Am I a Voice or a Traitor? Dialogues with Youth from Aggressor States

Research on migrant youth identity has largely focused on processes of bicultural adaptation, heritage language maintenance, and everyday negotiation of belonging (Reynolds & Zontini, 2015; Alshihry, 2024). Studies on youth political expression and digital practices have likewise examined self-censorship and identity management across social media platforms (Lee, 2018; Chu & Yeo, 2018). However, little attention has been given to youth from states implicated in acts of geopolitical aggression, even when residing in democratic host societies, continue to carry the burden of collective guilt and face political suspicion. Guided by the framework of youth agency under constraint (Honwana, 2012; Jeffrey, 2010), this study examines how migrant adolescents from Belarus, China, and Russia negotiate political identity and self-expression under conditions of suspicion and risk. We ask: How do they reconstruct moral identity and boundaries of expression, and what role can picturebooks play in enabling safer dialogue on contested political issues? During the recruitment process, all potential participants actively requested anonymous online interviews, expressing strong concerns about the potential impact on personal safety when discussing political topics. This dynamic prompted us to adapt our methodology: employing picturebooks as cultural identity negotiation catalysts. The selected texts The Enemy (2007), How War Changed Rondo (2015), and War (2021) served as narrative entry points, enabling participants to explore political and moral questions within the safer framework of literary analysis. Findings reveal recurring strategies of protective silence and language avoidance in daily interactions, deliberate compartmentalisation of identities across digital platforms, and the use of art and literature as safer channels of resistance. These practices illustrate fragile but resilient forms of youth agency under constraint, allowing participants to navigate precarious spaces between silence and expression. By demonstrating how picturebooks can break through barriers to discussing sensitive topics, this study contributes both substantively and methodologically. Substantively, it extends scholarship on migrant youth identity and political self-expression by foregrounding the marginalised voices of young people from states associated with geopolitical aggression. Methodologically, it validates picturebooks as innovative tools for eliciting authentic narratives on high-risk political issues while protecting participant safety. In doing so, the study underscores the importance of recognising youth agency under constraint and the fragile forms of resilience that emerge within it.