Questions of belonging and identity constantly shift, especially when borders and other boundaries are imposed on people and their communities. Contemporary literature and art uniquely show how the Irish border and the Troubles conflict created a felt sense of in-between-ness in the six northern counties of Northern Ireland. Similar issues characterize the Texas/Mexico border, which is reflected in Chicana art and literature. How do creative arts uniquely reveal, explore, and map feelings of belonging and identity in areas with disputed borders, and how might creative writing students approach correlating geographic locations and literary/artistic evidence in creating their own portrait of these encounters with in-between-ness?
Using the arts to engage with connections between place and identity, I’m researching and talking with creative practitioners in South Texas and Northern Ireland to consider the place of art in processing ideas about division and connection, environmental crisis, and social justice, drawing on methodologies from many disciplines and artistic practices. These ideas will be further explored in the Fall 2025 Lennox Seminar, culminating in the online publication of a map-based multimedia archive of interviews, creative interventions, and literary/visual representations of place/s. Through reading literature, watching, and interacting with all kinds of media and art, I’m compiling sources to create a digital archive on ARC.GIS that represents the immediate and generational nuances of living in and experiencing borderlands.