Affective Bordering

Affective Bordering is an incisive exploration of the emotional politics of migration and borders. It explores how emotions shape migration and border policies, perpetuating racial, sexual, and national hierarchies. Billy Holzberg analyses key events in the wake of the misnamed 'refugee crisis' in Germany such as Angela Merkel's hopeful 'Wir schaffen das' speeches, the empathetic response to Alan Kurdi's photo, the anger and resentment after New Year's in Cologne, and the current climate of fear and border militarisation. Additionally, the book examines alternative affective practices employed by migrants and migrant solidarity actors, including marches of hope, hunger strikes, public mourning, and activist interventions aimed at shaming the European border regime. By uncovering the racial grammars of deservingness underlying this form of affective border governance, the book challenges the notion that appeals to positive affective forces like empathy and hope necessarily work as a counter to negative emotions such as anger, resentment, and fear. Rather than centring on the affective life of national citizens, the book advocates for a paradigm shift towards the affective practices enacted in the cracks of the European border regime, where those most impacted by oppressive borders enact forms of collective agency and affective resistance. Combining queer feminist theories of affect with postcolonial border and migration politics, Affective Bordering offers a thought-provoking perspective on the reproduction and contestation of borders in today's world.