragile identities that emerge. These identities are not only hybrid, but also shaped by the continuous navigation of social rejection, legal invisibility, and generational tension. In doing so, it argues that identity in displacement is neither preserved nor erased, but re-anchored and reassembled within spaces of structural uncertainty. By tracing these processes, the paper sheds light on how refugee youth confront exclusion, adapt to liminal conditions, and assert presence in a context where belonging is always conditional and often denied.