Every now and then, reality brings us new important events, interesting phenomena and intriguing questions that call for close observation and insightful reflection. As it seems, these activities will often be fostered by the formula of integrated efforts of people representing many scientific centres, different disciplines, theoretical and methodological approaches, and – last but not least – widely understood non-academic circles.

There is no shortage of valuable references in Polish social sciences on this issue. Theoretical and empirical reflections on the diversity of social phenomena occurring in borderlands have been developed since the end of the 1980s, in a way referring to the tradition dating back to the interwar period, and these differences have been inscribed in a number of categories, such as ‘social borderland’ (‘transborderland’), ‘administrative borderland’ (‘borderland area’), ‘transnational borderlander’ (‘borderland man’), ‘borderland effect’, ‘social borderland area’, ‘ethnically diverse area’ and others. Over time, the findings of Polish border(lands) studies have entered into a fruitful dialogue with the output of the border studies conceived in an interdisciplinary and international way, yet it would take a lot of space to list even a selective set of undertakings (national and international) which have taken place in this respect only in the last decade or so. Yes, Polish studies have much to offer the world in this regard….

Bearing in mind this good and rich tradition, as well as the challenges of the present and the future, and at the same time sharing the conviction that it is justified (or even necessary) to create a physical space for the presentation of the effects of one’s activities, the integration of the borderlands community – we have the pleasure to invite you to participate in a new project of interdisciplinary, cyclical scientific meetings – the Congress of Border and Borderlands Researchers, which is an initiative of the Centre for Regional and Borderlands Studies at the University of Wrocław, the Institute of Political Science and Administration at the University of Opole, the Terra Diversa Laboratory at the University of Białystok, the Faculty of Political Science and Journalism at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań and International Border Studies Center, University of Gdańsk. We plan that such an event would take place every three years in different centres of Poland, and we have scheduled its first edition for 16–18 September 2024 in Wrocław and Opole. It is worth emphasising that our meeting is part of the celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the accession of Poland and a number of other countries to the European Union; a celebration that is scientific in spirit, joyful in form, though also marked with a pinch of perplexity as for the future of Europe.

So far, border studies have tended to focus on administratively and substantively delimited borders, but nowadays a number of issues and events of interest take place beyond the physical borders of states and borderlands themselves. On the one hand, this is a feature of contemporary social phenomena, which are increasingly de-territorialised, often prompting a correspondingly broad and inclusive framing of inquiry. An excellent illustration of this tendency is provided by events that have recently involved Poland heavily: the Polish-Belarusian border crisis and refugees from war-torn Ukraine. On the other hand, it is worthwhile – also on the rising wave of popularity, even fashion, for both categories in their broadest sense – to reflect on the limits of this inclusion. Does the fact that borders and borderlands ‘are everywhere’ entitle us to broaden the definitional scope of these concepts, and if so, to what extent? Is it possible to propose some kind of a ‘cut-off line’ here? This is somewhat of a foundation dilemma for our interests, after all, touching on their identity.

But it is also just one of the important issues which, in our view, deserve reflection within various disciplines: anthropology, cultural studies, economics, geography, history, law, literature studies, philosophy, political studies, sociology and others. For the issue of borders and borderlands interests us both in the theoretical, methodological and empirical dimension, in the Polish, broader European and non-European (global) context. A more complete set of problem blocks outlining the framework of the conference, but without absolutising it, could therefore include the following:

• defining ‘borders’ and ‘borderlands’ (bordering the border studies) as research categories, their metaphorisation and colloquialisation; civilisational, national, ethnic, regional, confessional, phantom and other borders and borderlands; ‘non-obvious’ borders and borderlands; border as practice (borderwork) present in research;

• borders in the territorial sense (lines separating states), as institutions (reproduction of borders, power contexts, border policies, politicization of borders), including as sites (fixed or mobile) of specific securitization practices; borders as lines constituting barriers between different ‘larger entities’ (e.g. EU external border, Schengen zone border, etc.); biopolitical borders, ‘COVID fencing’;

• borders as phenomena being subject to specific social processes (bordering, debordering, rebordering) and focusing their consequences on each other; borders and borderlands as spaces for the movement of people, cooperation (its actors, determinants, effects), cultural diffusion, etc. (as a phenomenon generating specific phenomena, e.g. borderland effect, transnational borderlander, etc.), life on the border;

• borders and borderlands as spaces forming the basis for transnational phenomena (at macro and mega level): migration (discursive deconstruction of borders), multiculturalism, host-guest relations, etc.; Europe as a borderland (re/de-bordering of, in and out of Europe); borders in wartime (hospitality-envy; hos(ti)pitality); digitalisation, biometricisation of borders;

• borders and socio-cultural borderlands, constructed on the basis of differences of an ethnic nature, including categorisations of ‘insider’, ‘other’, ‘stranger’; minority-majority-state relations; borderlands as sites of encounter, inclusion, competition and exclusion;

• borderlands as areas located in the vicinity of state borders, in the sense of: borderland area (and thus regardless of the scale and nature of the social and cultural interactions taking place between its inhabitants); as areas not necessarily located in the vicinity of state borders, in the sense of: transborderland (and thus an area of interaction), close to the concept of borderscapes;

• borderland as imagined (imaginary), symbolic space, deconstructed in discourses, narratives and performative practices;

• representations of borders and borderlands in visual arts, literature and pop culture; the musealisation of borders and borderlands;

• historical heritage of borders and borderlands; borders as scars of history, reconciliation processes in borderlands; borders and borderlands in historical policy and social memory.

We cordially invite you to take part in the Congress, hoping for interesting and inspiring speeches, creative discussions and a pleasant atmosphere across all borders, boundaries and frontiers.

Conference fee – 150 EUR (PhD students – 70 EUR) 

Details for transfer to the account:

Payments in EUR:
University of Opole
PL88 1090 2138 0000 0005 5600 0076
SWIFT: WBK PP LPP
Santander Bank Polska S.A.
Title: “Congress of the borderlands name_surname”

We provide:

• participation in the congress
• refreshments during coffee breaks, lunches,
• reception on Wednesday
• transfer Wrocław – Opole – Wrocław

If you have any questions, please contact us by e-mail: agnieszka.roczek@uni.opole.pl