ABSTRACT
This international collection provides a comprehensive overview of twin cities in different circumstances – from the emergent to the recently amalgamated, on 'soft' and 'hard' borders, with post-colonial heritage, in post-conflict environments and under strain.
With examples from Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, South America, North America and the Caribbean, the volume sees twin cities as intense thermometers for developments in the wider urban world globally. It offers interdisciplinary perspectives that bridge history, politics, culture, economy, geography and other fields, applying these lenses to examples of twin cities in remote places. Providing a comparative approach and drawing on a range of methodologies, the book explores where and how twin cities arise; what twin cities can tell us about international borders; and the way in which some twin cities bear the spatial marks of their colonial past. The chapters explore the impact on twin-city relations of contemporary pressures, such as mass migration, the rise of populism, East-West tensions, international crime, surveillance, rebordering trends and epidemiological risks triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic. With case studies across the continents, this volume for the first time extends twin-city debates to fictional imaginings of twin cities.
Twin Cities across Five Continents is a valuable resource for researchers in the fields of anthropology, history, geography, urban studies, border studies, international relations and global development as well as for students in these disciplines.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part I|68 pages
Intranational Twin Cities
part II|41 pages
International Twin Cities
chapter 7|13 pages
Prussian border twin towns
part II|40 pages
International Twin Cities
chapter 10|14 pages
Aqaba and Eilat
chapter 12|12 pages
Ketu and Imeko
part II|38 pages
International Twin Cities
part II|49 pages
International Twin Cities
chapter 17|12 pages
The Oyapock River Bridge as a one-way street
chapter 18|11 pages
The everyday of the twin cities of Chuí (Brazil) and Chuy (Uruguay)
chapter 19|12 pages
‘You can't have one without the other’
part II|41 pages
International Twin Cities
chapter 21|14 pages
Asylees, removals, returnees
part III|26 pages
Twin Cities in Fiction and Editors' Dreams