A border‐as‐tidemarks in the Polish–German borderland
in Social Anthropology/Anthropologie socialeSearch for other papers by Agnieszka Halemba in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
All currencies in US Dollar
Since 2004, when Poland joined the EU, and especially since 2007, when it joined the Schengen zone, the Polish–German border, formerly perceived and experienced as highly controlled, has been increasingly described as a disappearing one. Yet the border as a spatial organisation of difference is still a part of the everyday experience of the inhabitants of the region. Especially younger Polish people see the border as a valuable resource, with a potential to make their life easier and better. I show how the continuous presence of the (open) border influences the practices of people on the ground. I conceptualise this border as a set of multiple tidemarks that are simultaneously visible and consequential, as well as ephemeral and changing. From the perspective of people living next to the state border, the multifarious border has strong virtual aspects – it is a set of potentialities that can be, but do not have to be, realised as resources.