Shifts in Visibility: Experiencing The Border Landscape from The Coffeehouses in Zahra Street, Nicosia.
Abstract: Zahra Street is a socially lively thoroughfare frequented by young Turkish Cypriots in Northern Nicosia, Cyprus, the capital of the island’s unrecognised northern part. It is uniquely located next to the northern-southern border and on the Venetian Walls of Nicosia. Here, overlooking the panoramic view of the border landscape while having coffee and socialising is possible and common. The means by which border communities integrate borders into their everyday lives has been a neglected area of study. This paper ethnographically explores how the border landscape from Zahra Street became invisible for young Turkish Cypriots, suggesting that the sensorial stimuli and the routinised habits as well as the border’s omnipresence contribute to its invisibility and integration into the everyday. The study considers the marginalising effects of the border, exemplifying how Turkish-Cypriots create systems of visibility to counteract their invisibility. The relationship between landscape and identity, looking out and in, is examined within a material and visual anthropology lens.
Pesented in City, University of London, 'Partitioning Cyprus' (2024). Highly Commended in the Inaugural British Institute at Ankara Masters Dissertation Prize (2023).
Email me ibrahim.ince@anthro.ox.ac.uk to access the paper.
