Language – Culture – Identity

We, most of the time, look on border as simple artefacts on the ground serving a variety of practical reasons and that can be classified according to the purposes (political, social, economic, etc.) they serve and how they serve them. If they are necessary for all sorts of reasons, borders are also inherently problematic. Instead of adopting a rigid position about them, we need to consider them as movable structures that have advantages and disadvantages. Borders should define ‘dwelling’ rather than national spaces and motivate political responsibility for pursuit of a ‘decent life’ as not restricted to any particular state.

The main goals of this work group are:
•    Highlighting issues, options, areas of responsibility, and specific activities of these regions;
•    Representation of their shared interest with the parliaments, legal entities, authorities and institutions on national and international levels;
•    Initiation, support and coordination of cooperation between the regions through Europe;
•    Encouragement to exchange experience and information to identify and coordinate the shared interests at the diverse issues and options, as well as to suggest potential solutions.
The work group of European border regions also does lobby work through the representation of the voice of the cross-border regions in the European institutes.

The ESPON project “Metroborder” includes an investigation and the further development of the approach of a Cross-Border Polycentric Metropolitan Region (CBPMR) within the Greater Region and the Upper Rhine (Rhin Supérieur). The study refers to the “understanding of metropolises as nodes in a globalizing world” (p. 43). Aspects of the functional integration and governance structures in the case study regions are analyzed. Strategic options and specific approaches to the further development of CBPMRs are presented.

This article examines the concept of boundaries, by putting an emphasis on the utility of the concept for the study of relational processes. Literatures on collective and social identity; ethnic/racial, class, gender/sex inequality; knowledge, professions and science; as well as national identities, communities and spatial boundaries are discussed. The similarity of processes that are at work across different social worlds and locations as well as in a range of institutions are highlighted. Finally possible development paths for the future elaboration of the concept are proposed.

This volume brings together contributions from the symposium "Cross-border Representations" (held September 16 and 17, 2010 at Mulhouse University Institute of Technology, University of Upper Alsace, UHA). It contains analysis of the practices, identities, forms of governance, and policy in cross-border territories such as the Greater Region, the PAMINA area, the border regions between France and Geneva, France and Spain, and other French border territories including Brazil and Africa. With twenty contributions, the book offers insights from politicians, historians, geographers, researchers in the field of information science, sociologists, and linguists.

This text focusses on the daily practices, perceptions, and ideas constructed around and in regard to border areas, and the institutions installed on this scale. In order to harness the breadth and complexity of representations associated with the border, three types of so-called "entries" are proposed: an entry via practices, an entry via discourse, and an entry via artifacts.

There is an extensive growth in the number of international borders. At the same time goods, people and ideas are more mobile than ever before. A Companion to Border Studies brings together viewpoints on these developments by preeminent border scholars from the fields of anthropology, geography, history, development studies, political science and sociology. Case studies from Asia, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas, are presented. A comprehensive analysis of key characteristics of frontiers and borders, including topics such as security, cross-border cooperation, and controls, population displacements and migration, transnationalism and hybridity is provided.

The articles in this edited collection deal with the conditions and obstacles of the cross-border flow of information. The question is also raised as to why the development of a European media public sphere has been a difficult undertaking. The investigations are mainly concerned with the Greater Region. It is clear that media production is still largely national in character. Above all, the concept of the “journalistic field” (Bourdieu) is used to contribute to an expanded understanding of European media phenomena.