Document Type
Honors Project
Abstract
Although borders mark the beginning on one political administrative unit and the ending of another, individuals who live in borderlands translate the abstract ideas of borders into part of their daily, physical reality. Conflicts about borders indicate that despite their static representations on maps, people in borderlands may challenge the legitimacy and meaning of these boundaries. Social interactions that are created through the borderwork of using, resisting, and avoiding borders and through practices of exclusion and inclusion affect the daily lives of communities. The main question this research will therefore answer is how borderwork in contested borderlands produces the types of social relations that can enhance or mitigate conflict. By examining Hebron, a Palestinian city in the West Bank, in which a minority of Jewish settlers decided to reside four decades ago, this research illustrates how actors use orientation toward borders to deploy corresponding strategies of resistance, compliance, surveillance and navigation of space. These different borderwork strategies challenge and perpetuate the status quo dictated by the inner and external borders, both intentionally and unintentionally.
Recommended Citation
Eberzhon, Shahar, "The Walls We Build: Borderwork and Manipulation of Power Relations in Hebron" (2012). Sociology Honors Projects. 38.
https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/soci_honors/38
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