Programm

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Plenary events

Roundtable

Diskussionsrunde

“Les impacts de la crise sanitaire dans les régions frontalières en Europe |
Auswirkungen der Gesundheitskrise auf europäische Grenzregionen |
The impact of the global health crisis on European border regions.”

Moderation: Jun.-Prof. Dr. habil Florian Weber (Universität des Saarlandes)

Diskutant*innen:

• Dr. hab. Joanna Kurowska-Pysz, prof. AWSB (WSB University in Dabrowa Gornicza, Poland)
• Prof. Dr. Grégory Hamez (Université de Lorraine)
• Roland Theis (State Secretary for Europe and Representative of Saarland for European Affairs)
• Dr. Heinrich Kreft (Andrássy University Budapest, Hungary)

(DE-EN-FR with interpretation)

Keynote Jean Asselborn - Freitag

Jean Asselborn
Minister für auswärtige und europäische Angelegenheiten und Minister für Immigration und Asyl Luxemburgs

 

more information coming soon.

Keynote Victor Konrad - Samstag

Victor Konrad
Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada

Border Renaissance in a Time of Border Perplexity?

 

In this presentation, I explore the questions of why and how there can be a border renaissance in a time of border profusion and confusion. Are we simply witnessing border renascence, a revival of the statist boundary, increasingly dormant in globalization? Or, is the renaissance of the border new growth arising from the confusion, bewilderment, puzzlement and incomprehension of the border in the 21st century? With reference to my research in North America, Southeast Asia and Europe, I examine the entangled state of the border in order to discern what is unaccountable from what is complicated, and differentiate the rebirth and revival of classical learning and wisdom about borders from that which addresses the perplexity of borders. In my view, a renaissance in border studies flirts with a return to the archaic through the definition and explication of borders everywhere. A true renaissance in border studies must confront the entangled state as process, spirit, style, form, and other potential influences at once rooted in the classical and portrayed and performed in a post-globalization era of border re-discovery. Ultimately, my goal is to confront the notion of border renaissance, not to diminish the concept, but to reveal the fuller meaning and impact of border rebirth and revival.

Biography
Victor Konrad is Adjunct Research Professor of Geography and Environmental Studies at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. Recently, Dr. Konrad was visiting professor at Eastern China Normal and Yunnan Normal Universities in Shanghai and Kunming; Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands; and the Karelian Institute of the University of Eastern Finland. In 2009, he was visiting fellow at the Border Policy Research Institute, Western Washington University. From 1990 to 2001, Dr. Konrad established the Canada-US Fulbright Program and the Foundation for Educational Exchange between Canada and the United States. During the 1970s and 1980s, he was a professor of Anthropology and Geography at the University of Maine and Director of the Canadian-American Center. Professor Konrad is author and editor of more than 100 books, articles and book chapters in cultural geography, border studies and Canadian studies. Recent books include North American Borders in Comparative Perspective (2020) and Borders, Culture, and Globalization: A Canadian Perspective (2021). Border Culture. Theory, Imagination, Geopolitics is forthcoming in 2022 from Routledge. Dr. Konrad is past president of both the Association of Borderlands Studies and the Association for Canadian Studies in the United States, and recipient of the Donner Medal. 

Panel Sessions:

Panel 1-A: Texturing the Border

Astrid M. Fellner 
Saarland University

Theorizing from the Border: Bordertexturing as an Epistemic Framework

This paper proposes the approach of bordertexturing as a theoretical foundation for the analysis of borders. Tracing its origins as a conceptual tool and methodological approach to its genealogical roots in Chican@ Studies and decolonial thinking, I seek to delineate a way of borderthinking that opens up a space in which alternative literacies can coexist with Western cultural and narrative forms. By turning to the concept of bordertextures and the act of bordertexturing, I suggest an epistemological, conceptual and methodological shift in the way in which we think about and conceive of borders and bordering practices, and, ultimately, how we research borders. In order to visualize and exemplify this understanding of bordertextures and bordertexturing, I will look at visual expressions by recent border artists whose performative practices constitute enactments of bordertextures.

Joachim Frenk
Saarland University

Text(uris)ing Belfast and the Northern Irish Border

After the Good Friday / Belfast Agreement of 1998, only very few in Ireland north and south will have deluded themselves about the deep scars the 30-year-conflict of the Troubles had left behind and about the continuing precarious state of the Irish border for the foreseeable future. The pivotal city of the Troubles and their aftermath is the bordered city of Belfast. In my talk, I would like to look at recent representations of Belfast both during the Troubles and after them. I will look at recent novels by two authors, who were both born in Belfast: The first is Anna Burns (*1962), who came to fame when her novel Milkman won the Man Booker Prize in 2018. Milkman is a virtuoso, humourous and intricate portrayal of a deeply troubled Belfast society at the end of the 1970s. My second author will be Glenn Patterson (*1961), who has arguably become the go-to cultural correspondent of post-agreement Belfast, not only in Ireland and the UK but also, increasingly, on the European mainland. I will discuss two of Patterson's novels, Gull (2016) and Where Are We Now (2020). Gull takes its readers back to the late 1970s and early 1980s as it portrays one of the most bizarre industrial initiatives of the Troubles years. Where Are We Now offers a cautiously optimistic view on Belfast in the almost-present. In all novels, diverse Irish borders are being textually explored and textualised.

Bärbel Schlimbach
Saarland University

Interwoven (His-)Stories and Border-Crossings: Bordertextures in Hernan Diaz’ In the Distance

In the context of current discourses about migration and border control, my paper analyzes a literary migration story to the United States. I utilize the concept of bordertextures as a tool for a cultural studies analysis of migration narratives to the United States as well as within the United States which are interrelated to discourses which emerged and circulated in the United States but which are interconnected to migration narratives on a global level. For most of the 19th and 20th centuries, the U.S. was deemed a fabulous place in the imaginations of Europeans, especially as a possible destination for those who dreamed of emigration. In these dreams, the U.S. was a place of unlimited possibilities and endless lands available to new settlers. Literary narratives of migration, be it European immigration to the United States as well as migration within the United States, often focused on (linear) movements from East to West as well as romanticized myths about the settling of the country which ignored Native American inhabitants and their rights to the land which settlers fashioned as “empty.” Hernan Diaz’ novel In the Distance (2017) deconstructs some of these mythical narratives by reversing perspectives and relativizing directions, opening new perspectives for migration narratives. The novel presents the fictional life story of Håkan, a Swedish immigrant, who accidentally arrives in California, immigrating from the, for European immigrants, untypical Pacific/West coast into his new life. The novel narrates his journey eastward, meeting a massive stream of settlers moving west. As a method, bordertextures enable me to show how power relations are inscribed into texts and how identity constructions develop by carving out underlying rhyzomatic structures of discourses and underlying power structures. My paper will focus on Håkon’s movements throughout the narration as a re-evaluation of (mythical) migration narratives.

Panel 1-B: La frontière comme objet

Grégory Hamez / Jordi Bakker
Université de Lorraine

Quelles données pour caractériser l'objet « frontière » ? Pistes de recherche dans le domaine de la sécurité aux frontières (Borders, Human-to-Military Security Database)

Considérer la frontière comme un objet suppose l’existence de données et d’informations propres à la frontière. Cela soulève des questions d’ordre théorique, en termes de définition de ce qui relève de la frontière, et d’ordre méthodologique en termes de traitement et de représentation de ces informations. Par ailleurs, dans la mesure où de nombreuses données restent produites dans des cadres nationaux, à quelles conditions est-il possible de s’extraire de ces cadres pour une représentation systématique des frontières ? Cette communication abordera cette question à travers la participation à la constitution d’une base de données des frontières, sous l’angle de la sécurité humaine et militaire (Human-to-Military Security Database, Chaire Jean Monnet à l’Université de Victoria, Canada, https://www.uvic.ca/humanities/intd/europe/eu-grants/network/hmsdata-20-23/index.php). Les auteurs présenteront les premiers résultats pour un ensemble de frontières en Europe de l’Ouest, entre caractérisation conceptuelle de la sécurité aux frontières, disponibilité des données et représentation graphique.

Olivia Tambou
Université Paris-Dauphine

Frontières numériques, frontières physiques : aussi ouvertes que possibles aussi fermées que nécessaire

L’expression « aussi ouverte que possible, aussi fermée que nécessaire » constitue un principe clef de la science ouverte dont l’objectif est de faciliter la circulation de la connaissance. L’objet de ce papier d’en faire le point de départ d’une réflexion sur l’ambivalence de l’articulation des frontières dites numériques et des frontières physiques vu sous le prisme de la renaissance des frontières au sein de l’Union européenne. Parler de frontières numériques tend souvent à constater que les nouvelles technologies sont porteuses de nouvelles frontières ou du moins participent à la transcendance des frontières physiques. Le numérique comporte de façon intrinsèque une forme de dématérialisation des frontières physiques. Cette virtualisation ouvre le champ de tous les possibles d’un internet sans frontières avec la création de nouvelles communautés au sein des réseaux. Pourtant, la nécessité de recréer des frontières dans le cyberespace s’est fait sentir. Que cela soit pour l’affirmation d’une souveraineté numérique, la défense de valeurs collectives comme notre modèle démocratique ou individuelles comme le respect d’une vie privée, la nécessité des frontières numériques est principalement invoquée comme dans le monde physique en raison de la fonction protectrice des frontières. Pour autant plus encore que dans le monde physique, le contrôle des frontières numériques s’avère ardus, ce qui renouvelle la problématique de l’effectivité de la fonction protectrice des frontières. Parallèlement, le numérique est de plus en plus invoqué comme outil de surveillance des frontières physiques pour en faire notamment des « Smart Border », permettant de concilier l’exigence de fluidité et de sécurité. L’objet de ce papier sera d’analyser dans quelle mesure le numérique est à la fois un vecteur de nouvelles frontières et de surveillance des frontières physiques. Il s’agira tout particulièrement de questionner comment le droit européen appréhende l’articulation ambivalente entre les frontières numériques et physiques. 

Frédérique Morel-Doridat / Sabrina de Pindray d’Ambelle
Université de Lorraine

Définir les frontières par la pratique – apports d’un serious game

Comment les frontières nationales sont-elles objectivées – et quelles frontières viennent spontanément à l’esprit, suivant les pratiques du quotidien ? Une démarche inductive a été mise en place pour répondre à cette question. Des serious games ont été organisés auprès de trois groupes différents : un groupe constitué d’enseignants d’histoire-géographie français (sélectionnés de façon indépendante à leur proximité à la frontière nationale), un second d’étudiants de master en urbanisme et un dernier d’étudiants de master ayant un background interculturel. La méthodologie employée alternait alors la production de cartes individuelles avec celle de cartes collectives. Le résultat offre une lecture riche et nuancée de la façon de déterminer une frontière, en fonction de l’espace vécu des personnes et des groupes.

Panel 1-C: COVID-19 als Chance

Die Covid-19-Pandemie hat in kürzester Zeit im globalen Maßstab weitreichende Auswirkungen auf Gesundheit, Soziales, Kultur, Politik, Wirtschaft etc. entfaltet. Diese zeigten sich in besonderer Weise auch in Grenzregionen: Mit der Wiedereinführung verstärkter Grenzkontrollen bzw. in Teilen sogar Grenzschließungen sind mit europäischem Fokus 35 Jahre nach der Unterzeichnung des ,Schengener Abkommens‘ scheinbare Gewissheiten offener Grenzen und so auch der Vorstellung eines ,borderless Europe‘ massiv angegriffen worden. Statt einer engen gemeinsamen Abstimmung auf EU-Ebene dominierten zunächst nationalstaatliche Reaktionen zum Gesundheitsschutz, der sich gerade über nationale Grenzen definierte. Gleichzeitig zeigte sich so ,vor Ort‘ wie in einem Brennglas, wie eng in Teilen Verflechtungen in Grenzräumen bereits heute vorhanden sind und wie erforderlich es war, Abstimmungsprozesse zur Krisenbewältigung von der lokalen und regionalen Ebene ausgehend zu initiieren. Im Panel wird vergleichend aus Perspektive der Border Studies beleuchtet, welche Auswirkungen Covid-19 auf verschiedene grenzüberschreitende Kooperationsräume im ,Herzen‘ Europas entfaltete. Dabei gilt die Aufmerksamkeit den Aspekten, worin Unterschiede und Gemeinsamkeiten in verschiedenen europäischen Borderlands liegen sowie welche Entwicklungsprozesse sich mit und nach der Pandemie bereits ergaben und weiter ergeben könnten.

Nora Crossey / Julia Dittel
Saarland University

SaarLorLux: Covid-19 als Chance für die grenzüberschreitende Zusammenarbeit? 

Der Umgang mit Grenzen im Verlauf der Covid-19-Pandemie hat die hohe Bedeutung offener Grenzen, insbesondere aber auch eines enge(re)n grenzüberschreitenden Austausches innerhalb der EU, auf regionaler und kommunaler Ebene aufgezeigt. Abweichende nationale Regelungen standen hierbei in Konflikt mit den gelebten Realitäten in der Grenzregion SaarLorLux.  Unser Beitrag beleuchtet – aufbauend auf eigenen Erhebungen – in einer Rückschau Auswirkungen der Covid-19-Pandemie auf den grenzüberschreitenden Verflechtungsraum mit einem Fokus auf dem Saarland und dem département Moselle. In einem Ausblick werden Hindernisse und Potentiale für die weitere Gestaltung des grenzüberschreitenden Austausches erörtert.

Birte Wassenberg
Sciences Po Strasbourg

Die Auswirkungen der Covid-19-Pandemie auf die deutsch-französische grenzüberschreitende Zusammenarbeit am Beispiel des Eurodistriktes Strasbourg-Kehl/Ortenaukreis

Die deutsch-französische Zusammenarbeit im Eurodistrikt Strasbourg-Kehl/Ortenaukreis wurde bisher immer als Modell der Europäischen Integration und als erfolgreiche Anwendung des im Elysée-Vertrages von 1963 verankerten Prinzips der Versöhnung auf lokaler Ebene gepriesen. Die Covid-19-Pandemie hat allerdings diesen Modellcharakter überraschend in Frage gestellt. National gesteuerte Grenzschließungen führten zu einer traumatischen Trennung des integrierten gemeinsamen Lebensraumes. Dieser Beitrag beleuchtet anhand der verschiedenen Phasen der Pandemie zwischen Frühjahr 2020 und Sommer 2021, wie im Eurodistrikt nach anfänglicher nationaler Abschottung, Ausbrüchen von ressentiments und einer völligen Lähmung der grenzüberschreitenden Institutionen allmählich ein Lernprozess einsetzte, der dazu führte, dass neben Bekundungen grenzüberschreitender Solidarität in der Bevölkerung auch innovative politische Grenzinitiativen ergriffen und neue Governance-Strukturen gegründet wurden.

Elżbieta Opiłowska
Universität Wroclaw 

Der Einfluss von Covid-19 auf die Strukturen und Strategien der Zusammenarbeit in der deutsch-polnischen Grenzregion    ‬‬‬‬

Die Covid-19- Pandemie hatte zahlreiche soziale und politische Folgen für die Grenzregionen. Die Grenzeinschränkungen haben sich nicht nur auf das Leben der Grenzbewohner:innen ausgewirkt, deren Alltagspraktiken im transnationalen Raum eingebettet sind, sondern auch auf die Funktionsweise der institutionellen Akteure. Das Ziel des Beitrags ist es, die Reaktionen und (neuen) Strategien der grenzüberschreitenden institutionellen Akteure im Kontext von Re-bordering am Beispiel der deutsch-polnischen Grenzregion darzustellen. Unter Anwendung des Resilienz-Konzepts werden Bewältigungsmechanismen sowie Strukturen analysiert, die entwickelt wurden, um sich an neue Umstände anzupassen. Im Weiteren sollen fördernde und hemmende Faktoren der Resilienz identifiziert werden. 

Panel 1-D: Étrangers familiers

Souvent appréciés, parfois décriés, les travailleurs frontaliers occupent une place importante dans le paysage économique, politique et social de Suisse. Dans certains cantons, ils constituent depuis plusieurs décennies un des facteurs de la croissance économique. Pourtant, ils sont relativement peu connus. A cheval entre deux pays, leurs modes de vie, leur statut spécifique, leur pratique de la frontière interrogent. Ils sont ainsi qualifiés d’Etrangers familiers. Le panel s’attachera à présenter l’emploi et les pratiques de travailleurs frontaliers en Suisse ainsi que quelques éléments de conceptualisation, à la lumière d’entretiens mais également de données statistiques, révélant au passage la diversité des situations selon les cantons, et la grande variété des profils des frontaliers, mais aussi les similitudes et différences avec le travail frontalier que nous connaissons dans la Grande Région.

Isabelle Pigeron-Piroth
Université du Luxembourg

Eclairage sur le travail frontalier en Suisse : une mosaïque de profils selon les cantons de travail 

Cette communication d’attache à donner une vue d’ensemble du travail frontalier en Suisse à la fois à l’échelle fédérale et cantonale. À travers la statistique des frontaliers de l’Office Fédéral, elle révèle toute la variété des profils des frontaliers. Débutant par une analyse globale à l’échelle de la Suisse présentant les principales caractéristiques économiques et sociodémographiques des frontaliers, cette communication s’intéresse ensuite aux principaux cantons de travail des frontaliers : Genève, Bâle et le Tessin, ainsi que Vaud, Neuchâtel et le Jura. Il en résulte une mosaïque de profils des travailleurs frontaliers, très variables d’un canton à l’autre au gré des besoins et des caractéristiques des différents marchés du travail transfrontaliers. Phénomène durable et ancré dans les économies locales, le travail frontalier en Suisse n’en demeure pas moins soumis à des variations conjoncturelles. L’analyse porte sur une période de vingt années, laissant entrevoir une certaine diversification des profils parallèlement au renforcement du poids des frontaliers dans leurs activités historiques traditionnelles. Pour terminer , une mise en perspective avec le travail frontalier dans la Grande Région permettra de souligner les particularités de la Suisse ainsi que les aspects méthodologiques liés à la recherche sur le travail frontalier.

Claudio Bolzman / Nasser Tafferant
Université du Luxembourg

De la recherche d’un premier emploi aux pratiques extra-professionnelles des travailleurs frontaliers en Suisse romande 

Lorsque l’on s’intéresse aux travailleurs frontaliers, on adopte souvent une approche économique qui les considère principalement comme des acteurs rationnels. Les représentations dominantes soulignent aussi qu’ils seraient guidés avant tout par une logique d’intérêts, cherchant à maximiser leurs bénéfices, en tenant compte des coûts et risques éventuels de leur situation.  Ils ne viendraient ainsi finalement en Suisse que pour travailler et prêteraient peu d’attention à d’autres dimensions de l’existence, telles que les relations sociales, la vie associative, ou les loisirs. D’ailleurs, de nombreuses recherches dans la région lémanique et au Tessin portent sur cette dimension économique, puisqu’elles concernent le profil de la main-d’œuvre frontalière et son impact sur le marché de travail et la croissance. A première vue, les motivations évoquées pour venir exercer une activité professionnelle à Genève par les travailleurs frontaliers, donnent raison aux théories à prédominance économiques ou sociologiques rationalistes. En effet, selon une enquête récente de l’Observatoire des frontaliers, 64% d’entre eux déclarent qu’ils sont venus travailler en Suisse parce que les salaires y sont plus élevés et 32% signalent qu’en Suisse, le marché du travail est plus dynamique qu’en France. Des motivations extraprofessionnelles, telles que la qualité de vie (23%) et la découverte d’une nouvelle culture (4%) viennent plus loin (El Malti et al., 2018, 23). Cependant, diverses recherches sociologiques soulignent le fait que le travail est rarement une activité purement instrumentale: il est créateur également de sens, de constructions identitaires, de statut et de liens sociaux pour les personnes concernées. Dans cette présentation nous explorerons d’une part, les circonstances qui amènent les frontaliers débutants à venir travailler en Suisse, d’autre part les pratiques extra-professionnelles qu’ils élaborent une fois qu’ils exercent un travail en Suisse. La présentation est basée sur une quinzaine d’entretiens qualitatifs et sur l’analyse des données tirées d’enquêtes quantitatives récentes.

Cédric Duchêne-Lacroix 
Université de Bâle

Qu’est-ce que le frontalier ? Proposition de canevas

L’analyse des phénomènes transfrontaliers court souvent le risque de l’excès de simplification et perd en richesse explicative. La complexité des espaces frontaliers s’exprime à la fois à travers des différences de nature d’objets et de niveaux d’échelle d’observation : des différences socio-territoriales qui en fin de compte s’enchevêtrent en matière de législation, de langue, d’identification, de niveau de vie, de densité urbaine, de moyens et d’habitudes de transport, … mais qui forment un tout, un fait total dynamique. Ces différences socio-territoriales constituent, organisent, ces écosystèmes frontaliers, définis comme des ensembles durables d’activités, de transactions, d’effets de synergie et d’interdépendance entre acteurs, artefacts, services, lois, symboles et représentations sur un territoire donné, autonome par rapport à d’autres territoires. Cette contribution propose une grille analytique avec six caractéristiques permettant de mieux saisir les manifestations des phénomènes transfrontaliers dans chacune des quatre dimensions (territoriale, écosystémique, vécue et discursive) afin de rendre plus intelligible cette complexité et de contribuer à mieux agir sur elle pour le bien des parties prenantes et des territoires.

Panel 1-E: Territorial Collaboration in Transition I

Cross-border areas such as the Greater Region are confronted with specific spatial challenges in terms of mobility, land use and service provision, all requiring joint perspectives for future development. In the Greater Region, for example, installing a spatial development concept is paving the way for a concise collaboration on spatial requirements. In general, border regions are particularly suited to establish laboratories for comparative approaches and integrative strategies of spatial planning and planning cultures. This session explores and discusses results of the action ‘territory’ of the INTERREG project UniGR CBS, and invites scholarly contributions from the Greater Region and beyond.

Joanna Kurowska-Pysz
WSB University

The analysis of the changes in the barriers to cross-border research and educational projects – the COVID-19 pandemic effect

The research aim of the paper is to recognize the changes in the barriers to cross-border research and educational projects, especially in the context of the pandemic. The research was focused on the European borderlands where the level of maturity of cross-border-cooperation is diverse. The exploratory study of the barriers to cross-border research and educational projects covers the following types of obstacles:
- obstacles which existed before the pandemic and obstacles which have been present throughout (a.i. legal and administrative barriers; financial barriers; communication barriers; socio-economic barriers; cultural barriers and others), 
- obstacles which appeared during the pandemic (a.i. legal restrictions; the changes of the model of work, education and research;  personal communication and movement limitations; the changes in the inter-personal and inter-organizational relations).
The study was conducted simultaneously in the Franco-German and Polish-Czech borderlands for research and educational projects only. The author has based the analysis on the qualitative research methods such as desk research, in depth interviews, case studies and a research workshop. The conclusions of the paper show that despite the diverse level of cross-border cooperation maturity in both borderlands, the new barriers that appeared during the pandemic are very similar. The key difference is the approach to these barriers on each borderland. Since the level of cross-border cooperation maturity on both borderlands is diverse, research and educational cross-border projects on Franco-German and Polish-Czech borderland were conducted in accordance with the specifics of each target group. On the Franco-German borderland the cross-border cooperation is more complex and deeper, on the Polish-Czech borderland it is more superficial, focused on specific issues only. These specifics cause the differences in the solutions that should be implemented to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on research and educational projects on each borderland.

Petra Schelkmann
Ministry of Interior and Sports, Rhineland-Palatinate

The development concept of the Greater Region

Cross-border spatial development has a long tradition in the Greater Region. In the Coordination Committee for Spatial Development of the Greater Region as one of the working groups of the Summit of the Greater Region, the spatial planners of the Greater Region have been working together for a long time on cross-border, coordinated and coherent spatial development and transport planning. The first preliminary work dates back a long time. The current process of the spatial development concept of the Greater Region was triggered in 2010 by the "Metroborder" study, a project funded through ESPON (European Planning Observation Network for Territorial Development and Cohesion). It examined the added value of a cross-border polycentric metropolitan region for the Greater Region as well as aspects of territorial governance. Bilding on the results of the Metroborder study and having in mind a long and intensive debate on functional regions, concepts of "variable gegraphy" and urban-rural partnerships and large-scale communities of responsibility ("großräumige Verantwortungsgemeinschaften") the current spatial development concept of the Greater Region (REKGR) ermerged from a strong political mandate to set up the REKGR as a strategic and operational instrument in a multi-stage process. From 2019-2023 the further elaboration of the REKGR was co-financed from the Interreg A programme "Greater Region".

Julia Lenz / Kirsten Mangels
Saarland University / TU Kaiserslautern

The (possible) relevance of services of general interest for spatial development of the Greater Region

The contribution ties in with current discussions on securing services of general interest, which are increasingly being conducted in spatial planning and development against the background of demographic change and the effects of the Corona pandemic. As critical infrastructures, services of general interest are of considerable importance for the quality of life of citizens and are partially endangered, especially in peripheral regions, also in border regions, due to carrying capacity limits. The contribution therefore examines the concept of services of general interest in (cross-border) spatial planning and specifically shows which potentials exist in spatial planning and development to contribute to secure services of general interest in border regions. Based on a general classification of the concepts of spatial planning and spatial development, the contribution shows the relevance of the concept of services of general interest for spatial planning and development, firstly at the level of the European Union and Germany and in particular in the federal states of Saarland and Rhineland-Palatinate as well as the neighbouring region of Grand-Est. From this, different challenges of services of general interest in the Greater Region can be derived for cross-border spatial planning, but also potentials for securing cross-border services of general interest. In general, border regions have a poorer infrastructure of services of general interest than other regions. This is shown by the example of health care in the Saarland-Lorraine border region. However, it is made clear that spatial development in particular has the potential to contribute to a (cross-border) provision of services of general interest and/or their accessibility. Thinking about this in cross-border terms would already be a great step forward. Based on the example of the cross-border spatial development concept of the border region 'Greater Saar-Lor-Lux+', it is shown how issues of services of general interest can be dealt with and how they can be coordinated in practice. Finally, the importance of cross-border spatial planning and spatial development for a sustainable safeguarding of services of general interest in border regions is discussed.

Panel 2-A: Borders in Eastern Europe

Lidia Kuzemska
Lancaster University

The Many-Faced border between Ukraine and the occupied Donbas

During the transition of power in Ukraine after Euromaidan revolution of 2013-2014, Russia seized the opportunity to annex the Crimean Peninsula under the pretext of protecting its Russian-speaking population of Ukraine. It then occupied the Eastern Ukrainian region of Donbas by instigating secessionist movement. The political and military conflict between the Ukrainian armed forces and the Russian-backed separatists resulted in the biggest current forced displacement in Europe – 1.7mln people. The proclamation of two unrecognized states – Donetsk and Luhansk ‘People’s Republics’ – has de facto changed the borders of Ukraine. Officially, Ukraine considers the whole territory of Donbas as its sovereign territory and all population – Ukrainian citizens. In practice, multiple borders have gradually separated Donbas since May 2014. The heavily militarized ‘contact line’ became a de facto border between Ukraine and the self-proclaimed statelets. Both sides have also elaborated a set of laws, regulations, practices, and discourses around each other to create the feeling and reality of ‘otherness’. Apart from military fortification and a strict pass permit system for crossing between Ukraine and the occupied territories, the border gained many other faces. For instance, all Ukrainian state institutions stopped functioning in the occupied territories and the economic and trade blockade separates the two sides. There are multiple legal borders on access to citizenship rights for people residing in the occupied territories, e.g. access to social payments or voting. The state language, school curricula, the currency, and even the time zone is different in Ukraine and in the occupied territories of Donbas. Despite increasing multifaced bordering between the opposing sides, the cross-border contacts across the ‘contact line’ grew as the conflict situation ‘froze’. Until 2020, up to 13mln people crossed the contact line per year. The Covid-19 pandemic plummeted the number of crossings between Ukraine and the occupied territories of Donbas by 97 per cent. The sanitary border added another layer to the already many-faced border.

Olga Dorokhina
Caucasus International University, Tblisi

Conceptualizing “borderization”: cases from Eastern Europe

Border studies are in the process of constant development, putting scholars in the position of having to update or construct terminology, procedures and methodologies to represent the complexity of visible or imagined objects and processes associated to “borders.” In recent years, the neologism “borderization” has become highly popular, and it is widely employed in academic, political, and public discourses. It is applied in a variety of cases, contexts, ideas behind it. Borderization as a mechanism of securitization of borders and border policies is discussed in application to the Tri-Border Area (Grimson & Renoldi, 2019), migration crises in the Mediterranean (Cuttitta, 2014), and pandemic related border restrictions on external and internal borders of the EU (Wille, 2021). In Eastern Europe, borderization is associated with Georgia and “refers to the construction of physical barriers to transform a territorial ceasefire line into an international border” (Toal,Merabishvili, 2019). The term was introduced by the European Union Monitoring Mission, coming from a need to describe “physical markings and activities on the ground to make visible or obstruct passage” along the dividing Line. Following the conclusion of the war operations between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the issue of border delimitation and demarcation arose. Some analysts found it beneficial to describe the process through the concept of “borderization” although, underlying the different context where borders “remain ambiguously demarcated” (Broers, 2021). Interestingly, similar types of activities in Crimea are not in the center of attention of research of borderization in conditions of war and conflict. In the paper, I intend to conceptualize the term “borderization.” The main questions that appear when the term is used are: Why "borderization" or for what reason? Where and by what means? Introduced by whom or against whom? Comparative research discusses the concept based on the cases of Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan, and Ukraine.

Julia Prakofjewa (talk canceled)
Ca' Foscari University of Venice

Cross the border, close the gap: Tracking the environmental interactions across the boundaries between Poland, Lithuania and Belarus

The links between environmental discourse and border delimitations are most complex and sensitive in ethnically mixed regions with a long history of political and symbolic border shifts. The Polish-Lithuanian-Belarusian border area presents a notable example for investigation since close inter-ethnic communication and exchange here had existed for many centuries. The study aimed to evaluate the dynamics of the environmental interactions among local communities across the boundaries. The results are based on qualitative and quantitative analysis of field data, which was obtained in 2018 and 2019 in Hrodna region (Belarus), Vilnius county (Lithuania) and Sejny and Augustów counties (Poland) among the Lithuanian and Polish communities. The conclusions of the present study revealed the importance of periphery–periphery cross-border relationships. Furthermore, we described how the border impacts human-related environmental changes by analyzing the cross border mobility and social networks. Specifically, this study has evaluated the prospects for cross-border networking and cooperation in the current situation. The research was supported by an ERC Grant DiGe-714874.

Panel 2-B: Analyzing Border Renaissance(s)

Die Renaissance von Grenzen geht auf jüngere Ereignisse zurück, wie zum Beispiel der plötzliche Anstieg terroristischer Anschläge nach der Jahrtauendwende, die aufkeimenden Nationalismen, wachsende soziale Ungleichheiten oder die anhaltende Krise des Migrationsmanagements westlicher Staaten. Sie haben nicht nur eine forcierte Digitalisierung der Grenzregime, temporäre Wiedereinführung von Grenzkontrollen im Schengen‐Raum oder die Abschottung der EUAußengrenzen bewirkt. Sie haben auch soziale Fragmentierungen verschärft und zu einer Vervielfältigung von Grenzanlagen geführt: “In just the past 20 years […] hundreds of new borders have emerged around the world.” (Nail 2020: 195) Diese Entwicklung fordert von der Grenzforschung geeignetes Orientierungs‐ und Handlungswissen ein, das auf Basis adäquater wissenschaftlicher Grundlagen und Instrumentarien bereitgestellt werden muss. Das Panel diskutiert in drei Vorträgen solche rezenten konzeptionell‐methodologischen Entwicklungen und zeigt Perspektiven für eine Grenzforschung im Zeitalter der Grenzziehungen auf. Dabei werden der gewandelte Grenzbegriff im Spiegel des aufkommenden Trends komplexitätsorientierter Grenzforschung vorgestellt sowie methodologische und forschungspraktische Konsequenzen ausgelotet.

Christian Wille
Universität Luxemburg

Approaching border complexities: von der Linie zur Textur

Die Renaissance von Grenzen hat nicht nur für eine stärkere Institutionalisierung und Sichtbarkeit der Grenzforschung gesorgt, sondern auch theoretisch‐konzeptionelle Entwicklungen und Neuorientierungen in Gang gesetzt. Davon zeugen die zahlreichen Konzepte und Ansätze, die – inspiriert vom cultural, spatial und practice turn der Sozial‐ und Kulturwissenschaften – die Grenze als soziale Praxis fassen. Die Prozessorientierung überwindet die Idee der Grenze als Linie und bildet den Ausgangspunkt des Vortrags. Er zeigt verschiedene Weiterentwicklungen des sogenannten „‘bordering turn‘“ (Cooper 2020: 17) auf und geht dabei näher auf komplexitätsorientierte Ansätze als jüngsten Trend der territorialen und kulturellen Grenzforschung ein.

Dominik Gerst
Universität Duisburg-Essen

Seeing like a complex border: zum pluralen Verständnis von Grenz-Komplexität

Im Zuge der diagnostizierten Wiederkehr der Grenzen ist Komplexität zu einem zentralen Begriff der Grenzforschung avanciert. Ganz grundsätzlich ist damit zunächst der Umstand beschrieben, dass wir es nicht nur mit einem Mehr an Grenzen zu tun haben. Sie haben sich hinsichtlich ihrer Formen, Funktionen und Bedeutungen gewandelt, sodass wir von Grenzen als komplexen Phänomenen sprechen können, die etablierte Theorien, Begriffe und Forschungsstrategien herausfordern. In der Tat lassen sich bereits einige Ansätze identifizieren, die den Anspruch erheben, die Komplexität gegenwärtiger Grenzen zu entschlüsseln. In einer vergleichenden Perspektive möchte der Vortrag nicht nur zentrale Fluchtpunkte komplexitätsorientierter Grenzforschung bestimmen; es soll auch gezeigt werden, dass wir es in der Grenzforschung mit einer Pluralität an Komplexitätsverständnissen zu tun haben, deren Verhältnis noch näher zu bestimmen ist.

Ulla Connor
Universität Luxemburg

Praxeologizing the Border: zum Potential der Praxistheorien und ethnographischer Zugriffe

Die Beobachtung neuer Formen und Ausmaße territorialer Grenzziehungen hat in den Border Studies zu veränderten Perspektiven auf Grenzen geführt. Die Annahme einer wachsenden Dynamisierung wie auch Vielschichtigkeit von Grenzen stellt die Wissenschaft von den Grenzen dabei vor neue konzeptionelle und methodologische Herausforderungen. Hier setzt der Vortrag an und fragt nach dem Potential soziologischer Praxistheorien und die mit ihnen verbundenen ethnografischen Herangehensweisen. Beide können einen Beitrag liefern, um Grenzen als dynamische und komplexe Phänomene in Untersuchungen zu konzeptualisieren und zu entfalten. Soziologische Praxistheorien bieten ein theoretisches Vokabular wie auch methodologische Strategien, mit denen die jüngeren Entwicklungen in den Border Studies aufgegriffen und weiterentwickelt werden können.

Panel 2-C: New Crossings in Border Poetics I

The notion of border poetics has been used in various contexts. It has been established as a theory about borders in literature and other forms of discourse, and also an analytical practice of approaching such borders (through the concept of different border “planes” and identification of border figurations), since the publication of the edited volume Border Poetics Delimited in 2007. With the field of border aesthetics, it has participated in the spatial turn in literary studies and the humanities, but also in the cultural turn in interdisciplinary border studies. Increasingly, the discussion on borders in literature and culture has been able to draw up new concepts in border studies such as “bordering” and “borderscapes”, in addition to earlier border concepts in semiotics, post-structuralist thinking, cultural studies and theories of liminality. Border poetics analysis and similar approaches have been applied especially within migration narratives describing the crossing of national borders.

In this double panel we will be discussing possible new theoretical and geographical directions for border poetics. In an evaluation of the field in the monograph Grenzen und Grenzüberschreitungen. Ilija Trojanow - Dimitré Dinev - Sibylle Lewitscharoff - Evelina Jecker Lambreva (2020), Anne-Maria Sturm has pointed for the need to provide stronger arguments about one of the central tenets of border poetics: that borders described in various medial presentations can be connected to the way in which medial presentations are themselves bordered and function as borders. Especially with the focus turning to the crossing of national and symbolic boundaries in response to a pressing focus on phenomena such as the Mexican-USA border, migration or Brexit, the importance of stylistic and textual boundaries for the performative power of different medial forms has not received so much attention. Also, much work in border poetics has focused on English-, German- and Scandinavian-language texts, which make the publication of an edited volume like Patrick Suter and Corinne Fournier Kiss’ Poétique des frontières: Une approche transversale des littératures de langue française (XXe-XXIe siècles) (2021) especially welcome. In general, a focus on text and form raises the questions whether literary border poetics should be developed as an approach to all forms of literature, and not just the literature of borderlands and border-crossers. Various approaches to literature and culture, such as material studies, posthuman approaches and the study of emotions and cognition, may also prove to be fruitful avenues for conceptual development in border poetics.

While these themes are interwoven through the two panels, the first panel (Andresen, Sturm, Schimanski) broadly addresses the possibilities of border plane analysis and cognitive approaches, while the second panel (Schneider, Fournier Kiss, Suter) takes theories of borders and literature – and figurations of the border in literature – in the directions of the ocean, of Eastern Europe, and of Francophonie. Both early- and advanced-stage researchers are represented in the panels.

Marlene Andresen
University of Oslo

What is not a border? Nella Larsen, Katherine Mansfield and Literature’s Expanding Borders

One of the most prominent developments within border studies in the last 20 years has been the renegotiation of the concept of “border” itself. The nature of borders is now more nuanced than ever – not just static and naturally given, they are rather understood as processual, multifaceted phenomena. Literature is particularly rich in its representations of borders. However, border poetics tends to focus on works portraying crossings of explicit geopolitical or national borders (migration literature, travel narratives, and so on). In fact, many literary genres mediate crossings of various borders – borders that may have very little to do with physical lines of separation. Through formal devices and figurative language, literature partakes in conceptual border formations that allows us to imagine ourselves as border crossers in everyday contexts. Even as we read, we are, in a sense, “crossing” the threshold of the text itself. Using Nella Larsen’s novel Passing and Katherine Mansfield’s short stories as my departure point, I argue that literary fiction which represents borders implicitly rather than explicitly (e.g. racial borders, stylistic borders and figurative thresholds) is connected to how we think and perceive the world around us. Consequently, these texts mediate literature’s ability to expand conventional definitions of “border” which, precisely, constitutes border poetics’ greatest potential and challenge: can a border poetics still be meaningful if the analytical framework can be applied to narratives across all genres and historical periods? Are we merely partaking in a tendency within border studies “to see borders everywhere”? (Schimanski and Wolfe, 2007, 11) If so; what, in short, is not a border? I will address these questions in light of recent developments within border studies, concepts from cognitive poetics and narrative theory. The possibilities and challenges outlined in this paper will have implications for not just the future of border poetics, but for interdisciplinary approaches to border studies overall.

Anne Sturm
Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg

Reading a bordered text: Terezia Mora´s Das Ungeheuer (The Monster)

Borders and border crossings are essential to many literary plots, e.g. in travel or migration literature, coming-of-age stories or even Sci-Fi. Heroes and heroines move in space and time and face borders which turn into bifurcation points: Some characters are able the pass, other passages are hindered. In either case, approaching or crossing borders alters characters´ mindsets and perceptions. Terezia Mora´s novel Ungeheuer (The Monster) combines border crossings on all mentioned planes. The main character, Darius Kopp, travels from Germany to Hungary, home country of his wife Flora. Flora, who previously came as a migrant from Hungary to Berlin, recently committed suicide, leaving Darius in a major emotional crisis. The intention of Darius´ journey now is to find an adequate place for Flora´s ashes, but also to understand his wife´s condition. The outstanding feature of Mora´s novel is its special layout: Every page is divided into two parts, opposing Darius´ journey with diary entries of Flora. In my lecture, I want to explore how the different textual planes interact with each other. How do spatial and temporal elements of the plot work together in a reverse journey, bringing together searching for clues with the poetical idea of involution? Which borders does Darius encounter and cross on his journey and how do they conflict with Flora´s former border experiences? How does his journey alter Darius´ perceptions? Will he be able to understand what happened to Flora? On a textual level, the reader comes into focus: Which possible ways of reading does the text offer? How does its special typography support or complicate an immersive reading? Drawing a conclusion, I want to answer the question to what extent the bordered appearance of the text reflects borders within the plot and how its double-bordered design affects the process of reading.

Johan Schimanski
University of Oslo

A Cognitive Approach in Border Poetics

How we can use literary texts and other narratives in order to understand borders, borderings and border experiences? Can answers to this question be found in a combination post-classical borders studies, border poetics, and 2nd generation approaches to cognition? A border poetics approach proposes connecting borders met by characters in narrative storyworld with the borders of the narrative itself as they are met by readers or listeners. Many analyses of borders in literature still however focus mainly on borders that are presented rather than on the borders of those presentations. Beyond the more immediate observation that many novels begin or end with protagonists crossing e.g. national borders, it remains to be asked how presented borders can be linked to borders of presentations. I suggest that 4E cognitive approaches (embodiment, enactment, extension and embeddedness), involving also cultural cognition, emotion, predictive processing and kinetic cues – may provide answers to this question. I will also be drawing on cognitive approaches to urban borders in recent work by James W. Scott, building on the psycho-semiotic approach of Luca Tateo and Giuseppina Marsico focusing on the way in which narratives are co-constructed in intersubjective space by tellers and readers/listeners. To do this I will be carrying out an analysis of a poem addressing urban spaces by Sarah Zahid, the child of Pakistani parents who grew up in Oslo. I will first map the poem on to the geographical and bordered spaces of Oslo and also show how the poem maps these spaces on to a bordered textual space. After that I will be looking at how the border crossings (also unsuccessful crossings) in the world of its speaker-protagonist and in its textual rhythm invokes various kinds of embodiment, movement and cognition for the reader.

Panel 2-D: Border Languaging I

In this twofold panel on border languaging we’d like to introduce the contested spatiality of the border to our analysis of multilingual language practices. We aim at focusing on a (critical) analysis of creative (cf. Wei 2011) linguistic practices evolving at, on, and around the border. Of particular interest are linguistic politics and practices as well as discourses to counteract and subvert (re-)nascent borders and borderings.

The work of the border as a productive site of encounter and of the formation of identities and otherness becomes visible through related language use and linguistic performances. In developing a focus on border languaging, we aim to carve out new understandings of (the use of) communicative resources in relation to the border. Such a situated approach to (multi- /pluri-) linguistic performances helps us move beyond naturalized categories of and in language. In examining the interplay of practices of language and borders, contributions from the field of linguistic Border Studies may prove fruitful on different scales, whether e.g. addressing top-down questions of language policy or bottom-up linguistic practices (from below) of everyday interaction, the construction of language borders/boundaries, linguistic dynamics of demarcation, criticism of nativeness, the discursive (re)production and (de)construction of borders, sociolinguistic (cross-)border analyses, or many other takes on everyday, political, and aesthetic linguistic/semiotic practices.

Giulia Pelillo-Hestermeyer
Heidelberg University 

Re-Placing Race: Black Lives Matter and Transculturalization

In the summer of 2020, BLM-activism increased dramatically after the homicide of George Floyd by the policeman Derek Chauvin was filmed by a passer-by, and after its filmic testimony rapidly circulated all over the world. In this context, the de- and reterritorialization (García Canclini 2009, Tomlinson 1999) of the discourse on racial injustice from the US to the European context has stimulated changes in the public discourse on diversity. While some aspects of the US discourse have been introduced in Europe without change, their implications and potential consequences have been different. The category of “race” has acquired, in this discursive shift, a more prominent position within the public discourse also in contexts which had been characterized before by a much sharper focus on ethnicity (e.g. topics related to migration). This has provoked a direct confrontation with the colonial past in many countries which had not taken place in the public sphere before, or at least not to this extent. This induced, in turn, multiple re-negotiations of cultural heritages and public spaces. One of the most evident examples of this process is the symbolic act of toppling and defacing statues and monuments paying tribute to “historical” personalities who, in light of the mentioned rise in con-sciousness, are perceived as morally questionable or unworthy to be celebrated in a public space. Such debates have taken place both in virtual and in real spaces in many cities and countries around the world. 
In my talk, I focus on the re-negotiation of historical narratives, heritages and identities in Europe, and in this context on:
1. The interweaving between - material and imaginative - spatial, medial and discursive practices and the resulting blurring of boundaries between these categories.
2. The transculturalization of the discourse on race and ethnicity following the transnational circulation of multimedia products (texts, images, videos), and the resulting processes of transcultural appropriation and reproduction of representations and narratives (also in different languages). 
3. The transculturalization of narratives related to colonial pasts and the re-orientation of the discourse surrounding the categories of “race” and “ethnicity.”

Marie Veniard
Université de Paris, EDA

‘Don’t speak on behalf of those concerned’: Study of a Language Ethics Policy adopted by Political Activists campaigning for Foreign Nationals’ Rights in France

Mobilizations in France on the rights of foreign nationals are sometimes the setting for language policies that are based on a language ideology that characterizes the political voice as a possible path to empowerment. This article examines one policy in particular, ‘don’t speak on behalf of those concerned’, as it manifests in this specific battleground. The research is situated at the interchange between discourse analysis and sociolinguistics. The findings showed that the policy ‘don’t speak on behalf of those concerned’ was not a simple moral requirement but rather a politicized strategy that the activists used to counter what they identified as the dominant groups’ appropriation or invisibilities of the minority groups’ voices in the public space. The following hypothesis was laid: language is, for those activists, a resource to express their solidarity towards undocumented foreign nationals. This language ethics manifested at different linguistic levels and permeated interactions, discourses and actions. It is conceptualized here as a register (Agha 2007) because it was found to be a pervasive interactional norm that was characterized by its multimodality. Its various manifestations are illustrated at the mimetic/postural, pragmatic and interactional levels.

Naomi Truan
Leipzig University 

Navigating the German School System when being perceived as a Student ‘with Migration Background’: Ethnicity and ‘Accent’

Standard language ideologies, as a construct toward presumably unmarked and stable way of speaking or writing, pervade all aspects of social life, and schools makes no exception. The classroom realities in Berlin, our field of investigation, remain fixed on idealized notions of monolingual standard German. On the basis of eight interviews of about one hour with multilingual women aged 16-23 who speak German and Turkish, we show how young women who are constructed as ‘with migration background’ partially align with, but also challenge teachers’ expectations regarding their use of German along a continuum moving from collusion to contestation (Martin-Jones & Heller 1996). Specifically, we show that because of their perceived ethnicity, the interviewees are viewed as ‘having an accent’ or ‘using non-standard German’ across contexts, especially at school. Based on these findings, we argue for a renewed focus on addressivity. Following Flores & Rosa (2015), we propose that in order to value heteroglossic repertoires, a shift from the speakers to the addressees need to take place. In doing so, we argue that while giving students ‘with migration background’ the tools to navigate heteroglossic repertoires is still necessary, these speakers remain subjected to judgements on their ways of speaking, no matter how competent they are in standard German.

Panel 2-E: Territorial Collaboration in Transition II

Cross-border areas such as the Greater Region are confronted with specific spatial challenges in terms of mobility, land use and service provision, all requiring joint perspectives for future development. In the Greater Region, for example, installing a spatial development concept is paving the way for a concise collaboration on spatial requirements. In general, border regions are particularly suited to establish laboratories for comparative approaches and integrative strategies of spatial planning and planning cultures. This session explores and discusses results of the action ‘territory’ of the INTERREG project UniGR CBS, and invites scholarly contributions from the Greater Region and beyond.

Tom Becker / Hélène Rouchet
University of Luxembourg / University of Liège

Building Science-Policy Interfaces: co-productive trainings on planning cultures and cross-border spatial planning

The launch of the UniGR-CBS’s Working Group on Spatial Planning (WGSP) in 2016 and its subsequent trainings on planning cultures and cross-border spatial planning has affected the nature and mechanisms of existing science-policy interactions in cross-border spatial planning in the Greater Region. By actively engaging in the co-production of knowledge on cross-border spatial planning and on planning cultures between practitioners, decision-makers and scientists, the newly formed, informal network of academics from the six universities in the Greater Region has added an innovative dimension to the border area’s conventional ‘science-pull’ and ‘science-push’ models of the science-policy interface (SPI). Thanks to the trainings, the WGSP not only studies and informs spatial planning practices, but becomes actively associated in making these practices. The main focus of our paper lies on the trainings organized between 2016 and 2021 for researching planning cultures and challenges of cross-border spatial planning. These trainings for (future) practitioners and decision-makers in the field of spatial planning are based on the simulation game methodology and can thus be situated among co-productive SPI models in the area of spatial planning. We will investigate the functioning, underlying principles as well as the strengths and weaknesses of these trainings. Insights from this analysis on knowledge co-production will be used to assess the WGSP’s future potential to support the institutional and organisational consolidation and evolution of multi-scalar cross-border cooperation in the field of spatial planning.

Jean-Marc Lambotte
University of Liège

Transit-Oriented Development in a cross-border context: channelling urbanisation along structuring cross-border axes with a view to reinforcing public transport: from the case of the trinational conurbation of Basel to the quadrinational case of the Greater Region 

The paper focuses on the implementation of a Transit-Oriented Development type policy in a cross-border metropolitan context. This policy consists in channelling urbanisation along structuring public transport axes on both sides of the border, while at the same time reinforcing the offer. To this end, the policy pursued in Switzerland at the level of all the country's agglomerations (including the eight with a cross-border character) through the Agglomeration Traffic Programme is analysed. Under this policy, the Swiss Confederation invites the agglomerations to compete for the best projects every four years. The agglomerations that best demonstrate their ability to concentrate urban development along the main public transport routes are those that will receive the most financial support to improve their transport services. In particular, the Agglo Basel association, which brings together nine regional authorities from Germany, France and Switzerland, has succeeded through its agglomeration project (www.aggloprogramm.org) in coordinating urban and transport planning in a comprehensive and integrated manner within the trinational agglomeration of Basel. The cross-border traffic in the Basel conurbation will then be compared with that directed to Luxembourg City and the Grand Duchy as a whole, both in terms of commuter volumes and in terms of the modal split for commuting. Conclusions will be drawn with a view to considering how to transpose such a TOD-type policy to the quadrinational cross-border context of the Greater Region. This time, the aim would be to put the cross-border public transport routes leading to Luxembourg City in competition with each other in order to encourage local actors on both sides of the border to work together to concentrate this urbanisation along these routes.

Karina Pallagst
TU Kaiserslautern 

Creating a laboratory for territorial intelligence: how to support border areas on the way to resilience?

In the Greater Region different planning systems and planning cultures confront each other, requiring a constant exchange of information and collaboration. This transfer of knowledge is required on all levels of planning and government in terms of national, regional, local and cross border instruments, strategies, policies, and projects. In line with the process of creating the spatial development concept for the Greater Region the actors involved engaged in a fruitful discourse on planning cultures, policies, and strategic visioning, while focusing on shaping this joint territorial roadmap. In addition, the impacts of the COVID 19 pandemic on cross border territories demonstrated forcefully the demands for joint transfers of information and for negotiation processes. During the pandemic scholars suggested future scenarios for cities and regions, claiming that territories should be more socially connected, greener, and more diverse (Schneidewind et al. 2020). Yet, in complex spaces such as cross border regions, this cannot be accomplished by individual actors, but requires a programmatic approach. In consequence, reflections, discourses and research are needed on the resilience of border regions. In this respect, many open questions remain unsolved: Will the changes we saw during the pandemic result in trends in the longer-term? Which types of cities and regions will appear to be most resilient to this shock? How can we balance the transformations demanded by overlapping crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change? In view of the challenges ahead and towards building stronger resilience and livability for the cross border territory of the Greater Region, researchers of the UniGR Center for Border Studies suggest creating a Laboratory for Territorial Intelligence (LATI). LATI offers a platform for exchange and knowledge production by combining outreach and educational tools on spatial planning in a cross border context. LATI also aims at supporting the implementation process of the spatial development concept of the Greater Region. This presentation introduces the LATI approach as a forceful tool for dialogue and implementation in planning between research, policymaking, and citizens.

Panel 3-A: Borders and Discourses

Alina Mozolevska 
Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University, Mykolaiv

Rhetoric of Bordering and Indignation in French Populist Discourse 

Nowadays it is impossible to talk about contemporary politics without mentioning the term “populism” that has become the center of political and critical debate. This socio-political phenomenon is considered as one of the markers of the transformation of the modern democracy (G. Fitzi) that not only defines the relationships between the people and the sovereign state but also can drive profound changes of geopolitical space. The proliferation of populist discourses in Europe is tightly related to recent global challenges such as globalization or migration crisis, but is also accelerated by regional problems, social inequality and spatial disequilibria (K. Aiginger). In this paper we would like to focus on the driving forces of political mobilization in the left- and right-wing French populist discourse. We will compare main discursive and performative strategies of two parties that represent main populist actors in France – the Front National and La France Insoumise. The Front National manifests typical radical right populist policy focused on immigration issues, while La France Insoumise shows mostly left-wing egalitarian profile based on social issues.  They both exploit the deep sense of disappointment in the power institutions and the distrust in the system that partially explain their success. Following questions will be explored: What are the main narratives that are used to build borders in French populist discourse? What is the role of border and bordering practices in left- and right-wing French populism? What are the main traits of their public discourses? How main populist narratives are articulated\performed  by their leaders?

Ondřej Elbel
University of Ostrava

The Resurrection of Borders inside of the Schengen Area and its Media Representations

Borders are on the first sight common and sometimes inconspicuous part of the everyday experience of many people. Still, the boundaries between states may become more noticeable in times of international tensions. Concretely in the case of the European Union, the borders in such a situation may transform from an invisible line in a map to the topic of news headlines. The closures of borders and reintroduction of border checks inside of the Schengen Area are the steps rich in symbolic meanings and can become a tool during construction of threat in political discourse. In this project, I conducted a study on how did the debate on borders evolve in the decade between 2010 and 2020 in 6 newspapers from three countries (France, Austria, Czechia). In the context of migration (2011, 2015) and COVID-19 infection (2020), I analyzed the changing context of the border debate and compared the cases in time as well as between countries. In the case selection, different ideological background of newspapers (liberal – conservative) and also different position of the state towards the European integration (France being one of the founders, Czechia entered into the EU during the Eastern Enlargement). The study shows that the meaning of European borders is always under transformation and how the gradual securitization of borders in 2010’s helped to create conditions for covidfencing measures in spring 2020. In the project I focused also on the rhetorical justifications of re-bordering steps being used political actors who were explaining why they decided to reintroduce the border checks. This study indicates that one of the most important strategies is a trivialization of border measures.

Yuliya Stodolinska 
Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University, Mykolaiv

COVID-19 Pandemic on University Campuses: New Age of Borderization

At the end of winter and beginning of spring 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic began, university campuses transferred almost immediately to distance learning, all in-person interaction stopped at once. Universities intended to stop the spread of the novel virus and to eliminate multiple borders that existed. However, this led to the creation of numerous territorial and symbolic borders for the students, faculty, and staff. The newly created borders caused a number of additional problems such as limited access to technology, health issues, challenges in teaching and studying online to name a few. All this could have led to social unrest, quite unwanted and unacceptable for the universities. In this paper I will examine the newly drawn, existing, and disappearing borders that became evident when the university administrations established and communicated the crisis-oriented policies on the institutional websites during the COVID-19 pandemic. The first part of the paper presents the classification of territorial and symbolic borders that (dis)appeared on university campuses in 2020-2021. The second part investigates the bordering, debordering, and rebordering policies created by the universities. Overall, I assume that as the American universities transitioned from complete campus closure to partial and full campus reopening, striving to eliminate the borders that were created, a variety of new borders has emerged.

Panel 3-B: Old and New Boundary Lines in the BE-NL-DE Borderland

The three presentations of this panel discuss the resurgence of old, and the emergence of new boundary lines in the Belgian-Dutch-German borderland, specifically the Dutch and Belgian provinces of Limburg and the German Rhineland. In this borderland, people used to speak similar local language varieties, but partly due to processes of nation-state integration, varieties on different sides of the border have diverged linguistically (Cajot 1996; Cornelissen 1995), and in most places on the German side of the border, they have even become nearly extinct (Cornelissen 2008; Giesbers 2008). At the same time, new varieties such as Ruhrdeutsch (Cornelissen 2015) and Heerlens Nederlands (Cornips 2003) have emerged, which are closer to the national standardised language variety and contain elements of both traditional local varieties and new migrant varieties. Furthermore, processes of European integration, formalised through so-called “Euroregions”, stimulate new cross-border contacts in the area. The presentations discuss the resurgence of old-existing and the emergence of new boundary lines by focussing on three different societal domains: (1) preschools, (2) secondary schools, and (3) workplaces.

Marie Rickert / Leonie Cornips
Maastricht University

Bordering Early Education and Borders in Early Education: Language Socialization in the Southern German-Dutch Border Region

Preschool is an important educational site for language socialisation as toddlers come into contact with adults and peers who may use and choose between language(s) in different ways than in the home context (Schwartz 2018). Experiences in pre-school commonly include a socialisation into language ideologies shaped in particular national contexts. This has influential consequences, e.g., many children in Limburg stop speaking Limburgish at home when they go to preschool, even if the teachers there also use Limburgish (Cornips 2020). National languages have played a central role in European nation-state formation where they have been constructed, standardised and linked to a co-constructed nation-cultural dimension as prominently expressed in Herder’s paradigm ‘one nation, one language, one culture’ (Cornips 2018; Gal 1989). The aim of this presentation is to shed light on bordering early education in the Southern German-Dutch context as well as on borders in linguistic diversity in early education. We investigate the question: How is the border and thereby distinct linguistic spaces with certain language ideologies produced through language practices and policies in pre-schools in Germany and the Netherlands? We draw on data collected in ethnographic fieldwork in pre-schools on both sides of the border as well as survey data from 182 families in Limburg indicating who does and does not speak Limburgish at home and with whom (Tuller 2015). Taking a cross-border perspective, we line out language policies and language ideologies in interaction which contribute to respective socialisations into language hierarchies and sociolinguistic spaces on both sides of the border.

Daan Hovens
Maastricht University

Europeanisation and identities at secondary schools

Education has always played an essential role in the integration of nation-states (see, e.g., Green 2013). It is one of the societal domains where people learn to consider themselves as members of an imagined community (Anderson 2006). Nowadays, however, several school explicitly strive for a so-called “European” and “Euregional” orientation as well. This presentation focuses on two types of schools in the Belgian-Dutch-German borderland, the so-called “Euregioscholen” and “Euregioprofilschulen”, which each aim to educate more “Europeanised” pupils. The main question is how these school concepts are translated to practice, and what this implies in terms of the conceptualisation of, or underlying vision of “Europeanisation”. Do the schools, for example, primarily try to establish a Europe-wide or Euroregion-wide imagined community, or do they rather try to establish a sense of relativism and self-reflection about established identities (Delanty 2005)? And how do pupils respond to the European/Euregional orientation of their schools, for example in terms of imaginations about possible future selves (Dörnyei 2005)? Data will be gathered through interviews with school managers, teachers, and pupils.

Nantke Pecht
University of Duisburg-Essen

Language contact in a mining community

This presentation discusses the linguistic and social practices of former miners in Belgian-Limburg. Cité Duits (lit. ‘mining district German’) emerged as a Belgian Dutch-Maaslands-German contact variety among the sons of immigrant miners in the coalmining district of Eisden in the 1930s. Despite the speakers’ label Duits ‘German,’ a linguistic analysis reveals that Cité Duits cannot be easily characterized as a variety of German, or Dutch. Rather, there is much evidence toward an amalgamation of features due to intensive language contact between Belgian Dutch, the Maaslands dialect spoken in Eisden and varieties of German. Moreover, it is shown that Cité Duits emerged in a setting of multilingualism where speakers already shared a common language (Belgian Dutch), and therefore it served to mark an in-group identity but not to ensure communication. In addition, Cité Duits could only develop due to a combination of sociolinguistic conditions present in the mining district of Eisden in the 1930s. Furthermore, it has not been transmitted to subsequent generations of speakers and is clearly moribund. Finally, the presentation discusses how the absence of female speakers goes back to the fact that speaking Cité Duits has always been ‚indexical‘ (Eckert 2008) of masculinity linked to the underground miner. Girls from Eisden-Cité with numerous brothers may have picked up some Cité Duits, but female speakers were rather the exception.

Panel 3-C: New Crossings in Border Poetics II

Lena Schneider [talk canceled]
Trier University

Redefining Maritime Borders in Contemporary Anglophone and Hispanophone Literatures

Borders have become more ‘fluid’ and, in some cases, more ‘immaterial’ – in cyberspace, for instance – yet some borders remain intact and are even materially and physically reaffirmed. A case in point is the border between the land and the sea, which continues to be clearly demarcated in many representations and disciplines of the global north (Helmreich 135). The separation and fixing between what counts as land and what counts as the sea, that is, the constant bordering between land and sea, is in fact one of the founding ideas of European colonialism – something that finds its antipode in many indigenous epistemologies, in which the space and differentiation between the sea and land is much more porous and transitory. By dissolving the clearly delineated border between the sea and the land, various contemporary Anglophone and Hispanophone literary texts not only question the validity of political borders, but also some of the founding ideas of European thought, including constructs such as ‘gender’ and ‘race.’ Hence, my paper will analyse by what thematic and stylistic means two contemporary speculative novels, Scottish author’s Kirsty Logan’s The Gracekeepers (2015) and Dominican Rita Indiana Hernández’s La Mucama de Omicunlé (2015), represent bordering practices. I will examine how these novels contribute to dissolving the geopolitical sea/land border while at the same time tackling related racial and gendered borders. Accordingly, I will investigate in how far these contemporary narratives can be considered counternarratives to a current ‘border renaissance.’

Corinne Fournier Kiss 
University of Bern

Following the Danube – or “Central Europe” as a Border Space: Claudio Magris and Péter Esterházy

The concept of “Eastern Europe” (as we currently understand it) is relatively recent, dating back to the 18th century (cf. Larry Wolff, Inventing Eastern Europe). The “invention”, so to speak, of “Central Europe” is even more so, since it was created in the 1980s (by Danilo Kiš, Milan Kundera, György Konrad, etc.) in order to claim a shift of the cultural borders of Eastern Europe farther east, beyond the Iron Curtain – these “little” countries stuck between Western Europe and Eastern Europe are defined as “Central Europe”. I shall compare two works that were written against the backdrop of these debates and that take the Danube River as the great common denominator of Central Europe: Danubio [Danube] (1986) by the Italian Claudio Magris, and Hahn-Hahn grófnő pillantása – lefelé a Dunán [The Glance of Countess Hahn-Hahn - Down the Danube] (1991) by the Hungarian writer Péter Esterházy. “The entire Danube is a book of borders”, declares Claudio Magris. In this work, he shows that borders literally crisscross the space of the “other” Europe and that if they have been reinforced with the appearance of the Iron Curtain, they are also the result of a long tradition: “It is a culture that [...] has been obsessed with dykes, bastions to be built against others,” and in this context, the Danube has played the role of “line of defense par excellence.” Nevertheless, while identifying all the borders which in the course of history have succeeded one another and piled up in these regions, Magris emphasizes an understanding of time and space that leads to “routed” rather than “rooted” borders (in the sense given by Paul Gilroy to these words): to cross them is to understand that one has always been in dialogue with the other side, because each one is sometimes here and sometimes there. Péter Esterházy’s narrative clearly takes Magris’s Danubio as a hypotext and often lingers on the same borders as he does: nevertheless, the strangeness of crossing theses borders is immediately dispelled by the narration’s paradoxes and games: “The foreigner feels so foreign that he has itches, and this crisis of itches obliges him to scratch, and as a result he feels almost at home”. The mapping of borders in the journey along the Danube is thus characterized in both books by the same ambivalence. Both books stage the tension between a yearning for precise delimitations while simultaneously challenging this bordering impulse - the first, through stories undermining the meaning of borders as leading to an unknown other side, the second, through textual strategies of performance, gaps and subversion.

Patrick Suter
University of Bern

Towards a Poetics of Borders: Based on the Study of French-language Literature 

A reflection on borders reveals the difficulty of defining them, as they are plastic objects in constant mutation. Perhaps it will be clearer if we distinguish between two main types (which are in a constant dialectical relationship): spatial borders on the one hand, and social boundaries on the other, with both borders and boundaries being translated into French by the same term (frontière), and with both types constantly evolving between opposing or diverse positions. The former can operate at various scales: between nations, intranational units, at the level of cities (urban boundaries), etc. The latter are based on the elements that distinguish social groups (nation, ethnicity, language, gender, skin colour or race, class, culture, etc.). When referring to the former, research tends to speak of borders (in geopolitics or geography), while the latter are more often called boundaries (in the work of anthropologists) - although this opposition is much less clear in dictionaries. These different frontières are dynamic and constantly changing in form and function. They distinguish between social groups and therefore between different common and individual histories. They influence the journeys or movements of individuals or societies. French-language literatures constitute a choice field for exploring borders and boundaries, insofar as they are written in (or in reference to) very diverse places on earth (sub-Saharan Africa, Belgium, the Caribbean, France, Lebanon, the Maghreb, the Indian Ocean, Quebec, Switzerland, etc.). The study of French-language literature makes it possible to discover a vast repertoire of histories of and at the borders, and to bring to light their functioning or their poetics. This was the aim of the recently published book, Poétique des frontières. Un parcours transversal des littératures de langue française (September 2021), which I co-edited with my colleague Corinne Fournier Kiss, and whose theoretical issues I intend to present in this paper.

Panel 3-D: Border Languaging II

Philipp Krämer
Europa-Universität Viadrina

Language Making in and around French: Fixed or Fading Borders and Boundaries in Belgium and the Saar-Lor-Lux Region 

This paper discusses the Language Making of French with a focus on questions of standardization and its challenges in contact zones along linguistic and political borders, and it shows potential connections between the framework of Language Making and the key concepts of borders and boundaries (Schmieder 2021). Language Making describes “conscious or unconscious human processes in which imagined linguistic units are constructed and perceived as ‘a language’, ‘a dialect’ or ‘a variety’ […] with clear-cut boundaries […].” (Krämer/Vogl/Kolehmainen, forthc.) The delimitation of these entities is based on explicit or implicit structural and functional norms which emerge in close interaction with language ideologies. The validity of norms is frequently linked to politically bordered entities. Since Language Making is a process of negotiation between competing contributions, conceptual entities and their boundaries are constantly shifting. In addition, a reduced impact of Europe’s internal political borders in everyday realities and multilingual practices in transnational spaces blur erstwhile sharply drawn linguistic borders. To what extent does the Language Making process of French draw on notions of fixed boundaries, and where is this fixedness challenged by realities of fluidity? Which part do fixed and formalized borders play in the Language Making of French?:
• Belgium is a nation state which relies heavily on fixed borders between the political and linguistic regions and communities. However, the territoriality principle applied in Belgium has always caused friction against the realities of multilingual transition zones.
• Seemingly fixed boundaries can be found in the ideal of the French standard language and the abstract norm variety often labelled as français de reference (Francard 2001).
• The particularities of French in Belgium or recent developments towards inclusive language illustrate instances of fading boundaries and the difficulty to draw clear-cut lines between languages or varieties.
• We can also observe fading borders on a politico-linguistic level: The increased promotion of French in Saarland aims at deliberately reducing the qualities of the political border as a linguistic one.
The cases discussed in the article illustrate the fact that Language Making presupposes an inherent tension between fixed and fluctuating boundaries, particularly in settings where political and linguistic borders are equally fading. Language Making of French ultimately serves as a seminal case study to underscore the complexities emanating from the processual character of bordering and emerging boundaries (Wille 2021).

Itxaso Etxebarria Lekanda / Karin van der Worp
Euskampus Fundazioa / University of the Basque Country

Border Languaging between Aquitaine and the Basque Autonomous Community: Multilingual Practices in a University Cross Border Project 

Following the idea of the European University international cross border collaborations between universities are increasingly common, and consequently there is a growing research interest towards the languages used in those settings. Often, a Lingua Franca is chosen as the vehicle language for international communication. However, opting for one single language could harm the linguistic diversity that can exist among the members involved. Therefore, new ways should be explored in order to create truly multilingual environments that support the use of the several languages of the participants. This paper presents a case study of a cross border project between the University of the Basque Country at the Spanish side of the border, and the University of Bordeaux, at the French side of the border. It studies the language use in the Ocean i3 project, an interdisciplinary project where staff, students and professors from various faculties work together on the challenge of the ocean’s plastic pollution, aiming to contribute to the reduction of pollution on their shared Basque-Aquitaine transboundary coast. The work group puts into play a diverse repertoire of languages including the majority languages Spanish and French, the minority language Basque and the international language English. Therefore, the community seeks to create a multilingual workgroup in a context where otherwise the use of a Lingua Franca policy could form a threat towards the linguistic diversity. This paper aims to shed light on several multilingual practices used in this community with the goal of creating a linguistically diverse working environment. Several multilingual practices will be described, such as the use of translanguaging, receptive multilingualism, multilingual presentations and translating practices, providing examples of how a cross border project could work effectively making use of the different languages of the participants without the need of opting for a monolingual working strategy.

Stefan Diemer / Marie-Louise Brunner
Trier University of Applied Sciences

Effective Digital Language Management: Multilingual Practices on Social Media 

Our paper explores the pragmatics of communication in an international online business context, using a corpus of Instagram and Facebook posts by companies that are internationally active. In order to characterize language use in this complex environment, we follow a corpus-driven discourse analytical approach specifically optimized for multimodal data and providing an applied perspective. Our corpus of Instagram and Facebook data from internationally active companies was compiled by selecting companies with an international customer base and with a certain degree of social media activity from corresponding sectors, providing a differentiated view of current practice. The corpus collection started in 2017 and is still ongoing. The analysis investigates company practices with regard to language use, focusing particularly on the use of multilingual resources. We include a cross-platform analysis of Facebook and Instagram to get a broader picture of multilingual best practices from different social media. A further focus is on how text, images and other multimodal elements such as emojis interact intersemiotically across languages.  The respective affordances of Instagram and Facebook prompt different communication strategies, reflecting differences in purpose and target groups as companies cross virtual borders. The results of the analysis suggest that the companies in our study frequently cross the language barrier, addressing customers in several languages. English, in particular, is used in multiple customer contexts as a business lingua franca.  In sum, the study contributes to analyzing the complex interplay of languages, media and multimodal elements in an online environment. Our approach is intended to contribute to exploring new avenues in research on multilingual practices in a social media professional environment and also provides concrete guidance and best practice examples for internationally active companies seeking to expand their social media presence.

Panel 4-A: Multidimensionale (Grenz-)Raumdiskurse

Als einer der einschlägigsten Trends in der Forschung der Border Studies, ist derzeit wohl die multidimensionale Perspektive auf Grenzen und Grenzräume (vgl. Wille 2021). Unter der Bezeichnung complexity shift wird die Betrachtung zugelassen, Grenzen seien das Resultat von dynamischen Figurationen, die die komplexen Independenzen von Praktiken, Diskursen, Wissen, Materialität, Objekten und Körpern zusammendenken und so Effekte von Debordering und Rebordering Tendenzen beschreiben können. Sozialwissenschaftliche Raumkonstruktionsdebatten laufen in eine ähnliche Richtung, indem Veränderungen in Räumen als Refiguration (Löw et al. 2021) verstanden werden können, was somit die Analyse und Diskussion widersprüchlicher, spannungsreicher und konflikthafter und polykontexturale räumliche Prozesse ermöglicht. Die Erforschung von sozialen, materiellen, räumlich und zeitlichen Grenzraumprozessen ist auch Ziel des Verbundvorhabens Linking Borderlands. Das Konzept des Borderings aufgreifend, nämlich der sozialen Konstruktion und (Re-)Produktion von multidimensionalen Grenzen, soll hier, exemplarisch anhand der Teilprojekte Policy Borderlands und Energy Borderlands gezeigt werden, wie Verflechtungen und räumlich emergente Gefüge in Grenzregionen funktionieren können. Neben den bekannten Konzepten aus den Border und Boundary Studies, wie Borderscapes und Bordertextures, soll hier mit dem Spatial Dispositif auf ein weiteres verwiesen werden, welches die räumliche Arrangement von der Komplexität von Grenzen betont. Dabei wird vor allem auf die aktive Rolle von räumlicher Materialität in der Diskursanalyse Bezug genommen.

Kamil Bembnista
Technische Universität Cottbus-Senftenberg

Transitionsdiskurse grenzregionaler Energieräume an der deutsch-polnischen und deutsch-französischen Grenze 

Der Klimawandel hat sich in den letzten Jahren noch einmal stärker zu einer zentralen Thematik entwickelt, die neben ökologischen Wirkungen auch politische, ökonomische und kulturelle Implikationen entfaltet. Zu einer wichtigen Komponente werden Umbrüche in der Energiegewinnung und -versorgung als fundamentale Transition zugunsten einer low-carbon energy, wobei bereits im 19./20. Jh. grundlegende Verschiebungen erfolgten. In der hier vorgestellten Fallregionen, dem deutsch-polnischen und dem deutsch-französisch Grenzraum, treffen unterschiedliche Entwicklungspfade der Energieträger Kohle, Kernkraft und erneuerbare Energien aufeinander. Wie entwickeln sich diese Energieräume insb. zu Beginn des 21. Jh. zwischen globalen und europäischen Rahmenbedingungen, nationalstaatlichen Politiken und einhergehenden Zielsetzungen sowie regionalen und lokalen Umsetzungen? Die Verbindung eines diskursanalytischen und eines raumtheoretischen Zugriffs (TPSN: territory, place, scale, network) mit Ansätzen der Border Studies ermöglicht eine Differenzierung und einen Vergleich der Borderlands und ihrer Raumkonstruktionen als sozio-materielle Energieräume verschiedener Verflechtungsgrade. Am Beispiel von mediendiskursanalytischen Auswertungen von Artikeln regionaler Zeitungen und Social Media-Profilen von Initiativen im Bereich Energietransitionen, sollen erste Ergebnisse möglicher komplexer Energiegefüge im Grenzraum vorgestellt werden.

Peter Ulrich
Technische Universität Cottbus-Senftenberg / Viadrina Center B/ORDERS in Motion

EU-Grenzräume als mehrdimensionale Arenen des Policy-Lernens, -Transfers und –Innovation. Eine vergleichende Perspektive des deutsch-französischen und deutsch-polnischen Grenzraums 

Grenzüberschreitende territoriale Kooperation ist eine Erfolgsgeschichte EUropas. In den letzten Jahrzehnten hat sich ein grenzüberschreitendes Geflecht an Kooperationsstrukturen über europäische Grenzen hinweg und ein Europa der Grenzregion (Ulrich 2021) entwickelt. Gleichzeitig variiert die Tiefe und Qualität der Kooperation entlang verschiedener Grenzräume voneinander, was auf verschiedene Faktoren zurückzuführen ist. Des Weiteren wurden durch die „Border Renaissance“ einst unsichtbar erscheinende Grenzen wieder sichtbar und haben Einfluss genommen auf den Grad der Zusammenarbeit in den jeweiligen Grenzregionen. Dabei verstehen wir Grenzen als komplexe Phänomene, wobei sich die „Dickheit der Grenze“ durch die Ausprägung verschiedener „boundary layer“ bestimmen lässt. Die Präsentation geht auf grenzüberschreitende Zusammenarbeit als eine multidimensionale Arena ein, wo durch verschiedene politische und grenzbezogenen Praktiken, Wissen und Diskurse Policy-Lern- und –transferprozesse angestossen werden. Auf Basis einer vergleichenden Analyse zwischen dem deutschfranzösischem und deutsch-polnischem Grenzraum werden so die Bedingungen für gelingende grenzüberschreitende Kooperation ermittelt und Ansätze für weitere Policy-Innovationen diskutiert.

[talk canceled]
Vivien Sommer / Sune W. Stoustrup / Kamil Bembnista
Technische Universität Berlin / Leibniz Institut für Raumbezogene Sozialforschung, Erkner / Technische Universität Cottbus-Senftenberg

Spatial Dispositif 

Our paper explores the pragmatics of communication in an international online business context, using a corpus of Instagram and Facebook posts by companies that are internationally active. In order to characterize language use in this complex environment, we follow a corpus-driven discourse analytical approach specifically optimized for multimodal data and providing an applied perspective. Our corpus of Instagram and Facebook data from internationally active companies was compiled by selecting companies with an international customer base and with a certain degree of social media activity from corresponding sectors, providing a differentiated view of current practice. The corpus collection started in 2017 and is still ongoing. The analysis investigates company practices with regard to language use, focusing particularly on the use of multilingual resources. We include a cross-platform analysis of Facebook and Instagram to get a broader picture of multilingual best practices from different social media. A further focus is on how text, images and other multimodal elements such as emojis interact intersemiotically across languages.  The respective affordances of Instagram and Facebook prompt different communication strategies, reflecting differences in purpose and target groups as companies cross virtual borders. The results of the analysis suggest that the companies in our study frequently cross the language barrier, addressing customers in several languages. English, in particular, is used in multiple customer contexts as a business lingua franca.  In sum, the study contributes to analyzing the complex interplay of languages, media and multimodal elements in an online environment. Our approach is intended to contribute to exploring new avenues in research on multilingual practices in a social media professional environment and also provides concrete guidance and best practice examples for internationally active companies seeking to expand their social media presence.

Panel 4-B: Conceptualizing the Border

Christophe Sohn
Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research

The border as a resource: towards a redefinition of the concept 

Christophe Sohn The concept of borders as a resource is generally understood as the ability of border populations to cross borders in order to benefit from the differences they create. In a global context of border security, and taking into account the way in which certain economic and political actors profit from their closure, this article proposes to reconsider the concept of border as a resource according to two dimensions: on the one hand, by broadening its meaning to a wider set of practices and discourses that aim at mobilizing different border opportunities; on the other hand, by deepening the understanding of the mechanisms at play and their social, spatial and political implications. The broadening of the concept is based on the mobilization of the notion of opportunity structure. The deepening of the concept relates to the processes of production of resources from a relational perspective. Redefined in this way, the conceptualization of borders as a resource makes it possible to critically illuminate the different forms of border exploitation and the theoretical and ethical questions that arise as to their changing role and meaning.

Julie Abbou / Karim Hammou
CNRS/Université de Paris / CNRS

Penser le genre depuis ses frontières

Nous proposons de mobiliser la notion de frontière pour penser le genre. Nous postulons que les frontières sont premières, et qu’ensuite viennent les entités qu’elles distinguent, (individus, groupes sociaux, territoires étatiques…). Cette définition non substantialiste des frontières – comme activité, comme interfaces auxquelles des groupes différents peuvent agir ensemble malgré des perspectives divergentes – met l’accent sur le caractère instituant du processus de contact. Elle a montré sa fécondité aussi bien dans l’analyse des relations inter-ethniques que dans la sociologie des professions ou les science studies, par exemple. Regarder aux « frontières du genre » invite alors à observer les lieux et les temps de partition : ceux où des acteurs opèrent symboliquement et matériellement des clivages mobilisant la catégorie de sexe, à penser la distinction entre « masculin » et « féminin » en termes d’opérations concrètes de démarcations, qui sont toujours en même temps des hiérarchies. Cela permet du même coup d'articuler le féminisme matérialiste et les théories queer, autour d’un questionnement des processus de la catégorisation qui repose sur un principe d’anti-essentialisme, dans une volonté de prendre en compte les rapports de pouvoir comme simultanément structurés et résistibles, avec une attention à la pluralité des formes de pouvoir. Nous avançons que la notion de frontières – définies comme relatives, fruits d’activités collectives réitérées et lieux de partage dichotomiques mais plurivoques – permet de saisir la complexité du rapport qu’est le genre en pensant :
1. les pratiques de catégorisations qui, d’un même mouvement, distinguent et associent, que ce mouvement soit violence, résistance, subversion ou solidification ;
2. les frontières du genre comme espace d’interprétations divergentes du genre – où se forment des des objet-frontière (discours, protocoles, dispositifs matériels, etc.) – et donc révélateur des pouvoirs et résistances à l’oeuvre ;
3. l’incertitude, la plurivocité et l’aspect non-permanent des arrangements du genre, pour rappeler que dans toute distinction demeure de l’indivisé, de l’inqualifié, et que celui-ci recompose en permanence les catégories de genre ;
4. enfin, la nécessité de ne pas idéaliser la frontière et de prendre en compte les conséquences concrètes et violentes des grands partages dichotomiques.

Panel 4-C: Borders and Empire

Lena Steveker 
Luxembourg University

Narrating Borders in Contemporary British Fiction 

Both Ali Smith’s Autumn (2016) and John Lanchester’s The Wall (2019) explore the cultural repercussions of the British vote for Brexit. Set in the fall of 2016, Smith’s Autumn is a ‘condition-of-Britain’ novel which traces the divisory lines running through British society in the post-referendum period. Lanchester’s The Wall is a dystopia which not only negotiates twenty-first-century anxieties about climate change, but also comments on the debates on immigration and British identity which have fed into the Brexit vote. I suggest reading these two novels as border narratives, and I take my cue from their shared strategy of using physical means of demarcation as metaphors for the cultural impact of the Brexit referendum: in Autumn, an electrified steel fence – complete with razorwire and security cameras – is built on common land, without any explanation as to its initiators or its purpose. In The Wall, Britain is surrounded by a gigantic concrete wall built in reaction to rising sea levels and increasing numbers of immigrants. In my paper, I will analyse how the fence in Smith’s novel and the wall in Lanchester’s novel serve to narrate different, and indeed competing, stories of Britain and its borders, both physical and cultural. As I will argue, Autumn rejects the idea of borders as lines of territorial enclosures in favour of the notion that borders, in particular those of Britain, are historical and cultural contact zones. In contrast to the open, outward-looking and inclusive notion of borders put forward in Smith’s novel, The Wall conceptualises British borders as closed, inward-looking and exclusive. I will show that despite the novel’s dystopian vision of its titular wall, which reviewers have interpreted as a warning against isolationism, The Wall in fact continues the narrative of Britain as an ‘island story’, its culture best flourishing within the borders established and patrolled by the ‘grand narratives’ of patriarchy, Christianity and the canon of English literature.

Kirsten Sandrock 
University of Göttingen

Britain's Borders: Debordering and Rebordering in Black British and Postcolonial Literature 

Britain's borders have been significantly shaped by the country's highly diverse literary traditions (Fellner/Frenk 2020). In this paper, I wish to draw attention to the contribution postcolonial and Black British authors have made to the cultural imagination of Britain's borders and especially to the critical reflection of debordering and rebordering practices in the UK. Whereas traditional images of Britain's borders have largely created an island iconography that excludes not only Northern Ireland but also the UK's postcolonial legacy – examples range from Shakespeare's "this sceptr'd isle" to the White Cliffs of Dover (McCall 2012) – postcolonial and Black British works frequently challenge the primacy of the island and draw attention to the long history of colonial debordering and rebordering that have turned Britain's borders into an intersectional space of racial, cultural, political gendered, and class boundaries (Sandrock 2019). The talk will first give an overview of which alternative border spaces Black British and postcolonial authors have added to Britain's border spaces and then focus on two examples more specifically: Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie's novel Americanah (2013) and Zadie Smith's essay "Fences" (2016). Both works address the history of what Cathal McCall has called "debordering and rebordering" in the UK (McCall 2012) and both emphasise how Britain's colonial history has created border spaces that cannot be contained within the island iconography. In the current climate of Brexit and BrexLit (Shaw 20180), it is important to remember that inner-British borders and the borders to the EU are globally entangled with the colonial legacy of Britain's borders in territorial, cultural, and linguistic terms.

Jens Temmen 
Universität Düsseldorf

For All Man/Moonkind: Imaginaries of Life Beyond Earth and the Territorialization of Outer Space 

My proposed paper offers an analysis of contemporary imaginaries of human life on the Moon through the lens of the study of US territoriality and border studies. Taking its cue from the recent popularization of Lunar colonization (For All Mankind), projects to identify and safeguard human heritage on the Moon (For All Moonkind), and the recentering of the Moon as part of international politics and resource strategies (Artemis Accords, US Space Force), my paper will analyze the ways in which all of these “astrofuturist” (Ganser) imaginaries contribute to the increasing militarization, commercialization and territorialization of Earth’s Moon. By relating this border renaissance in outer space to the international treaties (“Outer Space and Moon Treaty”) that frame the Moon and other celestial bodies as beyond terrestrial territorial regimes, my paper contributes to the ongoing critique of the alleged stability of exclusive territoriality and clear-cut borders as concepts (Griffiths qtd. in Loukatcheva, “Nunavut” 84; cf. Temmen and Waller).

Panel 4-D: Multiperspectival Moroccan Borders

Rhea Maria Dehn Tutosaus
Technischen Universität Darmstadt

Layers of Matter: Körper, Waren, Textilien als Grenzerfahrungen

Randa Maroufis Kurzfilm Bab Sebta – zu Deutsch das Tor zu Ceuta – inszeniert die spanisch-marokkanische Grenze als langsam ausgeführte Choreographie des täglichen Agierens und der grenzüberschreitenden zyklischen Bewegung in einem theatralen Reenactment. Als Bühne visualisiert wird die Grenze zu einem ‚bewohnbaren‘ Ort, an dem die grenzüberschreitende Interaktion der ‚Bewohner:innen‘ zentral ist. Routinen, Rituale, Handlungen und Schmuggelaktivitäten werden aus zwei Blickwinkeln gezeigt: Zum einen auf dem Boden, in Lebensgröße. Zum anderen von oben, wie der Blick eines Kartographen, der Räume strukturiert; oder wie der Blick aus einem Helikopter, der das Geschehen sieht, überwacht und kontrolliert. Besonders sichtbar in diesem Grenzensemble sind die Porteadoras, die Lastenträgerinnen. Frauen, die sich Schmuggelware und Textilien um den Körper binden, bis sich ihr Umfang verdoppelt, oder sie sich als Paket auf den Rücken schnüren. Die Grenze materialisiert sich somit in den Körpern, die sie überqueren, wie es Gloria Anzaldúa (1987) in Bezug auf La Frontera einführte, sie schreibt sich als Machtstruktur in das Fleisch ein und wird buchstäblich von den Frauen auf ihren Rücken getragen. Es sind Subjekte der Mobilität, die durch ihre kontinuierlichen Grenzüberschreitungen und -erfahrungen als liminal aesthetic bodies konzeptualisiert werden. Die Erweiterung des weiblichen Körpers durch Textilien und Ware ist eine subversive Strategie, die nicht nur die territoriale Grenze als Zone des Übergangs, sondern auch die Überschreitung der Körpergrenzen durch das Textile verhandelt. Die Grenzerfahrung wird in einem doppelten Sinn verstanden: Einerseits als Erweiterung und Überschreitung der Körperlichkeit, und Andererseits als Überquerung und Erweiterung des Grenzraums. Indem der Kurzfilm die unterschiedlichen Rollen und Handlungsstrategien der ‚Grenzbewohner:innen‘ visualisiert und sich auf deren ineinander verwobenes Agieren konzentriert, wird die Grenze zu einem in sich flexiblen Möglichkeitsraum, welcher Handlungsräume hervorbringt.

William Kutz
Université Paris Diderot

Between dependency and engagement: Centring subaltern geopolitics in multiperspectival border studies. Lessons from the Western Sahara

Contributing to the growing interest in multiperspectival border studies, this article advocates for a re‐centring of subaltern geopolitics in the debate. Focusing empirically on Morocco’s diplomatic dispute with the EU over the application of trade agreements to the Western Sahara (2015‐2019), the analysis considers the geopolitical bordering of the controversy through the concepts of dependency and engagement to explain how the disputed territory both structured Morocco’s disadvantageous relationship to the EU, while also giving rise to material and symbolic possibilities for the state leadership to subvert these geopolitical asymmetries in the late 2010s. The events are theorised through the combined lenses of critical border studies, subaltern geopolitics, and the politics of space to bring two complementary insights to the fore: (i) to insist that multiperspectival approaches account for the uneven landscape border power, and the entities that act upon, animate, and transform geopolitical affairs from outside the dominant nodes of power and knowledge; (ii) to destabilize prevailing binaries of geopolitical marginality and centrality through a reading of borders in an irreducibly multiple sense. Together, the analysis demonstrates the value of centring subaltern geopolitics in emerging debates on border multiplicity in the field today, while also avoiding the tendency to reinforce the spectacle of the border itself.

Panel 4-E: Architektur von Grenzräumen

Mit dem Vertrag von Maastricht wurde am 1. November 1993 der Vertrag über die Europäische Union ins Leben gerufen (vgl. Schmuck, Otto/Unser, Günther 2018). Seitdem „[…] garantieren die Europäische Union (EU) und ihre Vorgängerorganisationen den Menschen in ihren Mitgliedsstaaten Wohlstand, politische Stabilität und ein friedliches Zusammenleben“ (Schmuck, Otto/Unser, Günther 2018: 7). Durch Fachkräftemangel und grenzraumspezifische Lohngefälle werden in vielen europäischen Grenzregionen Anreize zur grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierungs- und Ausbildungspraxis ausgelöst. Mehrsprachigkeit und plurikulturelle Kompetenz, insbesondere in der jeweiligen Nachbarsprache, wird für die grenzüberschreitende Mobilität im Berufsorientierungs- und Ausbildungskontext zu einem wichtigen Gut. Sowohl an der deutsch-dänischen Grenze, im Saarland und in Lothringen (vgl. Polzin-Haumann 2017), als auch in Brandenburg und Lebus gibt es sprachenpolitische Ansätze zur Förderung der Nachbarsprache jedoch zeigen die Fortschritte beim Sprachenlernen und -lehren im grenzüberschreitenden Berufsausbildungskontext weiterhin noch großes Entwicklungspotenzial. Im Rahmen des Panels werden grenzraumspezifische Aspekte sozialer Praxis und Sprache im grenzüberschreitenden Berufsausbildungskontext im Kontext der jeweiligen (sprach)politischen Rahmenbedingungen diskutiert. Die Vorträge im Panel behandeln dabei folgende Fragestellungen:

1. Wie gestaltet sich die Architektur der Grenzräume im Hinblick auf geographische Gegebenheiten, Population sowie Mobilität? Welche Akteure entlang der Grenzen beschäftigen sich mit der Förderung grenzübergreifender Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung? Wie ist das Verhältnis zwischen verschiedenen Akteuren und Angeboten?
2. In welchem sprachpolitischen Rahmen bewegen sich Angebote der grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung und welche Beispiele können hier benannt werden?
3. Welche spezifischen Herausforderungen, Hindernisse und Chancen gibt es bei Angeboten zur grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung im Bereich der Sprachlernpraxis?

In den drei geplanten Beiträgen wird die Rolle der Grenze und ihres Charakters für die Herausforderungen und Chancen der grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und konkreter Ausbildungsangebote und deren praktischer Umsetzung exemplarisch und kontrastiv in den drei Grenzregionen behandelt. Ziel ist es, die dadurch sichtbar werdende Architektur der Grenzräume vergleichend zu diskutieren.

Konstanze Jungbluth / Nicole Richter / Sara Bonin / Dagna Zinkhahn-Rhobodes
Europa-Universität Viadrina und Viadrina Center B/Orders in Motion

Rahmenbedingungen des Sprachlernangebots in der grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung im deutsch-polnischen Verflechtungsraum

Der Berufsausbildungskontext, als Tor zur grenzüberschreitenden Arbeitswelt, stellt einen Teilbereich dar, in dem sich politische Bestrebungen, Hürden und Chancen wie unter einem Brennglas beobachten lassen. Kommunikation über Grenzen hinweg spielt hierbei eine besondere Rolle. Die Sprachenpolitik in Grenzräumen beeinflusst maßgeblich die Qualität und Quantität grenzüberschreitender Angebote im Berufsausbildungskontext. Auf europäischer Ebene kommt hierbei das Muttersprache-Plus-Zwei-Prinzip, also das politische Ziel der Dreisprachigkeit, für alle in der Europäischen Union lebenden Menschen zum Tragen, welches erstmals 2002 auf dem Treffen des Rates der Europäischen Union in Barcelona formuliert wurde. In der Übertragung des Barcelona-Prinzips in einzelne Grenzregionen müssen die jeweiligen Nachbarsprachen Teil des Dreisprachigkeitskonzepts sein (Landtag Brandenburg, 2021). Wie gestaltet sich die Sprachen- und Kommunikationsförderung in der grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung im deutsch-polnischen Verflechtungsraum? Im Rahmen des Panels Architektur von Grenzräumen in der sprachenübergreifenden Ausbildungspraxis gibt der Vortrag einen Einblick in die (sprach)politisch-institutionellen Rahmenbedingungen der grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung in der deutsch-polnischen Grenzregion Brandenburg-Lubuskie. Zunächst wird hierbei auf die geographischen Gegebenheiten sowie die Mobilität der Population eingegangen. Als Teil der Darstellung der Architektur des deutsch-polnischen Verflechtungsraums werden zudem Schulen, Unternehmen und Handelskammern unter sprachlicher Perspektive vorgestellt und die juristische Fundierung bzw. administrativen Ausführungsbestimmungen der konkreten Umsetzung vor Ort werden gegenübergestellt. Neben den Best Practice-Beispielen von Projekten zur grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung werden insbesondere Herausforderungen und Chancen grenzüberschreitender Ausbildungskooperationen auf der Grundlage von Expert*inneninterviews diskutiert. Der Schwerpunkt liegt hierbei auf dem Sprachenlernen in der grenzüberschreitenden Berufsorientierung und -ausbildung.

Claudia Polzin-Haumann / Leonie Micka
Universität des Saarlandes

Grenzüberschreitende berufliche Aus- und Weiterbildung: Ein Blick auf das Saarland

„Die europäische Idee gewinnt an Realität. Greifbarer als je zuvor ist heute die Chance, eine immer engere Union der Völker Europas zu verwirklichen. Im Rahmen dieses Integrationsprozesses kommt den Gebieten an den Binnengrenzen eine besondere Rolle zu: Gerade hier wächst Europa zusammen“ (Gipfel der Großregion 1996: 1). Mit diesen Worten beginnt die „Gemeinsame Grundsatzerklärung“ des 1. Gipfels der Großregion am 20. September 1995. Seitdem haben es sich die Teilnehmer des Gipfels zur Aufgabe gemacht ein Zusammengehörigkeitsgefühl innerhalb der Großregion zu schaffen und durch Kooperationen, beispielsweise in den Bereichen Wirtschaft, Tourismus und Bildung, Grenzen zu überwinden (vgl. ebd). Im Sprachunterricht in Grenzregionen geht es neben dem Spracherwerb darum, von der Grenze zu profitieren. So sollen durch Freundschaften Brücken zum Nachbarland entstehen und ein nachbarschaftliches Verhältnis geschaffen werden (vgl. Raasch 2003). Mit der „Rahmenvereinbarung für die Kooperation in der grenzüberschreitenden beruflichen Aus- und Weiterbildung Saarland-Lothringen / Accord-cadre pour la coopération transfrontalière en formation professionnelle intiale et continue“ im Jahr 2014 wurde eine erste Tür zur grenzüberschreitenden Arbeitswelt geöffnet. Bestandteil der Rahmenvereinbarung ist es „[…] deutschen und französischen Jugendlichen, die Möglichkeit zu geben, den praktischen Teil ihrer Ausbildung – auf der Grundlage eines Ausbildungsvertrags – in einem Unternehmen des Nachbarlandes zu absolvieren“ (Gipfelsekretariat der Großregion 2014: 3). Zudem haben die jungen Heranwachsenden die Möglichkeit, neben dem Abschluss in ihrem Heimatland ebenfalls die Prüfung im Nachbarland abzulegen und so eine Doppelqualifikation zu erhalten, wodurch ihnen ein Zugang zum deutsch-französischen Arbeitsmarkt geboten wird (vgl. ebd.). Im Rahmen des Panels werden das Saarland und Lothringen in Hinblick auf grenzraumspezifische Aspekte sozialer Praxis und Sprache im grenzüberschreitenden Berufsausbildungskontext in den Fokus genommen. Neben den besonderen geographischen Gegebenheiten der Großregion sollen die unterschiedlichen Akteure und deren Tätigkeitsfeld in der grenzüberschreitenden Ausbildung vorgestellt und mit den Rahmenbedingungen der Sprachenpolitiken verglichen werden. So werden im Laufe des Panels sowohl Chancen und Hindernisse als auch Herausforderungen identifiziert.

Camilla Hansen
UC SYD in Dänemark

Herausforderungen und Perspektiven für Nachbarsprachen am Beispiel der deutsch-dänischen Grenzregion

Camilla Franziska Hansen wird in ihrem Beitrag auf die bildungspolitischen sowie diskursiven Herausforderungen eingehen, die im deutsch-dänischen Grenzraum für Deutsch und Dänisch als Nachbarsprachen existieren. Das Fach Deutsch steht in Dänemark mit sinkenden Schülerzahlen und fallenden Zahlen für Studierende seit Jahren in einer Krise. Dänisch in Schleswig-Holstein hingegen basiert mit den seit dem Schuljahr 2016/17 geltenden Fachanforderungen auf „einer regional verankerten Nachbarsprachendidaktik“ und hat somit aus bildungspolitischer Perspektive einen Sonderstatus. Der Beitrag wird die unterschiedlichen Gegebenheiten, unter denen die Nachbarsprachen im deutsch-dänischen Grenzraum verwaltet werden, erörtern und perspektivieren.

Panel 5-A: Hybrid Borderlands

Isis Luxenburger / Andrea Wurm
IRTG Diversity Saarland University / Saarland University

Overcoming Borders. Cinematic Representations of Border Languaging in Industrial Borderlands

Many audiovisual documents stem from or illustrate industrial activities in the Greater Region. Due to its geological and geopolitical specificities, this region has forced people to overcome the ever-changing borders as numerous economic activities would not have been possible without cross-border cooperation. Films belonging to different genres shed light on practices of bordering, re- and de-bordering. In this paper, we will present some examples of border languaging in those films and put them in the larger context of re- and de-bordering in the industrial history of the Greater Region. We enrich our audiovisual material with (archival) research to better understand the practices as well as the motivations behind the persons’ and companies’ acting which are shown in film excerpts. The vision of a peaceful and borderless Europe is of particular interest and becomes a driving force behind several audiovisual productions. But the corpus also yields instances of ordinary people communicating across borders or of companies establishing cross-border networks of production and sale. Our holistic approach within the methodology of bordertexturing (cf. Weier et al. 2018) allows for a thick description (Geertz) and a deep reading of films (or film excerpts). Thus, we are able to analyze complex re- and de-bordering practices based on audiovisual material produced for different reasons and audiences. Motivations and overarching goals become clearer and the films can be seen as a tool used – with or without intention – to hint at practices and discourses overcoming boundaries in a region with permanently (re-)nascent borders.

Tobias Schank
Linking Borderlands, Saarland University

Of Three Colors and Third Spaces: Discussing the Construction of Cultural Identities in Borderlands and Their Representation in Film 

In this paper, I intend to combine elements of film phenomenology with the recently introduced theoretical and methodological apparatus of border texturing. I see a structural homology that connects film phenomenology’s prioritization of the body for a better understanding of cinema and border textures’ proposal to configure “theor[ies] in the flesh” for a better understanding of borders. Both film phenomenology and border texturing seek to investigate a third space that weaves together hitherto disjointed spheres marked and marred by the primacy of difference. Seen in this light, film and borders contain and convey meaning and construct identity through the nexus of the body, as it is created, represented and perceived in a hybridized third space between the ‘here’ and ‘there’. I will illustrate these theoretical deliberations in the example of two films, DREI FARBEN SCHWARZ: SCHICKSALE IM BERGBAU VON BELGIEN, LOTHRINGEN UND DER SAAR (1997) by Christian and Dorlie Fuchs and GRENZLAND: EINE REISE (1992) by Andreas Voigt. The two films are situated at different borderlands, the former in the Greater Region that conjoins elements of the Saarland, Lorraine, and Wallonia, the latter in the Polish-German borderlands. Interestingly, not only do both films share an aesthetic and thematic approach to their subject matter that corroborates the theoretical aspirations of this paper. They also share a common ancestor in Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Kieślowski, whose THREE COLORS-trilogy (1993-1994) unmistakably inspired DREI FARBEN SCHWARZ’s programmatic title, and who incidentally functioned as both mentor and cinematic subject to filmmaker Andreas Voigt. I believe that this rhizomatic texturing of interdisciplinary theory and methodology with filmic examples, which are already in and of themselves interwoven, will produce a multilayered tapestry of insights both about the hybridization of cultural identities in borderlands and their representation in film.

 

Screening "The Saar"

Havrilla, Alois (Erzähler/narrator/voix), The Saar, Vagabond Adventure Series, Van Beuren/RKO, US 1935.

Der US-amerikanische filmische Reisebericht „The Saar“ wurde vor Ort in der zweiten Januarhälfte des Jahres 1935 gedreht und erschien als der viertletzte Teil der Reise-Kurzfilm-Reihe „Vagabond Adventure Series“, die von Van Beuren produziert und von RKO vertrieben wurde. Vor „The Saar“ entstanden Kurzfilme wie „Cuba“ (1933), „Gibraltar. Guardian of the Mediterranean“ (1934) und „Madeira. The Land of Wine“ (1934). Nachdem die Filmreihe in „World on Parade Series“ umbenannt wurde, folgten zwanzig weitere Reiseberichte, darunter „Venice of the North“ (1936) über Stockholm und „Manhattan Waterfront“ (1937) über New York City. In dieser Liste bekannter Orte scheint die Präsenz des Saarlandes auf den ersten Blick überraschend. Doch bei genauerer Betrachtung fügt sich das vormals unabhängige Land mit seiner Sonderstellung zwischen 1920 und 1935 treffend in diese Liste interessanter Orte ein.
Während ein hohes Medieninteresse vor und während der Saarabstimmung für die Entstehung zahlreicher internationaler Filmberichte über das Saargebiet als unabhängiges Land zwischen Deutschland und Frankreich sorgte, sticht die filmische Dokumentation des an Deutschland angeschlossenen Saargebiets der Vorkriegszeit in „The Saar“ hervor. Da der Reisebericht den Alltag, das Leben, die Beschäftigungen und die Arbeitsplätze der Bewohnerinnen und Bewohner – der Männer, Frauen und Kinder – im ehemaligen Saargebiet dokumentiert, ist „The Saar“ nicht nur ein zeitgeschichtliches Dokument, sondern ein bedeutsamer Schatzfund für das lokale wie regionale, industrielle und kulturelle Filmerbe des Saarlandes und der Großregion.

Panel 5-B: Transnational Feminisms

Die Notwendigkeit der Vernetzung feministischer Praxis ergibt sich aus dem gemeinsamen Bewohnen einer globalisierten Welt. Große Strukturzusammenhänge und Kontinuitäten lassen sich nur in transnationaler Perspektive erkennen und geben bis heute die zentralen Aktionskomplexe transnationaler Feminismen vor. Themenfelder von globaler, ja, weltbürgerlicher Bewandtnis können Aushandlungen von Staatlichkeit und Staatsbürgerschaft, Friedenspolitik, nachhaltiger Weltentwicklung, Selbstbestimmung sowie Körper- und Gewaltpolitiken sein. Die Bündelung der Kräfte rund um diese Bereiche durch das Schmieden weltweiter feministischer Allianzen kann hier einen Mehrwert für die Durchsetzung der Ziele bilden und stellen gleichzeitig eine der brisantesten Herausforderungen innerhalb der feministischen Praxis und Theoriebildung dar. Das kohäsive Auftreten partikularer und lokaler Feminismen lässt sich auf Faktoren wie das Angebot einer gemeinsamen Gruppenidentität und gemeinsamer aktivistischer Handlungsschauplätze, politischer Strategien und das Formulieren einer feministischen Agenda auf Grundlage konkreter Lebensrealitäten zurückführen. Im transnationalen Feminismus muss, ob der Verschiedenheiten der weltweit unterschiedlichen Positionen, Identitäten und Handlungsspielräumen von Frauen, dieses Terrain der Nähe und Verbindlichkeit verlassen werden. Des Weiteren können keine weltweiten Lösungen erarbeitet werden, auch nicht für weltweite Probleme. Zwar beinhalten globale Konflikte stets eine Genderdimension, deren konkrete Gestalt konfiguriert sich lokal jedoch höchst unterschiedlich. Worin liegt der Mehrwert einer transnationalen feministischen Solidarität? Und wie kann diese sich globaler Probleme annehmen, ohne selbst in Denken und Handeln in ebendiesen Problemkomplexen verstrickt zu sein, wie es beispielsweise in Form von imperialistischen Gesten westlicher Feministinnen in der Vergangenheit der Fall war? Dieser Beitrag möchte auf theoretischer Ebene unterschiedliche Fallstricke transnationaler Feminismen problematisieren und darauf hinweisen, welche Antagonismen, die über machtvolle Differenzierungen etabliert werden, zu überwinden sind. In einem zweiten Schritt werden unterschiedliche Transferpraxen und Modelle zum Umgang mit Vielfalt aus partikularen Feminismen, die (auf engsten Raum bestehende) Unterschiede zwischen Frauen innerhalb partikularer Gruppen konsolidieren sollen, vorgestellt und auf ihre Übertragbarkeit in einen transnationalen Kontext geprüft und diskutiert. In dem Beitrag sollen Möglichkeiten zur Überschreitung innerfeministischer Grenzen, seien sie symbolischer, kultureller oder epistemischer Art untersucht und in Abhängigkeit zu außerfeministischen Grenzen, z.B. solche geopolitischer Natur, kontextualisiert werden.

Heike Mißler
Universität des Saarlandes

Disrupting White Hegemonic Feminism in the Chick-Lit Genre: Candice Carty Williams’s Queenie (2019) and Ayisha Malik’s Sofia Khan Is Not Obliged (2015)

Candice Carty Williams’s Queenie (2019) and Ayisha Malik’s Sofia Khan Is Not Obliged (2015) are two relatively recent novels by British authors of colour that have been classified and marketed as chick lit. Chick lit is an umbrella term for female-centred, humorous novels which became popular in the 1990s with titles such as Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary (1996) or Candace Bushnell’s Sex and the City (1997). Due to its most successful, or rather, most visible heroines, chick lit is often perceived to be a white genre, even though it has been adapted in numerous cultures around the world. Indeed, some scholars convincingly argue that it can be considered a global discourse and a genre of world literature (see, e.g., Folie 2020). As numerous studies have shown, these global variations of chick lit - some of which predate Fielding’s and Bushnell’s novels, and many of which are written by people of colour – address a multitude of issues that are at the heart of transnational feminism, such as questions of belonging, citizenship, and migration, and the intersections of class, race, and gender (see, e.g., Ponzanesi 2014; Hedrick 2015; and Hurt 2019). In fact, chick lit, although it is frequently belittled and dismissed by critics because it is genre fiction, lends itself well to the negotiation of female identity and agency, because it puts its primary focus on women’s everyday-life experiences. Queenie and Sofia Khan Is Not Obliged productively engage with some of the key debates in transnational feminism by showing their heroines’ struggles with racism in a majority-white, Western society, and the challenges of creating and upholding a functioning support network - a sisterhood - which reaches across cultures. Moreover, both novels are read by and address both white readers and readers of colour and hence have helped to extend debates about female solidarity and white hegemonic feminism beyond the page.

Nicole Fischer
Universität des Saarlandes

Zum Mehr- und Streitwert transnationaler feministischer Solidarität. Versuch einer Bilanz

Transnationale Solidarität ist in den letzten Jahren als feministisches Projekt immer mehr in den Hintergrund gerückt. Diese Entwicklung kann man als Nachwirken des Scheiterns der Globalen Schwesternschaft, einer Initiative des weißen Feminismus verstehen. Dieser Aufruf zum gemeinsamen Kampf im Namen aller Frauen hat durch seine kurzsichtige, hegemoniale und eurozentristische Auffassung der condition feminine dazu geführt, Frauen aus dem Kollektivprojekt auszuschließen, anstatt sie vereint zu mobilisieren. Die Idee, als Anhänger*innen einer marginalisierten Gruppe Verbündete rund um den Globus zu finden, hat sich in Folge dieser spaltenden Erfahrung als utopisches Projekt diskreditiert. Die an den weißen Feminismus herangetragene Kritik wurde ernstgenommen. Aus den Fehlern der Vergangenheit wurde jedoch die Konsequenz gezogen, auf Interventionen auf globaler Ebene zu verzichten, um der Gefahr einer Bevormundung anderer Feminist*innen zu entgehen, die sich aus dem ungleichen Kräfteverhältnis entlang der Nord-/Südachse ergeben könnten. Ina Kerner warnt vor den Folgen des Rückzugs westlicher Feminist*innen aus dem internationalen Ter-rain, was den Auftakt eines Rückfalls in einen „Semi-Provinzialismus“, also einer Wiedergeburt nationaler bzw. ethnisch-kultureller Grenzen als Wirkungs- und Bezugsrahmen feministischer Arbeit bilden könnte. Sie plädiert daher für eine sinnvolle Aufarbeitung unterschiedlicher Positionen im feministischen Kampf und für einen machtenthobenen Umgang mit Differenzen. Bereits in den 80er Jahren erklärte Spivak in French Feminism in an International Frame, dass der Verzicht auf das symbolische, intellektuelle und epistemologische Kapital westlicher Feminist*innen keine Alternative sei und im Sinne einer Verbesserung der Lebenssituation von Frauen weltweit genutzt und zugänglich gemacht werden müsse. In diesem Beitrag sollen in diachroner Perspektive und mit einem besonderen Fokus auf westliche Feminismen und Theoriebildungen diejenigen Fallstricke aufgerufen werden, die die feministische Zusammenarbeit über Grenzen hinweg erschwert beziehungsweise kategorisch ausgeschlossen haben. Damit sollen die Differenzen, die zu der angesprochenen Konjunktur lokal begrenzter feministischer Arbeit geführt haben, theoretisch reflektiert werden und gleichzeitig der Mehrwert einer transnationalen Solidarität erörtert werden.

Fatma-Pia Hotait
Universität des Saarlandes

Perspectives sur le traitement des différences dans les luttes féministes

Dans cette partie de la discussion, nous allons nous intéresser à la manière dont plusieurs mouvements féministes agissent ou réagissent à la diversité. Cette thématique nous amènera à évoquer le concept d’affidamento, la « mise en confiance », qui décrit la relation entre la femme qui a le savoir et celle qui le demande en absence de tout hiérarchie entre les deux. L’idée est de s’éloigner des décennies précédentes, qui se concentraient sur un féminisme horizontal et totalement égalitaire : dans l’affidamento, les féministes reconnaissent la différence de savoir de chaque femme et l’utilisent pour transmettre leurs connaissances. Il s’agit ainsi de décrire une manière de transmission du savoir issu d’une féministe experte d’un sujet ou d’un terrain duquel une féministe « novice » peut jouir, sans pour autant qu’il y ait une forme de hiérarchie entre elles. Cela permettait un « empowerment » des féministes en évitant que des couches hiérarchiques se forment au sein du réseau. En lieu, le savoir est transmis de femme en femme dans un cercle fructueux. En plus, nous évoquerons plusieurs exemples, notamment du Féminisme Islamique et celles du Black Feminism aux États-Unis. Ainsi, nous verrons comment, en fonction des régions géographiques mais aussi des différentes problématiques que rencontrent les femmes en fonction des territoires qu’elles habitent, leur combat est souvent double. Un exemple assez général que nous déclinerons et détaillerons par la suite sera le double combat contre 1) la domination occidentale, blanche, hétérosexuelle, et 2) les discriminations auxquelles les femmes doivent faire face en raison des sociétés dans lesquelles elles évoluent au niveau local. Nous évoquerons les mouvements féministes en Amérique latine, au Moyen-Orient, dans les pays d’Europe occidentale. Cette diversité géographique permettra de voir à quel point les combats locaux varient en fonction des pays et des zones territoriales et pourquoi il est important que les féministes soient instruites non seulement à un niveau local mais également global. Enfin, nous donnerons des clés pour promouvoir un mouvement féministe transnational au-delà des frontières géographiques, qui permettrait d’ériger une base de savoir libre d’accès et commune à toutes féministes.

Panel 5-C: Literary Narratives of Border Crossing

News coverage of migration to the United States in the last years often concentrated solely on the U.S.-Mexican border and the notorious border wall. In this time of (heated) debates about migration, border crossing and border control, this panel considers recent literary productions which approach migration to the United States of America as well as migration within the U.S. from diverse perspectives.

Svitlana Kot
Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University

"Border Children": the Image of a Child in Border-crossing Literary Narratives

The last decades have seen an unprecedented increase in the number of children crossing various borders out of the need to flee wars and violence, seek asylum and better life, with their parents or unaccompanied. At the U.S.-Mexico Border alone, ten times more migrant children, since the beginning of 2021, are reported to be waiting to cross into the US or being returned. These children represent at least 30 percent of the migrant population in this region. Due to the deepening migrant crisis, the issue of juvenile migration has become a growing concern worldwide and thus received considerable attention not only among political activists, researchers of various fields, but also writers. Recently, a considerable literature both for children and adults has grown up around the theme of  minors at the border including but not limited to Border Child by Michel Stone, Separated by the Border: A Birth Mother, a Foster Mother, and a Migrant Child's 3,000-Mile Journey by Gena Thomas, The Only Road by Alexandra Diaz, Enrique's Journey: The Story of a Boy's Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with His Mother by Sonia Nazario. Such novels explore the experiences of children crossing/ living/ imagining borders.  This paper will focus on a range of representations of  children experiencing borderlands. The critical optic of this paper seeks to unravel the narrative construction of the image of a child as a border-crosser. The research intends to demonstrate how authors explore and reexamine border practices and policies through the lens of childhood across various cultural, spatial, and temporal dimensions.

Bärbel Schlimbach
Universität des Saarlandes

Re-Negotiating Migration Narratives in the American West: C. Pam Zhang's How Much of these Hills Is Gold

Literary narratives of European/American settlement of the American West traditionally concentrated on settler perspectives and tales of linear movement from East to West which were connected to Frederick Jackson Turner’s concept of the “frontier” as the focal point of Americanization and the creation of an American identity. Native American as well as non-white perspectives within this hegemonic national narrative were often neglected or even completely silenced. Literary texts about territorial expansion of the U.S. or migrant experiences negotiate these topics on several levels, for example textual, symbolic, generic or epistemological. My paper analyzes C. Pam Zhang's historical novel How Much of these Hills Is Gold in the context of migration and border crossings. The novel narrates the story of two Chinese children who immigrate to California in the 19th century, to be more precise in the time of the California gold rush and depicts their experiences in the “new” country. My analysis will focus on representations of borders in the American West as well as underlying power relations which establish border control, border regimes and bordering practices in connection to (historical) geographical borders but also symbolic and other borders. Additionally, I will consider literary representations of possible reasons for migration to the United States: the imaginary factor of the American West or the U.S. in general and “the American Dream.” My analysis shows the novel’s potential to re-evaluate discourses about the American West and its history/histories by adding an Asian American immigrant perspective and by shifting the emphasis from the hegemonic East to West direction to multidirectional interconnections or even rhizomatic structures.

Oksana Starshova 
Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University

Spatiality of Migration: Real and Imaginary New York in Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland

Among many American cities New York is probably the one that holds the sense of Americanness more than any other due to its history, geography, architecture, people, and community that might be considered representative of the whole nation. At the same time the city is particularly unique, because for many an immigrant it became a frontier and a border zone on the way to the inside of the country. Although migrants have constituted a great part of New York population since its foundation and therefore have contributed to the literary imagination throughout decades, the beginning of this century has witnessed the surge of texts specifically focused on the migrants’ sensibility and point of view. Such shifts in the perception of the city provide estrangement  and open up new perspectives, as they express the thorough interest to the places of New York, stereotypified, mythologized and unknown; they depict the clash between the city imaginary and its real urban landscapes; and they dwell upon the pre-arrival expectations and the aftermath of the everyday life reconnaissance. Joseph O’Neill in his Netherland novel revisits New York with a migrant’s eye. This point of view allows to reconsider the history and myth of America. In the focus of this study are the correlations between the real New York places present in the novel and the imaginary of the city formed in a migrant’s mind. In the novel the urban New York cedes to the immigrants’ New York of parks and subtropical variety. American dream and the dream of Eden are mixed together to achieve transgression consisting in the heterogeneity of space and cultural interaction. New York becomes the zone of “porous borders” or creative crossroads rather than isolating or demarcating boundaries.