Conference "Relocating Borders: a comparative approach", Berlin, Humboldt University, 11-13 January 2013

Deadline for applications: 31st May 2012
Second EastBordNet Conference

www.eastbordnet.org

Borders are taking on greater significance these days, even while their
meaning is changing
and multiplying. This conference brings together research on the way
borders are currently
being relocated, in every sense, both material and conceptual. While the
conference focuses
particularly on the eastern peripheries of Europe (whose precise
location, either in terms of
'eastern' or 'peripheries' is also currently being debated), it invites
researchers working on
any regions of the world to participate. That will provide both a rich
comparative perspective,
but also allow an exploration of the shifting interrelations between
locations.
It is not surprising that borders are currently a key focus of
attention: there are more people,
things, money, debt and ideas moving across them, and they are moving at
a faster pace; state
power is increasingly challenged, as well as reinforced, by
globalisation, while more walls,
security and surveillance are constructed; intense debates are raging
about environment and
climate change and the apparent need to straddle borders to solve the
problems they generate;
information, digital and medical technologies have reshaped the
relations and separations
across borders, and made differences and similarities more visible; the
European Union and
other trans-state entities have made borders ever more complex; the
balance of power across
the world is changing. In short, borders appear to be relocating just
now, both conceptually
and materially, and this conference invites researchers from all
disciplines to come together
to compare notes on this major shift. On the assumption that the change
is epistemological as
well as ontological, the best way to explore that process is through
comparison.
Berlin is the right place to hold such a gathering: traces of the city's
past remain despite the
removal of the Wall, that icon of Cold War border in Europe. Those
traces are most obvious
in what used to be the gap beyond the wall: no-man's land has been
filled by a jumble of
contemporary buildings, creating what some say is a strip of neoliberal
landscape flowing
across the city where once there had been emptiness. The gentrification
of many
neighborhoods in East Berlin (and elsewhere) has generated internal
inequalities, while the
previously migrant neighborhoods have become vibrant alternative
districts both socially and
politically. Humboldt University, where the conference will be held, is
in the immediate
proximity of the Wall's trace. The conference will include a round table
devoted to Berlin's
special status in Europe as a city that traces and marks both past and
contemporary
significance of borders in Europe.

Relocating Borders is organized by COST 2 Action IS0803

Keynote speakers:
Thomas Hyland Eriksen (Oslo)
Caren Kaplan (UC Davis)
Saskia Sassen (Columbia)

and for a special session on Berlin, Daniel Libeskind, designer of the
Berlin Jewish
Museum and master planner for the design of the post-9/11 World Trade
Center.

Conference Topics:

Applicants are welcome to submit either individual papers or panel
proposals on any topic of
their choice relevant to the conference theme. Alternatively, you may
choose to submit under
one of the following headings:
1. European Tidemarks
2. Money, Trade and Finance
3. Genders and Sexualities
4. Techniques and Technologies
5. Laws, Documents, Bureaucracies
6. Beliefs, Faiths and Religions
7. Architectures, Things and Objects
8. Places, Spaces and Locations
9. Histories and Futures
10. Travels and Crossings
How to Apply:
Please fill in the form that can be downloaded here:

www.eastbordnet.org/conferences/2013/

Deadline: 31 May 2012

What happens next:
Your proposal will be assessed by the conference committee, and you will
be informed of the
result by 25th June 2012. If you are selected, you must confirm your
acceptance of the offer
by Monday 9th July.