Ep 24: Why no borders. With Bridget Anderson, Cynthia Wright, and Nandita Sharma (English).

De Verbranders

Our guests in this episode are Bridget Anderson, Cynthia Wright, and Nandita Sharma. We speak to them about their editorial called “Why no Borders”, which they published in 2008. In it, they distill the scholarship on borders at the time, in order to draw the conclusion that we should get rid of borders. Taking the editorial as our starting point, we speak about collaboration, and the joy of working together with people with whom we share a politics, and a sense of humor. And we talk about no borders as a practical political project, that is carried out in the here and now, by all of us who refuse to conform to nationalized borders. Bridget, Cynthia, and Nandita bring two pieces of music to the episode: No One Is Illegal, by Renovatio, and Absolute Power, by Akala. We recorded this episode right after the Maritime Solidarities conference that brought Bridget, Cynthia, and Nandita to Amsterdam in September of 2023. This was a few weeks before the Israeli state took the Hamas attack on the 7th of October as an opportunity to escalate the destruction of Palestinian life in Gaza and the Westbank. We don’t speak about Palestine in the episode. But, as we publish this in January 2024, we want to state that the freedom dreams we express in this conversation apply to Palestine in Particular. And right now, we must act. We must reject this total destruction of life. We must resist the occupation, we must resist settler colonialism, and we must resist ethnic-nationalist states. And, we must refuse to lose, as Bridget puts it in this episode. Graphic design by Thomas from Dark Roast (www.instagram.com/thomas.darkroast) Theme music: David (guitar) and Joris (drums) Theme music: Allen (accordion) and Neske (violin), after Doina from the Fanfare Ciocarlia