ABSTRACT
The convergence of intense human mobilities, financial flows, economic turbulence, and heightened securitization of borders make this a crucial period in which to study the implementation and impact of new mobility regimes and “smart borders.” 1 This also requires attention to the effects of shifting discourses, representations, and ideologies of im/mobility and opening/closure of borders. Research on the sociocultural dimensions of air travel and airports has brought new attention to the cultural and informational dimensions of air travel within the field of “aeromobilities” research (Adey 2004a, 2004b, 2009a, 2010; Cresswell 2006; Salter 2006, 2008; Adey et al. 2007; Urry 2007; Cwerner et al. 2009). 2 There is an emerging view of the airport as a site of both complex materialities and complex flows of information, communication, and discourses concerning mobility, security, and borders. As a site “imbued with power and control,” Peter Adey suggests, “the airport is now a surveillance machine – an assemblage where webs of technology and information combine” (2004b: 1375). Forms of vision, design, communication, and cultural circulation are all caught up in the production of what is broadly called aeromobility and its meanings (Sheller 2010).
