INTRODUCTION Ongoing discrimination, violence, and denial of rights and livelihood opportunities to Rohingya in their native Rakhine State, Myanmar, have led to multiple waves of displacement. Over 710,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh since August 2017, joining 35,000 previously registered refugees and an additional 74,000 that fled Myanmar after violence that occurred in Rakhine State in October 2016.4 According to the United Nations, over 100,000 others migrated irregularly to other countries in the region between 2012 and 2016.5 These rapid and drastic disruptions resulted in many Rohingya families suddenly finding themselves indefinitely separated from one another across borders. In a context of protracted displacement and uncertainty, they strive to maintain cultural and family ties while coping with other hardships. to repatriation due to the denial and revocation of their citizenship by Myanmar. Combined with the ongoing security crisis, Rohingya’s lack of political rights means that large-scale repatriation is unlikely in the near term. Security measures have increased in the camps since September 2019, further restricting camp residents’ livelihoods. The Rohingya boat-trafficking crisis last spiked in 2015, but since April 2020 it has resurged amid the Covid-19 pandemic. The Bangladesh government has made a concerted effort to curtail the spread of Covid-19, yet the negative economic and social impacts of the virus reverberate in the camps, as they do around the world. The United Nations estimates a fivefold increase in Rohingya taking to boats in the first five months of 2020 compared to 2019.6 Meanwhile, local media reports cover ongoing gang violence throughout the Cox’s Bazar region, and persistent yaba (methamphetamine) trafficking continues across the Myanmar border into Bangladesh. The Cox’s Bazar Analysis and Research Unit (CARU) of the United Nations Development Programme reports 42 murders and 37 gunfights in the area in the four months between January and April 2020.7 Nearly all Rohingya refugees living in the camps of Cox’s Bazar District, Bangladesh, depend on humanitarian services for survival. Humanitarian agencies provide the material resources needed for survival, such as sufficient food to meet basic nutritional and caloric needs and materials for constructing simple bamboo and tarpaulin shelters. However, despite this basic aid, ongoing livelihood challenges propel camp residents to pursue other options for fulfilling their needs. Costs such as transportation within the camps, topping up one’s phone credit, purchasing special foods for a religious holiday, or buying clothes for a child all must be met with cash, as they are not covered through aid. Money may also be needed to pay a debt or for major life events such as a daughter’s marriage or emergency medical expenses. Seeking mobility to flee violence and persecution has been predominantly a life-saving necessity, but sometimes it is also an attempt to secure better long-term prospects and security. While data is not available, many do escape the camps and manage to start new lives as refugees in foreign countries.8 In some families, members abroad are able to send a remittance, helping relieve camp livelihood pressures. But the prospect of transnational mobility gives rise to a tapestry of risks: people sometimes suffer sexual violence, starve to death, or drown during boat journeys. A young jobseeker may be caught illegally crossing borders to pursue a work opportunity and endure a long, harsh jail sentence. A breadwinner may save earnings for many years and pay smugglers to obtain a passport, only to have the money stolen. A family may endeavor to send a daughter by boat for marriage in Malaysia and face the risk that she will be assaulted by her traffickers. Despite these risks, some Rohingya people continue to pursue transnational mobility in an effort to improve their own lives and those of their families. The need to obtain money and resources beyond those provided as aid challenges the logic that has shaped the humanitarian policy landscape in Bangladesh since 2017: that as short-term guests in Bangladesh, Rohingya only require basic humanitarian assistance to meet their survival needs until they repatriate to Myanmar. Despite having been forcibly displaced from Myanmar, which makes them refugees under international law, Rohingya who arrived in Bangladesh after 2016 have not yet been accorded formal refugee status. The newly arrived population is currently categorized as Forcibly Displaced Myanmar Nationals (FDMNs), a status that precludes access to formal employment and the banking system, among other sectors. ADDRESSING KNOWLEDGE GAPS REGARDING ROHINGYA FAMILIES Since the large influx of Rohingya arrived in Bangladesh in 2017 as a result of mass violence, conditions in their native Rakhine State have remained unstable, as Rohingya continue to face systematic denial of basic rights and violent conflict rages between the Myanmar Army and the Arakan Army, an ethnic Rakhine insurgent group. Even in situations of protracted displacement, refugees in other contexts usually maintain the legal right to go home. They remain citizens of their home countries, their ability to repatriate hinging primarily on security factors. In contrast, the Rohingya face significant additional barriers A key achievement of this study is the completion of a representative survey of the refugee population, assembling extensive data that helps clarify the prevalence of family separation across borders. Themes such as trafficking, smuggling, and illegal migration among Rohingya populations have typically been examined through a humanitarian, security, or human rights lens. In contrast, this study applies an ethnographic and familial frame to reach a deeper understanding of how and why 9