Boundaryma(r)king: Mediating (Im)material Memory Along the Inter-Entity Boundary Line, Bosnia and Herzegovina
The talk examines the boundary region of the successor state to Yugoslavia, using the example of the Inter-Entity Boundary Line (IEBL) in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. This boundary, which divided Bosnia and Herzegovina into two political-administrative entities in the wake of the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement, provides insights into the complex interactions between physical infrastructure, symbolic meaning, memory culture, and the everyday lives of inhabitants in a post-conflict context. A particular focus is placed on the discursive interweaving of material and immaterial boundary dimensions and their impact on collective memory, social identities, and practices. The present study concentrates on an investigative approach that facilitates the process of gaining access to socio-spatial and cultural memories. This approach is employed to present and mediate inscriptions in the culture of remembrance, historic negotiations, and the affective charge of the boundary area. The objective of this research endeavour is to methodically capture the intricate inter- relationships between power, materiality, and memories in formerly frontier regions. This undertaking is expected to make a substantial contribution to the critical analysis of spatial-political practices from the perspective of cultural studies-oriented design research.
Yvonne Lober (she/her) is an alumna of the Köln International School of Design, where she pursued a BA in Integrated Design and an MA in Integrated Design Research. Her interdisciplinary research engages with spatial and border studies, with a particular emphasis on memory studies. In her Master’s thesis, she examined how memories are produced and negotiated along (geo)political boundaries within contested environments and competing spatial narratives, highlighting how these processes shape, reflect, and (im)materialise underlying power relations.
Carolin Höfler (she/her) is Professor of “Design Theory and Research” at the Köln International School of Design, TH Köln. She acquired her PhD in art history from the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, as well as her diploma in architecture from the TU Berlin. She is spokesperson for the DFG-funded collaborative research project “Cultural Memory in Crisis” at TH Köln. Her research interests include design processes, material systems and medial spatiality, spaces of memory and ephemeral urbanism, combining investigative methods with drawing analysis.
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