Borders cannot limit themselves to absolute lines. Either we see the border as a phenomena existing on different planes in a multilayered space in imperfect juxtaposition, as a dynamic phenomena of bordering under constant renegotiation, or as the origin of border effects taking the form of folds, overlaps and invaginations, the border will always produce its own space, the border zone.
This border zone take the form of a gradiant between different territories, a dissemination of the border across a greater space, a split, hybrid, ambivalent space, or an in-between "third space" of negotiation. When its transitory and temporal aspect is emphasized, the border zone may be called a liminal space.
Because border zones are places of negotiation and hybrid interpretation, they can also become contact zones between the real and the imaginary.
"Arguably, border zones provide the most interesting grounds for artistic creativity. It appears that these zones are better referred to in terms of margins or Ränder, which blur the distinction between inside and outside." (Rüdiger Görner 69)
In human societies, border zones can become both no man's lands and inhabited borderlands.
references
- Görner, Rüdiger. "Notes on the Culture of Borders". Border Poetics De-limited. Eds. Johan Schimanski and Stephen Wolfe. Hannover: Wehrhahn, 2007. 59-74.