Changing Functions of a Border Festival
Insights from Friendship/Slavic Unity Festival at the Triple Border of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5625713 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Ekaterina Mikhailova (0000-0001-9106-4824, University of Tromsø, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Pages | 1-30 |
| Publication date | 2025-10-15 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Geopolitics (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1465-0045 • E-ISSN: 1557-3028 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/14650045.2025.2562292 |
| OpenAlex | W4415206919 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 33 |
Following the need for critical reflection on post-Soviet bordering and othering, notably between Ukraine and Russia, this paper focuses on the triple borderland of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, and the originally trilateral festival celebrated there annually since 1969. The study relies on content analysis of festival programmes and media reports from the three countries covering the Festival editions from 2001 to 2022 with the main focus on the period of 2014–2021. By examining the disruptions and resignifications that the Festival was subject to before and after 2014 and asking why the Festival survived this rupture, this paper provides a new perspective on how the short-lived, authentic dialogue among Ukraine, Russia and Belarus and their border regions was replaced with a performance of dialogue. By synthesising the literature on borders, spectacle and performance, a heuristic model to study changing functions of border festivals is proposed identifying ten such functions. The paper shows that the Festival at the tri-point of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus has had at least five out of the ten border festival functions over its half a century of existence. The paper discusses comparatively the Festival in relation to its different editions and in relation to other border festivals worldwide. It is expected that the heuristic for studying changing functions of border festivals will facilitate future cross-national and cross-temporal comparative studies of border festivals
Foreign policy · Geopolitics · International relations · Politics · Cross-Border Cooperation and Integration · Sport and Mega-Event Impacts · Urbanization and City Planning
The Spectacular State
Border as Method, or, the Multiplication of Labor
Constructing the political spectacle
Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly
Performing community
Structural features of the economy and gradients of socioeconomic development of the border regions of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine
Ethnocultural gradient and regional identity along the Russian-Ukrainian-Belarussian Borderlands
Transnational EncountersMusic and Performance at the U.S.-Mexico Border
The Geopolitics of Spectacle
The co-mingling of bordering dynamics in the San Diego–Tijuana cross-border metropolis
Clashing geopolitical self-images? The strange co-existence of Christian bulwark and Eurasianism (Turanism) in Hungary
Territorial Dynamics, Cross-border Work and Everyday Life in the Finnish–Swedish Border Area
Cross-Border Regions in Europe
Kirkenes
Post-Soviet Borders
Viva George
Ritual and Affect in Europe Day Celebrations
Everyday Europeanization and Bottom-Up Geopolitics at the Ukrainian-Polish Border
The inconspicuous power of border festivals
The Postcolonial Moment in Russia’s War Against Ukraine
Tales of Faith
Sixth Avenue is now a memory
Decolonial paths through borderlands
A Geopolitical Analysis of Popular Songs in the CCTV Spring Festival Gala, 1983-2013
Waiting at Giurgiulesti Customs
Re-Thinking Border Politics at the Sarajevo Film Festival
Geopoliticisation of Belonging
Theorizing Borders
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |