WOW Recommends: Borders

Questions of sovereignty, citizenship, and who gets to decide are the central issues in Borders (2021), a graphic novel with expressive colorful illustrations representing a realistic sensibility. A first-person narrative told from the perspective of a young boy, readers follow along on a road trip between the Blackfoot Reserve in Canada to the border between Canada and the United States. Upon reaching the border, those wishing to cross the border either for returning to their own country or entering the visiting country must declare their citizenship. When asked for her citizenship, the boy’s mother responds, “Blackfoot.” This creates a dilemma for the border guards, as she is expected to answer either “Canadian” or “USA.” Because she refuses to claim any citizenship other than her tribal affiliation, the boy and his mother are not allowed in the USA, and are turned back. But once they return to the border crossing into Canada, they not allowed into Canada because the boy’s mother responds in the same way when asked her citizenship.

Caught between two physical borders, the two spend the night in their car, visit the duty-free shop between the two crossing gates, and contemplate a world in which borders can cross sovereign lands and citizenship can often be arbitrarily-based on political boundaries without regard to First Nations peoples. As their food and money run out, the two continue to languish in the space between two countries, neither of which recognize their citizenship in the Blackfoot nation. Their plight is eventually highlighted by the media when one of the duty-free shop workers contacts local news agencies.

The ending is not only a physical leaving borders behind but a metaphorical way we might look at the world. Woven in the context of one boy’s life and his thinking about the world, this book will have readers thinking about the assumptions they make about others, the arbitrary aspects of borders and their crossings, and how politics so often disrupts both aspects of freedom and sovereignty. –Recommended by Holly Johnson, Cincinnati, Ohio

Title: Borders
Author: Thomas King
Illustrator: Natasha Donovan
ISBN: 13-978-0-316-59316-59306-9
Publisher: Little Brown
PubDate: September 7, 2021

Each month a committee of Worlds of Words advisors recommends a book published within the last year. Our hope is to spark conversations on our website and on social media about the book that expand global understandings and perceptions. Please join us by leaving a comment. You can also share your thoughts with us by using the hashtag #WOWRecommends on social media.

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