The concept of border

Abstract

In the following essay, Yuri Lotman presents and elaborates on the concept of semiotic border, which proves extremely useful for cultural studies. The semiotician defines it as a liminal area situated between two or more semiospheres, where cultural exchanges and artistic innovations occur with great intensity. These borders often coincide with geographic peripheries. As with all that is external and othered, border texts are typically negatively valued by norm-setting centers. However, such manifestations do not remain crystallized there; they tend to move toward the center of the semiosphere. It happens because the border also functions as a mechanism of translation, transforming these foreign texts into internal ones without stripping them of their alien character. To illustrate this idea, Lotman offers a series of examples, such as the seemingly paradoxical existence of a Russian Byron in the figure of Mikhail Lermontov, and the popularization of jeans, initially a typical garment of the working class. Thus, the essay proves to be highly relevant in the analysis of marginalized cultural manifestations and the process through which their elements are appropriated by central spheres.