Conference 'Border Matters' on Embodiment, Environment, and Infrastructure of Border Spaces
The conference focuses on border spaces as social, material, and political spaces. The presentations explore the significance of borders for body, environment, and infrastructure. Topics will include historical and contemporary perspectives on border demarcations, experiences, and crossings.
“Hardly any region in Europe has been as strongly shaped by shifting borders in the past as East Central Europe. At the GHI Warsaw, we investigate how territorial changes influenced the lives of people in this region. This leads us to ask these questions in relation to other regions where the Max Weber Foundation is active,” says Magdalena Saryusz-Wolska, Director of the GHI Warsaw, explaining the choice of the conference theme.
The conference will open on Monday, May 4, 2026, with a keynote speech by Michal Frankl from the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO), Prague Branch. Under the title “Humanitarian Border Crossings: Aid in No Man’s Land”, he will speak about humanitarian aid for refugees in the “no man’s lands” of East Central Europe in the late 1930s. The lecture will shed light on the extent to which border crossings and border experiences shaped humanitarian action.
On May 5 and 6, 2026, five sessions will follow: on phantom borders, on border demarcation in urban spaces, on the redefinition of imperial border spaces, on the material dimension of border demarcation, and on bureaucracy at the border. The presentations will address, among other topics, the legacy of historical borders on infrastructure, border spaces in the South Caucasus, queer underworlds, land rights in colonial border regions, maritime territorial conflicts, and border regimes and financial controls as practices of bordering. A panel discussion featuring Ettore Recchi (Sciences Po), Julia Buyskykh (University College Cork), and Jan Musekamp (GHI Warsaw) titled “Uncommon Experiences: Sharing Borders in Contemporary Europe” will conclude the second day of the conference.
The event will take place in the on the 3rd floor of the German Historical Institute Warsaw. The keynote will be recorded and made available afterwards on the GHI Warsaw YouTube channel.
Conference: Border Matters: Embodiment, Environment, and Infrastructure of Border Spaces
Date: May 4–6, 2026
Location: German Historical Institute Warsaw, Aleje Ujazdowskie 39, 00-540 Warsaw
