Border Work

Border Work
Author :
Publisher : Cornell University Press
Total Pages : 296
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780801470882
ISBN-13 : 0801470889
Rating : 4/5 (82 Downloads)

Synopsis Border Work by : Madeleine Reeves

Drawing on extensive and carefully designed ethnographic fieldwork in the Ferghana Valley region, where the state borders of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikizstan and Uzbekistan intersect, Madeleine Reeves develops new ways of conceiving the state as a complex of relationships, and of state borders as socially constructed and in a constant state of flux. She explores the processes and relationships through which state borders are made, remade, interpreted and contested by a range of actors including politicians, state officials, border guards, farmers and people whose lives involve the crossing of the borders. In territory where international borders are not always clearly demarcated or consistently enforced, Reeves traces the ways in which states' attempts to establish their rule create new sources of conflict or insecurity for people pursuing their livelihoods in the area on the basis of older and less formal understandings of norms of access. As a result the book makes a major new and original contribution to scholarly work on Central Asia and more generally on the anthropology of border regions and the state as a social process. Moreover, the work as a whole is presented in a lively and accessible style. The individual lives whose tribulations and small triumphs Reeves so vividly documents, and the relationships she establishes with her subjects, are as revealing as they are engaging. Border Work is a well-deserved winner of this year’s Alexander Nove Prize.

Movement, Power and Place in Central Asia and Beyond

Movement, Power and Place in Central Asia and Beyond
Author :
Publisher : Routledge
Total Pages : 217
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781135700126
ISBN-13 : 1135700125
Rating : 4/5 (26 Downloads)

Synopsis Movement, Power and Place in Central Asia and Beyond by : Madeleine Reeves

Central Asia is a region singularly marked by attempts to transform social life by transforming place. Drawing together established scholars and a new generation of historians, geographers and anthropologists, this volume brings empirical specificity and theoretical depth to debates about the politics of place-making in this diverse region, making an important contribution to Central Asian studies and a distinctive regional comparison to the ‘spatial turn’ in social analysis. Case studies draw on archival research and oral history to explore the workings—and unintended consequences—of policies aimed at sedentarizing, collectivizing and resettling populations as a means to fix and territorialize space. The book also examines ethnographic studies attuned to the role of movement in sustaining social life, from Soviet-era trade networks that linked rural Central Asia and the Russian metropolis, to pilgrimage routes through which ‘kazakhness’ is articulated, to the contemporary moralization of migration abroad in search of work. Rather than analysing ‘flows’ as abstract processes, the book enquires about effortful activity, material infrastructures, political relations and social habits through which people, ideas, knowledge, skills and material objects move or are prevented from moving. As such, it offers new insights into the complex intersections of movement, power and place in this important region over the last two centuries. This book was originally published as a special issue of Central Asian Survey.

Affective States

Affective States
Author :
Publisher : Berghahn Books
Total Pages : 158
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781785337192
ISBN-13 : 178533719X
Rating : 4/5 (92 Downloads)

Synopsis Affective States by : Mateusz Laszczkowski

In recent years, political and social theory has been transformed by the heterogeneous approaches to feeling and emotion jointly referred to as ‘affect theory’. These range from psychological and social-constructivist approaches to emotion to feminist and post-human perspectives. Covering a wide spectrum of topics and ethnographic contexts—from engineering in the Andes to household rituals in rural China, from South African land restitution to migrant living in Moscow, and from elections in El Salvador to online and offline surveillance among political refugees from Uzbekistan and Eritrea—the chapters in this volume interrogate this ‘affective turn’ through the lens of fine-grained ethnographies of the state. The volume enhances the anthropological understanding of the various ways through which the state comes to be experienced as a visceral presence in social life.

Engaging Central Asia

Engaging Central Asia
Author :
Publisher : CEPS
Total Pages : 196
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9789290797074
ISBN-13 : 929079707X
Rating : 4/5 (74 Downloads)

Synopsis Engaging Central Asia by : Bhavna Dave

"In July 2007, the European Union initiated a fundamentally new approach to the countries of Central Asia. The launch of the EU Strategy for Central Asia signals a qualitative shift in the Union's relations with a region of the world that is of growing importance as a supplier of energy, is geographically situated in a politically sensitive area - between China, Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and the south Caucasus - and contains some of the most authoritarian political regimes in the world. In this volume, leading specialists from Europe, the United States and Central Asia explore the key challenges facing the European Union as it seeks to balance its policies between enhancing the Union's energy, business and security interests in the region while strengthening social justice, democratisation efforts and the protection of human rights. With chapters devoted to the Union's bilateral relations with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan and to the vital issues of security and democratisation, 'Engaging Central Asia' provides the first comprehensive analysis of the EU's strategic initiative in a part of the world that is fast emerging as one of the key regions of the 21st century."--BOOK JACKET.

Borderless Bazaars and Regional Integration in Central Asia

Borderless Bazaars and Regional Integration in Central Asia
Author :
Publisher : World Bank Publications
Total Pages : 212
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780821394724
ISBN-13 : 082139472X
Rating : 4/5 (24 Downloads)

Synopsis Borderless Bazaars and Regional Integration in Central Asia by : Bartlomiej Kaminski

Bazaars in Central Asia play a major role in regional and national chains of production and distribution. This type of cross-border trade benefits particularly the poor, by keeping prices low and creating jobs also for women.

Development Zones in Asian Borderlands

Development Zones in Asian Borderlands
Author :
Publisher : Amsterdam University Press
Total Pages : 285
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9789048551811
ISBN-13 : 9048551811
Rating : 4/5 (11 Downloads)

Synopsis Development Zones in Asian Borderlands by : Mona Chettri

Development Zones in Asian Borderlands maps the nexus between global capital flows, national economic policies, infrastructural connectivity, migration, and aspirations for modernity in the borderlands of South and South-East Asia. In doing so, it demonstrates how these are transforming borderlands from remote, peripheral backyards to front-yards of economic development and state-building. Development zones encapsulate the networks, institutions, politics and processes specific to enclave development, and offer a new analytical framework for thinking about borderlands; namely, as sites of capital accumulation, territorialisation and socio-spatial changes.

Ferghana Valley

Ferghana Valley
Author :
Publisher : Routledge
Total Pages : 531
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781317470656
ISBN-13 : 1317470656
Rating : 4/5 (56 Downloads)

Synopsis Ferghana Valley by : S. Frederick Starr

The Ferghana Valley can reasonably be said to lie in the heart of Central Asia. As such, the Valley has made an inordinate contribution to the history and culture of the region as a whole, as well as significantly affecting the economic, political and religious spheres. This book looks at the region over time, from its early history to the present. It embraces not just the obvious fields of politics, economics and religion, but also ethnography, sociology and culture, and includes the insights of leading scholars from all three Ferghana countries. The book discusses various questions of identity relating to the region, showing how the identity of the Ferghana Valley relates to the emerging national identities of the three post-colonial states that are still gradually emerging from the demise of the Soviet Union, as well as how an understanding of the Ferghana Valley is key to understanding Central Asia itself.

Borders, Histories, Existences

Borders, Histories, Existences
Author :
Publisher : SAGE Publications Pvt. Limited
Total Pages : 300
Release :
ISBN-10 : 8132102266
ISBN-13 : 9788132102267
Rating : 4/5 (66 Downloads)

Synopsis Borders, Histories, Existences by : Paula Banerjee

Borders, Histories, Existences: Gender and Beyond contends that borders are, by definition, lines of inclusion and exclusion established by the state. It analyses how states construct borders and try to make them static and rigid and how bordered existences, such as women, migrant workers and victims of human trafficking, destabilise the rigid constructs. It explores the political conditions that have made borders problematic in post-colonial South Asia and how these borders have become regions of extreme control or violence.

Eurasian Borderlands

Eurasian Borderlands
Author :
Publisher : Springer
Total Pages : 270
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781137583093
ISBN-13 : 1137583096
Rating : 4/5 (93 Downloads)

Synopsis Eurasian Borderlands by : Tone Bringa

This book examines changing and emerging state and state-like borders in the post-Soviet space in the decades following state collapse. This book argues border-making is not only about states’ physical marking of territory and claims to sovereignty but also about people’s spatial practices over time. In order to illustrate how borders come about and are maintained, this book looks at border communities at internal, open administrative borders and borders in the making, as well as physically demarcated international state borders. This book also pays attention to both the spatial and temporal aspects of borders and the interplay between boundaries and borders over time and thus identifies some of the processes at play as space is territorialized in Eurasia in the aftermath of state collapse.