Anthropology of Borders

2025/2026

Academic Year

ENG

Instruction in English

Delivered at:

Department of Sociology

Course type:

Elective course

When:

4 year, 1, 2 module

Instructor

Симонова Вероника Витальевна

Course Syllabus

Abstract

Theory of borders in Social Anthropology mainly took their course from the famous work of Frederick Barth et al. ‘Ethnic groups and boundaries’. Though academic thinking about the topic has a deeper history in philosophy and social science generally. The Anthropology of borders is a subfield of Anthropology examining social, cultural and political dimensions of bordering processes. It moves away from a simplistic view of borders to a more complex idea of everyday experience of borders of different kind, maintaining borders and involving various actors such as state and individuals and local communities. In English speaking intellectual traditions the word ‘border’ is far beyond a single meaning we got used to in the Russian language. This multiple meaning is represented by different words which are terms for Anthropology of border. Hence, we speak about as follows: border, boundary, shrink, edge, rim, margin, frontier, verge, partition, outline, frame, threshold. Anthropologists who study borders and boundaries are primarily interested in how concepts of borders affects people’s life on a daily basis, including forming identities, social relations and hierarchies, patterns of mobility. Ethnographic methods here are most helpful since spending time in border zones of different kind from regional to interrelational allow getting a nuanced knowledge of the border’s effects. It is also necessarily to critically analyze the concept of border itself, challenge the notion of borders as neutral or free from any cultural meaning apart from political, and to highlight historical context constructing sense of belonging and otherness. To summarize, the Anthropology of Borders provides a critical and cultural perspective. It rejects simplistic approach to borders as lines and explores a sophisticated ways they shape human experience. The structure of the course: The course consists of following topics: 1). Deconstructing the term ‘border’ in Anthropology. Physical, imaginative, political and embodied approaches. 2). Ethnic groups and boundaries - early barthian approach to the question 3). Ethnography of borders from the globe 4). Borders and social hierarchies 5). Symbolic boundaries 6). Experience of border in the North and Arctic frontiers and ‘Far away’ studies 7). Late barthian approach and body borders’ phenomenology Overall this course consists of six lectures and forty two seminars covering the period of module 1 and 2 educational schedule. Seminars are practically oriented. Students will learn to distinguish border as an object of study from border as a theoretical framework for a research design and try themselves as practical investigators of bordering processes of different kind and how anthropology is incorporated into academic understanding of their dynamics. Students also will learn to do ethnography of borders and become well qualified specialists in the subject which is now a very relevant field in numerous spheres from policy to market economy trends. Lecture 1 is devoted to general deconstruction of borders. We shall discuss borders as geographical, political, imaginative, personal and even digital social conglomerates forming our society from their own prospectives. We shall also discuss basic methodological approaches which stimulated thinking borders anthropologically and sociologically. These theories mainly came from phenomenology and geopolitics; though, we may fins traces in almost all groundbreaking approaches to society and culture. Lecture 2. Follows key terms exploring differences between border, boundary, rim, edge, margin and their links to ethnic groups and boundaries theory developed by Frederick Barth. During this lecture students will learn about the starting point to discuss anthropology of borders in relation to ethnic identities and groups. Lecture 3. This lecture examines ethnographic examples of bordering processes from the globe. Students will learn how anthropologists approached borders in different contexts, targeting different research goals. This will help students to form their own research paper and plan, extract what might facilitate aging their ground academic interest in borders at large. Lecture 4. This lecture focuses on combination of theories of space and place in social anthropology and borders of all kinds discussed above. Students will learn to understand how social hierarchies and borders have been constituting one another in a society. The examples from my own research experience in the Arctic will be given as a material to visualize previously discussed theories and ethnographies from other parts of the globe. Lecture 6. The final lecture will summarize all the material passed, and will focus in the tradition of anthropology to study so called ‘far away’ spaces and cultures. Here digital borders and spaces as a methodological approach which must be considered in a greater detail.

Learning Objectives

• This course aims at changing the perception of borders from merely geographical to methodological prospective ion social science.

Expected Learning Outcomes

• - Know basic research skills
• A student compares research design
• - develop critical assessment and academic presentation skills;
• - develop academic skills in reading, writing, and presentation.
• Mastering the "dose-effect" phenomenology
• Students will get analytical skills of how to work with the concept of border
• Students will learn theoretical approach to symbolic boundaries and how top work with it practically
• Students will learn ethnographic examples on the topic and manage to compare them with their own project interest
• Students will learn to manage theory of border as hierarchically dependent category and apply it in this manner in their own research
• get new prospective in theory learn to work with concepts in practice
• Students will learn to follow and compare various ethnographic examples
• to develop comparative skills
• to compare the same theoretician in different time of creativity

Course Contents

• Deconstructing the term ‘border’ in Anthropology. Physical, imaginative, political and embodied approaches
• Ethnic groups and boundaries - early barthian approach to the question
• Ethnography of borders from the globe
• Borders and social hierarchies
• Symbolic boundaries
• Experience of border in the North and Arctic frontiers and ‘Far away’ studies
• Late barthian approach and body borders’ phenomenology

Assessment Elements

• Активность
• проект
• project presentation

Interim Assessment

• 2025/2026 2nd module
  0.4 * project presentation + 0.3 * Активность + 0.3 * проект

Bibliography

Recommended Core Bibliography

• Beyond methodological nationalism: research methodologies for cross-border studies, , 2012
• Border crossings : the internationalization of Canadian public policy, , 1996
• The symbolic construction of community, Cohen, A. P., 1998
• Антропология профессий: границы занятости в эпоху нестабильности, Абрамов, Р. Н., 2012

Recommended Additional Bibliography

• Border fury England and Scotland at war, 1296-1568, Sadler, J., 2006
• За степным фронтиром : история российско-китайской границы, Урбански, С., 2023
• Человек в космосе : отодвигая границы неизвестного, , 2020
• Этнические границы в местных сообществах: теоретико-методологический анализ : дис. ... канд. социологических наук : 22.00.01, Варшавер, Е. А., 2016

Authors

• Simonova Veronika Vitalevna
• DYMOVA POLINA MAKSIMOVNA