The everyday at the border

Examining visual, material and spatial intersections of international politics along the ‘Balkan Route’

Datos Bibliográficos

ID8912475
AutoresJelena Obradovic-Wochnik (0000-0003-0850-2737, autor de correspondencia), G Bird (0000-0002-6527-3195)
Año2019
Volumen55
Número1
Páginas41-65
Fecha de publicación2019-11-07
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaCooperation and Conflict (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0010-8367 • E-ISSN: 1460-3691
EditorialSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0010836719882475
OpenAlexW2979847662
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas12
Referencias citadas41

This article examines the intersections between the visual, spatial and material and considers how these interactions capture the border politics of everyday ‘banal’ objects. We do this by looking at some of the objects and things that constitute the ‘Balkan Route’ through Europe: posters, signs, directions, notices, flyers and maps produced by state authorities and volunteer-led aid networks. We use objects to reflect more broadly on how seemingly banal and everyday things become incorporated into the political work of states and become constitutive of fluid borders. We argue that everyday objects become visualisations of states and authorities, and help to make and regulate physical spaces. We show how each visual object encountered along the route gives us a broader insight into the macropolitics of European border regimes, specifically the effects of ‘closed borders’ and the criminalisation of aid networks. The article pushes forward the ‘aesthetic turn’ debate in international relations by bringing in insights from political geography and materialism, and suggests that a walking methodology can be a productive way of encountering the visual and understanding how its physical location creates political effects

Aesthetics · Art · Epistemology · Everyday life · Materialism · Object (grammar · Political economy · Political geography · Political science · Politics · Sociology · State (computer science · Computer Science · Global Security and Public Health · Law · Peacebuilding and International Security