Cooperative Borderlands: Trafficking Values and Waste Across Nesting Boundaries in Russian Karelia

Abstract

In my dissertation, I explore the sense of place and the local identity in Petrozavodsk, the capital city of the Republic of Karelia, Russian Federation. We are aware of the geographical and political borders, of those visible dividing lines on the map that insulate ethnic groups and nation states. At the same time, the social and cultural boundaries are harder to notice – they emerge through the sense of discomfort of conflict which signals that an invisible boundary has been crossed. In my research, I address the instances of such boundary crossings in a larger context of local urban life through the ethnographic approach of flânerie as well as through a case study of a joint Russian-Finnish project supported by the Nordic Council of Ministers, W.A.S.T.E.: Waste Awareness, Treatment, Education that was realized in Petrozavodsk from 2011 to 2013. I build a dialogue between social spaces divided by ‘nesting’ (Russian doll-like) borders that are in/congruent with territorial/political borderlines. I attempt to bring together the two approaches to the study of contemporary borders: the more traditional geographical and political approach to borders and an anthropological perspective that stresses the dynamic nature of the border.