Helen Brewer

Border Intimacies

This research project examines the infrastructural assemblages of Britain’s dispersed border.

These are navigated through its regime of (in)visibility by attending to the intricacies and intimacies of borders that are felt but not seen, exploring the racial architectures that render people as exposed and isolated bodies.

It demonstrates how the organisation of border space is ideologically and materially grounded in racial capitalism and imprinted by Empire. Britain’s borders do not stop at its shores, nor after persons deemed 'undesirable' are removed, their legacies continue to wear down those who have been exposed to its neo-colonial violence.

The project investigates post-deportation infrastructures in West Africa, tracing lines of flight along the deportation route from the UK and back.Through Helen's involvement in anti-oppression activism, the research asks what modalities of care, resilience and resistance imagine worlds beyond borders and actively participate in its dismantling.

Chase-AHRC Studentship.

Helen is a member of Roundtable four.