Denis Cerić

Abstract

The research examines how tourists experience the German-Polish maritime border as a symbolic boundary which exists beyond physical separation because of memory, movement, and meaning. The research addresses a gap in border and tourism studies by using a qualitative-dominant mixed-methods approach to analyse 116 tourist narratives through the lenses of the bordering-debordering-rebordering concept, liminality and emotional geography. Tourists experience the border as an invisible yet tangible presence which serves as a historical reflection zone with fluid identity and ambiguous emotional responses. By theorising concepts like floating thresholds and symbolic permeability, the study reconceptualises maritime borders as dynamic spatial imaginaries in post-Schengen Europe.

Keywords: : maritime border, cross-border tourism, border perception, emotional geography, liminality, bordering processes, German-Polish border, post-Schengen mobility, border tourism

Denis Cerić [d.ceric@twarda.pan.pl], Institute of Geography and Spatial Organisation Polish Academy of Sciences Twarda 51/55, 00-818 Warsaw: Poland
Marek Więckowski [marekw@twarda.pan.pl], Institute of Geography and Spatial Organisation Polish Academy of Sciences Twarda 51/55, 00-818 Warsaw: Poland