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This episode is the first time we’ve asked each other “how are you?” Yes, we’ve checked.

Here are two “rankings” for passports: the Henley Passport Index, which describes itself as “the only one of its kind based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Authority (IATA)” and the Global Passport Power Rank, which at the time of recording, ranked as “equal” passports issued by Canada, the UK, and Cyprus. Eagle-eyed listeners will note this has changed.

Thinking about the nationality/citizenship distinction, here’s an example of that slippage in the British context.

Gillian refers to C. Lynn Smith’s chapter “Is Citizenship a Gendered Concept?” in Citizenship, Diversity, and Pluralism: Canadian and Comparative Perspectives (eds Cairns et al.), 1999; and to Chelva Kanaganayakam’s chapter “Cool Dots and a Hybrid Scarborough: Multiculturalism as Canadian Myth” in Is Canada Postcolonial? Unsettling Canadian Literature(ed Moss), 2003.

“White civility” is an important analytical tool developed by Daniel Coleman in his book of the same title, published in 2006.

We discuss “Borders” by Canadian writer of Greek and Cherokee descent Thomas King, published in 1993 in the collection One Good Story, That One and more recently republished as a comic book with illustrations by the Métis artist Natasha Donovan.

For more on the Haudenosaunee Nationals’ travelling difficulties, please see this CBC article by Ka’nhehsí:io Deer.

The material in this podcast is for informational purposes only. The personal views expressed by the hosts and their guests on the Borders Talk podcast do not constitute an endorsement from associated organisations.

Thanks to the School of Arts, Media and Communication at the University of Leicester for the use of recording equipment, and to the School of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies at the University of Nottingham for financial support.

Music: “Corrupted” by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

Edited by Steve Woodward at podcastingeditor.com

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Special thanks to our guest speakers, whose border stories we gratefully share with their consent: Jenneba Sie-Jallok, Loraine Masiya Mponela, Ambreen Hai, and Gaura Narayan.

Gillian manages to get the name of her hometown wrong in this episode: it's Victoria, not Vancouver (which is not on Vancouver Island!).

We recorded this episode at the brilliant “Hostile Environments and Hospitable Praxes” conference, organised by Dr Rachel Gregory Fox at the University of Kent, UK, 23-24 June 2025. Thank you, Rachel!

As we started to think about actually doing a podcast, we relied heavily on Stacey Copeland and Hannah McGregor’s A Guide to Academic Podcasting (2021).

Our amazing podcast editor is Steve Woodward, also known as The Podcasting Editor, without whom Gillian would sound like Moira Rose.

Gillian and Zalfa quote from previous episodes.

Zalfa and Gillian quote from Jacques Derrida’s Of Hospitality (translated by Rachel Bowlsby, to whom Gillian refers later in the episode).

Zalfa quotes Tiziano Bonini’s essay “Podcasting as a Hybrid Cultural Form Between Old and New Media” and Michelle Hilmes’ essay “But Is It Radio? New Forms and Voices in the Audio Private Sphere”, from The Routledge Companion to Radio and Podcast Studies (2022).

Sara Ahmed writes about “the feminist ear.”

Canadian poet David W. McFadden’s collection Great Lakes Suite (1997) inspired the dots and dashes of our podcast’s name [and Zalfa’s brief foray into Morse Code]. Gillian references his work in this episode, including the line “the dots and dashes [...] glistening in the waves” (p.192).

Elizabeth Povinelli’s essay, “The Governance of the Prior” (2011)

Gillian mentions Immanuel Kant's Perpetual Peace (1795)

Mireille Rosello’s book Postcolonial Hospitality: The Immigrant as Guest (2002)

The material in this podcast is for informational purposes only. The personal views expressed by the hosts and their guests on the Borders Talk podcast do not constitute an endorsement from associated organisations.

Thanks to the School of Arts, Media and Communication at the University of Leicester for the use of recording equipment, and to the School of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies at the University of Nottingham for financial support.

Music: “Corrupted” by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

Edited by Steve Woodward at podcastingeditor.com

Send us a Message

The Urban Dictionary’s definition of “tsunamied” is very much not what Zalfa intended. In fact, she had to look it up on reading this entry in the show notes, and wishes she had turned on safe search.

For more on vulnerability, check out Judith Butler’s Precarious Life (2004), Martha Fineman’s “The Vulnerable Subject: Anchoring Equality in the Human Condition” (2008), Lauren Berlant’s Cruel Optimism (2011), Susan Sontag’s Illness as Metaphor (1978) and Regarding the Pain of Others (2003), and Polly Atkin’s Some of Us Just Fall (2023).

For more on the social model of disability, read Mike Oliver’s The Politics of Disablement: A Sociological Approach (1990). Read more about the origins of the social model at the National Disability Arts Collection and Archive.

Wayde Compton’s description of the Canada-US border as a “strait razorous border” is a pun on the Georgia Strait, a body of water interrupted by the Canada-US/British Columbia-Washington State borders. Read more in 49th Parallel Psalm.

The International Boundary Commission’s photo of the Canada-US border is very telling. As is this photo of the Mexico-US border.

The material in this podcast is for informational purposes only. The personal views expressed by the hosts and their guests on the Borders Talk podcast do not constitute an endorsement from associated organisations.

Thanks to the School of Arts, Media and Communication at the University of Leicester for the use of recording equipment, and to the School of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies at the University of Nottingham for financial support.

Music: “Corrupted” by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com

Edited by Steve Woodward at podcastingeditor.com