Feeling safe while being surveilled [Elektronisk resurs] The spatial semiotics of affect at international airports

• Departing from Lefebvre’s work on the social production of space, this paper explores the intersection between  perceived  and  lived  space from the perspective of  spatial discourse analysis . Empirically, the paper studies how the spatiality of international airports performs affective discursive work and establishes prerequisites for air travelers’ feelings of being “in control” and “excited” vs. feelings of being “controlled” and “surveilled”. The concept of  binding  is applied in order to understand how affect is spatially afforded at Stockholm Arlanda Airport and Vienna International Airport. The analysis reveals that alternations between bound and unbound spaces construe the airports as distinctly ideological sites with different affective potentials. Accordingly, this article adds to the understanding of how airport atmospheres are construed by means of spatial resources such as the height, depth, and shape of walls and ceilings and by the transparency and opaqueness of the built material, as well as by more dynamic elements such as carpets, colors, signage, and retractable belt barriers. 

Ämnesord

Humanities and the Arts  (hsv)

Languages and Literature  (hsv)

Humaniora och konst  (hsv)

Språk och litteratur  (hsv)

Svenska språket  (oru)

Swedish Language  (oru)

Genre

government publication  (marcgt)

Indexterm och SAB-rubrik

spatial discourse analysis

binding

affect

perceived space

lived space

airports