The New School: Greece - The Balkans Field Program

The Balkans IFP examines the dynamic between security and society with particular attention to issues of identity and migration along the Balkan route. It traces the physical, political, legal, social, and economic terrain that structures and defines the interactions between various actors along one of the main historic migration paths. As we shift our gaze from the Turkish Aegean coast, from one island "hot spot" to another, across Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Bosnia, we engage with histories of empires and their collapse, ancient and more recent migration flows, and the cultural sediment they have left behind. Student research agendas, internships, and media projects are arranged along several thematic axes connected to broader topics of security and society; human rights and democratic governance; identity relationships, the conversations and the conflicts they spark, and the actors that make claims about them; migration, refugee issues, and policies; EU and regional politics; and the built environment, camps, spaces of confinement, and the paths and actors of mobility, as well as the institutional and legal structures  and the dominant discourses that frame these topics.This course can be taken as an IFP as well as a Remote Studio.