The Smuggler and the Beauty Queen The Border and Sovereignty as Sources of Body Style 1n Gibraltar

T h i s a rt ic le oxploms the re l atively neglected topic o f how borders i nflu ence the h a b i t us and body styles of border popu l ations . It extends notions of habi t us and perf(u·mat i v i t y to the lie l d o f national idcnti lication . U ing data from the Br it ish Crown Colony of Gibraltar, it examines two context in which tho dominant body sty l es of men and women arc shaped as forms of rcs istcncc to pol i t ical h an-assmc n t enacted by t he neighboring country, Spain , at the colonies border: smuggling nnd bea u t y con t ests . Smuggling is both economically lucrative and part of the Gibraltarians' struggle l(u· po l i t ica l recogn i tion and sclf dctcrmi n ation . The i m age of ' thc smu ggler' a n d h is or her behaviour have become emblematic of th is conflict. Related to tho question of sovereignty and the border is the exclusion of Gibraltar from partici ­ pation i n many i n ternational events such as the Olympics and the E urov ision Song Contest. The only such even t in which Gi braltar parti cipates on an equ al foot ing with other nations is the Miss World Contest, the preparatory heats for which have beco me major occasions in the Gibraltarian calendar, spawning a mass of local beauty contests. These examples illustrate not only how borders create and mai ntain national differences and distinctions, but also how such differences can come to be inscribed on the bodies of those who live at borders.

Smuggling is both economically lucrative and part of the Gibraltarians' struggle l(u· po l itica l recogn i tion and sclf dctcrmi n ation . The i m age of ' thc smu ggl er' a n d h is or her behaviour have become emblematic of th is conflict. Related to tho question of sovereignty and the border is the exclusion of Gibraltar from partici pation i n many i n te r n ational events such as the Olympics and the E urov ision Song Contest. The only such even t in which Gi braltar parti cipates on an equ al footing with other nations is the Miss World Contest, the preparatory heats for which have beco me m ajor occasions in the Gibraltarian calendar, spawning a mass of local bea uty contests. These examples illustrate not only how borders create and mai ntain national differences and distinctions, but also how such differences can come to be inscribed on the bodies of those who live at borders. PD DJ: Iwbil. Dieter Halle1; Department of Comparative Cultural and Social An thropology, European University Viadrina, Gro(Je Scharrnst1: 59, D-15230 Franhfitrt ! OdeJ: E-mail: h0920cyt@rz. hu-berlin. de "You have to be very careful not to criticize. My wife always worries about me because she knows that I find it very difficult to keep quiet. When we had the double filter [a double control post at the border] , we stopped going to Spain, but I have a daughter who is married and lives in Marbella [50 km away from Gibraltar] , and she needed to have her insurance renewed, so we did it for her. Maribel said, lets take it over to her on Saturday. We went down there, no double filter. You know sometimes it was on, sometimes not. And I picked up the Chronicle [local news paper] and I am reading it and it said that when you are an ordinary passenger car, you don't need the triangle. You know, they used to ask for the [warning] triangle, the first aid kit, for everything. And they said in the paper that they said with the RAC [Royal Automobile Club] , that you didn't need to have it, because you could turn the flashes on. So I said to Maribel, 'look what they say here : they haven't got the right to ask us for the triangle. At that moment, they [the Spanish police] turned up: and we could see the double filter, and she said 'Look, we've only been in the queue for about 20 minutes, when we get to the front, let's go back, home'. I said 'why?'. She said, 'because I know what you are going to do and what will happen . Leave the queue'. I said 'I'm not going home. I'll give you money for the taxi, if you want to go home, I am going through and I am taking the paper to jail'. She said, 'if they ask for the triangle you tell them to sod of'. I said, 'I would'. As it happened, when we went through, it was alright. B u t thai tension there . . . '' (J n ftJ rmani Stephen H a rd i ng).
In the quotation above, M.r H a rd i ng ta l ks about the insecurity he a n d his w i fe M a ri bel fe lt abou t crossing the border between Gibra ltar and Spain in 1 995. The tri p to v i s i t the i r daugh ter in Marbeil a activates a tension, thai itse l f i s heightened b y this i n security. Hav i ng deci ded to cross on hearing that there were no border controls, they once again discovered that cross ing was not easy and u nproblematic: Shortly beJ(Jre arriving by car at the border checkpoi n t, the Hardings reali zed thai it had become effec tive again. The loca l newspaper had i n li.Jrmed its readers that di spl aying a t ria ngle was no longer necessary, but could one rely on this information? After all , experience taught bor der crossers that 'they' (the Span ish border guards) could not be tr usted. Wasn't Spain still laying claim to the Rock of Gibraltar?
Most Gibraliari ans to whom I talked raised such topics. In their narratives the border is linked to bodily experience oftension, insecuri ty, impotence, and vulnerability. This experi ence is not presented as being peculiar to th e Hardings or to other individual informants, but is thought to be the collective experience of all Gibraltarians. It has become commonpl ace to refer to Anderson ( 1983) and to Hobsbawm and Ranger ( 1973) when discussing matters of na tional identity. However, bodily experience is rather untheorized in their writings. I will ar gue that the body is a potent metaphor to naturalize national identity, and will show how bodies are related to sovereignty in Gibraltar.
The article is based on data collected during fieldwork between 1996 and 1997 in Gibraltar and especially on the border between the Brit ish colony and neighbouring Spain. I point out the various ways in which the border is linked to bodily experience, both dis cursively and in practice, showing in particular how this bodily experience is used as a powerful resource to establish a Gibraltarian national identity. The aim of the article is threefold.
Firstly, I will expose the theoretical back ground of my approach, by focusing on the importance of habitualization and bodily per formativity in national identification. I will show that the border situation, being one insti 58 lulion amo ngst other;;, generates the peri(J rm a nce or a national habitus. Second ly, [ ::;how thai the very special m a ke u p of' ihe Spa n i s h-Gibraltar border makes v i s i ble processes w h ich a re not so eas i ly d iscern i ble at many other national borders, especi a l ly w i th i n the l U. H i s a border, where a state (Spain) enacts te rritorial daims (towards G i braltar) via i ts border apparatus, which through intensive control measures inscribes cultural di fferen ce into the very bodies of Gibraltari an border crossers.
Thi rdly, I will argue that the border is related At the same time, their popularity cannot be understood without relating it to the border. As I will show, the particular resonance of both contexts in Gibraltar stems from their relation ship to the border and national sovereignty, to which they are related as forms of symbolic resistance to the Spanish territorial claim: smug gling being more than just an economic activity (this 'more' being Gibraltarian 'revenge' for Spanish harassment, a weapon that can be used to harm the enemy); and the Miss Gibral tar contest, which because of the Spanish veto on Gibraltarian participation in other national sporting and musical contexts, is one of the few possibilities to represent the 'nation' as such on the international stage.

Borders and Bodies
To name, discover, cross and recross cultural borders has become a hallmark of cultural an thropology. Borders create order and orienta tion in everyday life; they enable people to take a position in society, to identifY with the known and to protect them�>cl ves from the un known . This is not only tru e Ji> r sy mbolic borders o f' identi ty, but of many po li t i ca 1 borders as wel l . 1 Remarkably, u nlike symbol i c borders , poli tical borders h ave l ong been n eglected as a focus of anthropol ogica l resea rch and theorizing.
In his ground breaking book on the Spanish French borde rl a nd Ce rd enyu , Sahl i n s ( 1 989) has convincingly demon strated th at national borders are not passive, peri ph eral and recep tive in the process of'nation-b u i ldi ng, but rather functio n as active and central agents. Sahlins revoluti onized anthropological thi nking about borders, by showing how the inhabitants of Cerdcnya functioned n ot simply as the passive recipi ents of centralized nation al politics, but, by using nation al agents for their own aims, actively i nflu enced th e national politics ofSpain and France'1• Sahlins analyzed the national identification of the borderland population as mainly a strategic political act, limited by outer/ institutional/socio-structural constraints only. His actors seem to have intemalized these out er constraints on a cognitive level, thereby ne glecting the importance of bodily habitualiza tion of difference and its conscious or uncon scious extemalization via body styles. But bor ders, bodies and states are related in various ways.
First, the dichotomy inherent in the German distinction between Korper (as a carrier of signs) and Leib (as lived body) is reflected in different perspectives on national borders. The idea of borders as passive, peripheral and receptive is mirrored in the concept of the Korper as a readable system of signs only, while the idea of the border as permeable, central and as a source of power is analogous to the concept of the Lei b .
Second, nations are often imagined a s bodies and institutions of the state as its organs, as in Hobbes' Leviathan. The border, then, is the skin, which clearly demarcates an inside and an outside, and which distinguishes between in siders and outsiders. The border serves to ca nalize, to regulate and to control the exchange of insiders and outsiders and is often described as skin.
Third, the state's perspective on foreigners and of border crossers such as migrants and smugglers in particular often conceptualises their bodi es in terms of threat and injury to the state.4 For example, the o rgan ic analogy be tween body and state is deci dedly expressed i n the link between borders and the control o f epidemics, ascri bing to the foreign body a vital (or fatal ) role in th e carrying and spreading of diseases." Just as skin and border are often associated, so too i s th e penetrati on of both and the sexualizing of border crossing.
Fourth , many Eu ropean borderlan ds, such as Alsacc, South Tyrol , Kosovo and Maced o n i a , arc highly emotional spaces, deeply anchored in national narratives. Without doubt, the Rock of Gibraltar is a symbolic site for Britain (as a symbol ofthe perseverance ofthe Empire, Bri t ish continuity and solidity, and national gran deur), for Morocco (as a symbol of Muslim ex pansion into Al-Andalus) and for Spain ( a�> a symbol of the loss of empire and national de cline); it is deeply burdened with emotion . Bor ders are cultural sites where the collective mem ory of national communities is represented and exposed via material artefacts (such as flags, fences, control posts, uniforms) and procedures (controls ). Sometimes the physical appearance of borders and the borderland itself carries symbolic meaning. 6 From the point of view of the state, these artefacts and procedures are intended to be the central institution to divide insiders from outsiders and to transmit a differ ent national habitus. Consequently, they are conceptualized as receptacles within which national memory is stored, or, as Jeggle ( 1997: 77) puts it: "What has been stored as resent ments frequently 'comes up' at borders." This 'corning-up' can easily be understood in a phys ical sense, because what comes up may be phys ically experienced feelings of grandeur, fear, wrath or hatred; one may be deeply choked with emotion, contentedness or indifference. Even though feelings do not come up 'naturally', they are often perceived to be natural, because it is the body which reacts. As individuals only have direct access to their own physical reactions, these reactions are trusted to be authentic and true.
Of course, there is nothing inherently natu ral in these feelings, even in cases where we cannot control what's 'corning up' . Recent theo ries have shown that bodies are not natural either, bui a rc a l ways sha ped by c u l tu ra l l' orc cs.7 l l a b i t . u:; i :; cultu re t hat . ha:; beco me natu ra l ized. Bou rdicu w r i tes ( 1 982: :!08) thai bod ies function a:; a mncmon i c aid fo r ihc " deep-rooted values ol'a group and I iis l bas i c conv i ction::;". As a system ofdeeply spi r i t.uul i i:cd generative prin cipl es, habiiu:; produ ces a l l phys ical action and behaviour of"Lhc i n d i v id u a l . AR f:l r aR habitus i R basic io ihe rel ati on ship ofihe i n dividual io h i s/ her body, iis e!Iccts are prevalent in "all activi ties and forms of practice. . . where ihe body i s invol ved" ( B o u rdieu 1 982: a:l9), i nc l u d i n g fi>r examp le food habits, bodily hygiene, ihc way we deal w ith health, age, and s i ckne:;s, a:; we l l as thc "prcsum ably most a u tomat i c poses and most insigni ficant body tech n iques how to gesture and to walk, to sit or to snecr.c, to move th e mouth while tal ki ng or eati ng" ( 1 982: 727, trans lated by the author).
Habitus is a powerful concept to explain cultural perseverance via it:; naturalizing cf feet. It is also able to explain why essentialist concepts are so attractive io many of our in formants (and often io ourselves), and why situ ational-constructivi st argu ments arc so sel dom asserted by them: deconstruction is an act of violence, because so much energy has been invested in the acquisition of h abitus (by natu ralizing social reality).8 Habitus is not only perceived as self-evident by those who acquire (e.g. children) it from others who teach it (e.g. parents) , but by the latter as well. Transmission of habitus is therefore not exclusively based on verbal teaching of knowledge (do this, do that), but on mimetic performativiiy. Mimesis does not necessarily include verbalized or conceptu al knowledge but is mostly based on uncon scious perception, transmission and reproduc tion. According to Perl's gestalt-therapeutic the ory (Dreitzel 1982), bodily performativities of a generation that physically experienced trau ma, such as war, famine or, as in the Gibraltar case, isolation , can be perceived and reproduced by the following generation (even though it did not experience the trauma itselD . This chain, if it proceeds unconsciously, is what I would call original sin. The notion of habitus, however, has been forcefully challenged by performativity theory, for habitus acquisition presupposes a waxlike bod i ly mat ri x open to t he i n:;cription ol' hcg·cm on ic hubiiu:;-crcai i ng· agencies, such a:; t he f"u m i ly, d aRs or eth n ic We-gro u pR, 'cu ltu re' a n d state i n:;ii i u iion:; w i thout a l low i ng fi> r the po:;s i b i l iiy thai i nd i v i d u a l s ca n accept, a f"fi r m , res ist, coun teract, mock, m a n i p u l ate or s u bve rt ihc:;c forc es. The notion a l so pres u p poses sta bi l i ty, for habiiuR is often pc rcc ivccl as a p rocl uct ra ther than as a consta ntly negoti ated p rocess. Con n erion ( 1 989) has shown thai memories are not on ly cogni t. ively reca l led in ri tu a l s, b u i arc also re-en acted a n d rep re:;en ied th rough ceremon i al embodi ment. PrcfiJrmaticd memory is "bod i ly memory, encoded in postu res, gestu res, and movem en t s. Repeated re-cn acimcni i n such bod i ly practice:; enta i l :; ihc usc o f h abii-mc mo ry, wh ich con sists simply in th e cap aci ty to reproduce a certai n pcrform ativi ty wi th ou t re call ing h ow or when ih i s capaci iy was acqu i red" (Foster 1 991 ).
B uilcr ( 1998) h as argued, that ihc acquisi tion of a sense ofbodily naturalness (in her case: gender identity) is a regulated process of repe tition, mediated via s ubtle mechanisms of pow er expressed in -often seemi ngly ephemeral instructions and orders to behave, sii, eat eic. in the correct way. These discursive mechanisms ach ieve th eir goal if they gen erate the i ndivi d ual's desire to behave accordingly. Bodily mem ory therefore is not just "there", it can be acti vated or forgotten, manipulated, transformed and reinterpreted performatively, and it is com It is the memory of the Spanish territorial claim over Gibraltar thai is re-enacted and represented through the ceremonial embodi ment of border control. Gibraltarians are con vinced that border measures are enacted again and again to create a constant feeling of their helplessness, impotence and vulnerability. These feelings keep the claim alive, for they keep bodily memory alive. Every feeling recalls a chain of prior experiences at the border that were similarly unpleasant and creates the seem ingly self-evident perception how reality is: Spain will never give up her claim and therefore will do the utmost to harass the local population of the Rock. Narratives about special border crossings are popular amongst Gibraltarians they often invoke prior experiences drawing on cogn itive n n d phy::;icul memory alike and tram ; form i ng the i nd i v i d u a l cross i ng into col lective experience.

The Border between Gibraltar and Spain
To unde rstand why bodi ly experience is so prom inent i n n arratives about the border, we have to take a closer look at history. In the War of the On 8 June 1969, the Spanish government of fascist dictator Francisco Franco closed her frontier gates to the Rock, cutting Gibraltar off by land from its hinterland, the so-called Cam po de Gibraltar, and isolating Gibraltarians from friends and relatives on the other side. The closure was a reaction against both the referen dum of 1967, when Gibraltarians stated their wish to remain British and to the Constitution of 1969 which strengthened ties between the motherland and its colony. The gates were closed until 1982 when the border was opened for pedestrians. In 1985, it was opened for vehicles. Today, what Gibraltarians least desire is to become part of Spain.
Nevertheless, since the early 1980s Gibral tarians became increasingly disillusioned with Britain: they appreciate the constitutional guar antee which it grants but suffer from the pro gressive rundown of the Ministry of Defence (MoD), which until recently dominated the local economy and guaranteed full employment. In the political arena they decry the fact that Britain did little to counter-act the unpleasant Span ish check::; u nd con trols which Spain i ntro d u ced w h e n i t reopened the border and w h i c h Gibraltarians in terpret a s harassment t o make their l i fe as m i serable as possible. The Span ish authori ti es do not even recogn ize that th e re is a frontier between Gibraltar and La Linea. They call it Ve 1:ja (fence) and do not use of the word fronti er. 1 1 Today, Gibraltar is still a British colony at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsu l a .
Through its links t o Britain, Gibraltar i s part o f' the European Union but it is not part o f' the Schengen Territory nor of the EU-Customs Agreement. There is a sense of political stale mate : Britai n cannot leave the Rock, even i f' i t wished to. I t i s subj ect t o two treaties, the en actment of which i s likely to be contradi ctory : the Treaty of Utrech t, wh ich gu arantees Span ish sovereignty after Britain leaves, and the colonies Constitution of 1969, which guaran tees to honour the wishes of the Gibraltarian s. Moreover, Spain still considers Gibraltar to be an essentially Spanish territory which is Brit ish only temporarily, until the Rock is decolo nized, and even those Gibraltarians who favour self-determination or even independence from the UK cannot realize their aim, because ifthey were successful and Britain left the Rock, Spain would immediately demand its return accord ing to the Treaty of Utrecht.
The government of socialist leader Joe Bos sano  was partly elected to counter such political and economical difficulties. His platform was to create an economy not vulner able to Spanish actions and that countered the effects of the MoD-rundown. With regard to sovereignty, Bossano took a hard position, re jecting all forms of cooperation as long as Spain refused to recognize the right of the Gibraltar ians to self-determination in regard to their future. Economically, the alternatives lay in the advantages offered by membership in the EC (but outside the customs union): Bossano's de clared political aim was to create an interna tional financial centre and a tax haven.
To back up his economic position, Bossano's strategy had to move in two directions: first, to reduce the importance of Britishness, and sec ond, to increase national homogeneity. Gibral tarians had to be transformed from a pro-Brit ish co lonial popu l ati on i nto a n atio n . Nati on a l symbo l i sm and n ati onal ist d i scou r�;e beca me major features in Gibralta rian pol itical d i s course. Gibraltar bei ng a t i ny te rri tory w ith a heterogeneou s society, nationalist disco urse had to be groun ded in a com mon and creo l i zcd culture. Gibral tarians -who i t was often said were more Bri ti sh th a n the B ri t ish th emse lves -had to be persuaded to prioritize their G ibral tarian identity ov er their British one. In the 1990s, this resulted in a huge wave of c ultu ral and national identity produciion . 1 Pol it i ca l ly, the SDGG (Self Detcrmination for Gibraltar Group) was founded. This introduced the cele bration of a National day and whose aim it was to enhance national symbol ism, which included the increased use of the term 'national'. A na tional anthem was written, and calentita , a local chickpea-dish of Genoese origin, was de clared the 'national dish' . But Bossano's economic policy failed. The finance centre did not attract as many investors as expected, although Gibraltar's GNP benefit ed from this situation . And unemployment still remains a problem, mainly amongst unskilled youth.

Cros sing the Border, Controlling the Body
From a Gibraltarian perspective, the Rock's economic crisis is rooted in the Spanish territo rial claim. This claim is enforced on several levels, but is most tangible through various measures at the border. That harassment con tinues has certainly helped to link actual expe riences to the prior experience ofborder closure. Hnmeti meH i t. ta kes up t o �; i x ho u rs t.n c ross from G i bral tar by cu r i nto S pu i n ; • so m eti me�; regu l a r G i bra l ta rian passpo rts, iden ti ty ca rds and drivers' l icences a rc re jected by the Spa n is h a uthorities; • sometimes G i bral tarian citizens who enter Spa i n from other countri es s uc h us, f(H · ex am ple, a G i braltarian to u ri st retu rn i ng from I taly who ch oo::;c::; to fly to Malaga or B a rce lona, might be re fu::;cd entry into Spa i n as a hol der of G i bral tari an passport; • when Abel M atu tcs became Spanish foreign min iste r in 1996 he even threate ned to cl ose the bo rder again , recal ling the clos u re that Spain did effect between 1969 and 1982.
The experience of the closure years is central to Gibraltarian narratives about their national identity. The closure, so the n arrative goes, forced the 30 ,000 Gibraltarians, irrespective of their ethnic, ed ucational or econ omic back ground to live on approx. 6 km . The closure is presented as the big equal i zer, and com m on features caused by the closure are highlighted in narratives: such as the miserable housing situation with three or more generations of a family living tightly packed in a humble apart ment; where young couples had no place of their own; where it was impossible to escape social control from family members, neighbours and acquaintances; where the only trip one could make by car was skalestrics, driving in circles around 'the island' without stopping, once, twice, three times, and always meeting the same peo ple.
Border crossing demands physical and psy chological strain, thereby activating feelings of tension, impotence and vulnerability. This is particularly true for those who cross by car (for pedestrians it is much less problematic to cross). The measures that create most physical and psychological strain are the queues, which are the result of the intensive regulation of person al and vehicle documentation (the so-called double checks ). Queues are a particular prob lem in summer months; irritability is common, heart attacks not unknown, and sometimes even death due to the heat. 13 Exacerbating the irritation is the fact that these checks are irregular. Sometimes it is pas sible to c ross w i th regu l ar identi fication, at othe r ti me�:�, the :-;arne papers a rc rejected . G i bralta ria n �:� like Mr and Mrs Harding never know whether mea�;ure checks will be enforced or not.
Indeed, w h at might be i nterpreted as a mild nuisance to people who cross or live at the border in a bigger cou ntry, has a quite di fferent impact on a territory the size of Gibraltar: border eflects are everywhere: • da i ly routine such as shoppi ng in nearby Spanish towns, is structured by the degree ofborder controls; visits to the neighbouring coun try have to be planned careful ly, espe cial ly iftravcll ing by car; • there is always uncertainty as to whether appointments can be kept, and this not only influences indivi duals, but also and to a much greater degree, the economy. Local politicians, trade unionists and the mem bers of the chamber of commerce on both sides of the border lament the negative influence of time-keeping on economic de velopment. Border restriction s are the main obstacle for foreign investment in Gibraltar, e.g. for the unsuccessful plan to attract en terprises after the handing over of Hong Kong to China; • the second pillar of the economy, tourism, is also negatively influenced by Spanish bor der controls, since tourists from the Costa del Sol on a day trip to the colony would hardly wish to spend their day in a queue; • internationally, Spain vetoes Gibraltar's in dependent participation in the Olympics, at sports competitions and at other leisure contests; • what is going on at the border has become the central topos of public and political dis course, which is dominated by anti-Spanish sentiment; • and, as already noted, people's bodily perfor mativity is shaped by the border situation.
Individual tension, anxiety and impotence is shared by 'the community', because it is ex pressed in a collective code and communicated via language, symbols or mimesis. In Gibraltar, anti-Spanish sentiment and pronouncements en code these fee l i ngs towards what might po�; sibly h appen at the borde r.

Resentments that 'Come up' . Heightened Emotions about Spain
Vi rulent anti-Hispanism is the result of the con gru ency between objective structures (here: border harassment) and incorporated habitus (here : physical expectation of harassment) (ct: Bourdieu 1977: 5 1 fl). 'l'he primary experience of bei ng su j ect to harassing and humiliating con trol leads to an identity crisis similar to what Anti-Hispanism as a form ofpermanent cathar sis offers the possibility of evading the perform ativity of (Spanish) nationalism and at the same time reinforces the hegemony of national ism as a central means of expressing difference.
Border contro ls and the mod a l i ticl:i o f bordcr crol:i Hing ca n be del:icri bcd a;; rituall:i . Rituals class i cal ly have been theo ri zed fu r the domai n of religion ; in the tradition ofDu rkhc i m al:i well as of Marxi l:im, rituall:i have been con ceptu a l ized as Driessen ( 1 992: 1 1 ) w r itesas "epip h e nunwn al, cirC//. 11/ . Slan t ial, n n d ep hemern/". B u t ri tua ls have their o w n form and they n ot only refer to power relatiunshipl:i of domi n ance and subordination. ' " With its phases of separation (waiting in queues), margi nalisation ( being con tro l l ed ) and i ntegration ( leav ing the co ntrol sector), border crossings show characleri sticl:i of secular rituals. Through instruction in rituals, in iti ands arc made familiar with th e rules and secrets ofthc new statu s. O fte n traum atic phys ical experiences such as mutilations or ritual death are part of the initi ation, th e new status being i nscribed in the very body of the i ni ti and.
Even if one disagrees as to whether or not border crossings may be compared to religious initiation, they can (if; for example, w aiting in the heat is part of the process) stir deep emo tions, similar to that of thc candidate to initi a tion. Driver and ritual initiand are confronted with the uncertainty of what will happen dur ing the process of crossing or 'on the other side' . Similar to the candidate to initiation, Gibral tarian drivers have no influence on the ritual procedures. But, in contrast to initiation, they are familiar with what possibly will occur. This enables them to take precautions before cross ing to minimize the risk of being targeted: they can call the border hotline or select times for crossing that are considered 'safe'; they can carry all documents that possibly could be re quested and carry along few and easily reload able pieces ofluggage. Yet contrary to the ritual initiand, precisely because border crossers know about the range of possibilities Spanish border guards might deploy, border controls are espe cially well suited to subject Gibraltarian driv ers to the power relationship of dominance and subordination.
Unlike the ritual initiand, Gibraltarian driv ers can never be certain of achieving, once within Spain, a status that safeguards them from harassment. On the contrary, while still in the area immediately adj acent to the border on the Spanish side, they have to expect special and add i t i onal con t ro l s by S pan i;;h civ i l gLt a rds. It is the know l edge about the possihle e nact ment of these m cus u rcl:i, co m b i ned w i th their pe rce ived arbi tra r i n c;;::; and the i nco m p le te ness of i n tegratio n , that convcrtl:i border cross i ng i n tu a ritual ofh u m i l iatiun and degrad a t i on, thereby re i n forc i n g G i bralia r i a n identi t y a nd n a tional ist a rgu ments as f(J rml:i of sy m bolic rc o; il:itancc.
Uncertai nty and tension as res u l t�:� of the o;peci fic borde r s i tu ation a rc repeated ly activat ed i n th e bod ies of regu l a r border c ro;;sero;. This is mai n ly responsi bl e for the v i rulence of bor derland hystcria, prescn t i n an ti-lli�:�pan i s m . ln addition to this direct relation sh i p, budicl:i and bo rde rs in G ibraltar arc also related i n more indirect ways, as 1 will show in relation to two examples of resistance to the Spanish claim that foregroun d physical experience.

Smuggling
My first example is exposi ng th e bodily h abitus of the smuggl er amongst young Gibraltarian men. Smuggling of various goods -mainly to bacco -is an old and central activity in the western area of the Mediterranean, ' " enclosing Spain, Gibraltar and Morocco. 1 7 Today, smuggling i s not only a n eilcct of economic and political history, but also of Gi braltar's special economic status within the EU (it is not a VAT area and is excluded from the Customs Union). Moreover, and this is a new phenomenon, it is discursively linked to the struggle for political representation and for self-determination (which is both a fight against Spain and Britain). The image of 'the smuggler', and its associated body styles and behaviour, has become a male icon for this struggle even amongst non-smugglers.
As one informant remarked: "The other day I noticed that they [young local men] behave quite aggressively when parking their car in the parking lot. I could not help thinking of the smugglers, manoeuvring boldly with their pateras [speed boats] to escape the Spanish coast guard." The behaviour of Gibraltarians is often inter preted i n re lation to sm uggl i ng, both negatively by Spa n i a rd::; and po::;i tively by locals. The i n forman t cited above emphasized her words with her hand::; m i m icking the pateras' manoeuvres. Her inte rpretation ofl ocal driving habits indi cates the amb ivalence of the smuggl ing topos express i n g both admi ration and indignation .
Moreover, it reprod uces an d perpetuates the image of a :;ociety intimately tied to smuggling. In Gibraltar, the smuggler has been an im portant :;ocial image for generations. Since the early 1990:; it has been i n d i rectly encouraged as an acceptable image for young men through the politics of Chief Minister Bossano. Bossano's tolerance towards smuggl ing was a way to coun ter the negative effects ofunemployment among young unskilled workers. It was also con si stent with Bossano's position on sovereignty and his refusal to accept and to participate in the regu lar Anglo-Spanish talks on Gibraltar's future. Rather than accepting a passive role towards the sovereignty question, smuggling was a means of expressing growing self confidence in relation to both Britain and Spain.
This had several consequences for Gibral tar's civil society. Until the early 1990s, smug gling had been the preserve of a few specialists, but with the growing possibility of purchasing pateras through favourable credit, more and more people could participate. At the time im mediately prior to fieldwork, about 2,000 people were directly or indirectly involved in smug gling (8 per cent of the population), a new development that I will call 'democratized smug gling'. It is not surprising, then, that, especially in the early 1990s, smuggling carried positive connotations. Conscience about its unlawful character was low, prestige -mainly for young men -was high. A sense of adventure, quick money, male bravado and the sense of harming an opponent imparted to the activity an irre sistible aura of sex, money and success. It is worth noting that, in contrast to many other borders, smuggling between Gibraltar and Spain is a one-way transaction. As a duty free zone, not only tobacco is smuggled into Spain, but also everyday goods, such as milk, cheese, sugar, alcohol and perfume. Smuggling at the border between Gibraltar and Spain is highly gendered. Whilst large-scale smuggling of tobacco and drugs is mai nly control led by you ng m ale G i brulta ri ans via sea, small sca le smuggl ing of oth er goods is domin ated by Span ish women . 1 x ] t i s popular among young Gibraltarian men to displ ay the typical smuggler attributes oft he cool Mafiosi so well known from Hollywood movies: s u n gl asses, muscle shi rts , l ots of golden chains and rings, earrings, tattoos, slick-backed hair. Many of these young men became ri ch in the early 1 990s when smuggling activities were at their height and supported by the then local socialist government.
Initially, 'democratized' smuggling was "like a game", according to one smuggler informant.
"They brought tobacco into Spain, with rowing boats, and made 10,000, 15 ,000 or 20,000 pese tas a night. With the money they bought pate ras , which were easily available on credit. Then , the game became serious. Six or seven kids were killed when pursued by the Spanish coast guards." They bought spacious apartments, jewellery and big cars, with which in the evenings they paraded through the narrow streets of Gibral tar, noisy with ghettoblasters. Everybody knew their names, and their family background . Through the use of a device familiar from Mafia films as a means of concealing personal identi ties -tin ted car windows -the smuggler scorned integration into the tight-knit web oflocal com munity. Without an integrative function, tinted windows symbolized something different: "we are the lords of the streets", which means the subordination of all other aspects of public life to the practice of smuggling.
The image of the smuggler is tied to class. As smuggling became more and more visible in public, middle-class Gibraltarians, especially such as merchants, accountants, lawyers and teachers, became increasingly concerned with Gibraltar's international reputation, which was already portrayed by the Spanish media in terms of smuggling and piracy. In combination with Bossano's refusal to co-operate with Brit ain on the question of sovereignty, the visibility of smuggling, interpreted not only as harmful to the colony's reputation, but also as a take-over of th e p u blic scene by lawless mobsters, were cen tra l to pic::: , a round w h ich the then oppo::: i tional conservative (G SD) and liberal (GNP) pa rtie::: organized. Both parties criticized the fact that Bossan o's strategy towards smuggling wou l d prevent th e transfi>rmation of Gibral ta r's economy into a service-based, off shore and finan cial centre, an ai m whi ch was agreed upon not only by GSD and GNP, but by Bossa no's own party as well.
The GSD in particular worried that Bossa n o's tolerance towards s muggli ng and the fact that smuggling had become the main pillar of the local economy, would result in Britain tak ing a tougher stance on Gibraltar. The parties were afraid that Britai n, which the Spanish media portrayed as tolerating piracy in their colony, would introduce Direct Rule from White h a l l , removing Bossano's government and sus pending Gibraltar's Constitution. Without that Constitution, which guaranteed the very exist ence of Gibraltar as a self governed British colony, Gibraltarians would have no safeguard against Britain's talks with Spain, and, more importantly, no input into possible decisions on the question of sovereignty.
The GSD tried to persuade the public oftheir position by implicitly distinguishing between 'normal and acceptable, low quantity everyday' smuggling, carried out by almost everyone, from 'bad smuggling'. The latter was synonymous with 'democratized' smuggling. In 1995, under British pressure and the threat of Direct Rule, Bossano himself intervened against smuggling by expropriating most of the boats involved. His action led to local upheaval, the so-called " 1995 riots". Nevertheless, under threat of Britain's direct intervention large-scale smuggling was soon brought under control.
When I arrived in Gibraltar in January 1996, there were hardly any pateras left with which large-scale smuggling could be carried out. However, the outer signs of democratized smug gling, remained.
To counter the dangers of smuggling by sea, many of the pious young smugglers had been tattooed with protective images of the Virgin.
During the time of democraticized smuggling, such tattoos became popular even in those seg ments of society which did not actively partici 66 pate in smuggling. Other publ ic i m agc::: of::: mug gling ::: i m i l u rly per::: istcd . A l oca l designe1· pro duced T-shirts that show ed a pa.lera. , fo l lowed by Spanish police boat::: . The sm uggl er in the palera. had th e face of a s m i l ing s h a rk. The sharklike smuggler is a local icon to cou nter Span ish discourse on sm uggl ing. These T-sh irts were extremely popular amongst yo u n g men at the height of smuggling in the early 1 990s.
When the GSD won the May elections of 1. 996, their first measure was intended to resto re the old status quo ofthe non -v i s i bility of s m u ggl ing by prohibiting the Mafia-like tinted car win dows.
And again, even th ough any talk about smug gling with locals began with a condem nation, positive aspects of smu ggling were still present discursively, especially when drawi ng connec tion between the border, bodies, and resistance , as the following quotation illustrates.
"It was a formula for economic subsi stence which only damaged the all-powerful interests ofthe State, that mean stepmother who instead of protecting her children squeezed what she could out of them and, without recognising the revolutionary obligation oftheir citizenship, for many a century simply treated them as mere subjects. What did it matter robbing a State that was robbing one anyway? Contraband was the Robin Hood and the treasury the Sheriff of N ottingham."1 9 The evil and hostile Sheriff ofN ottingham is, of course, a synonym for Spain: the noble smug gler, fighting successfully with male bravado, patience and a snare against an overtopping fascistic state machinery. In the Spanish ver sion, the image is reversed: the noble bandit becomes a lawless and disgraceful criminal, whose persecution and punishment is the self evident duty of any nation.
The Spanish media and officials often de scribe Gibraltarian smugglers as pirates in the sense of Sir Francis Drake. For example, Cesar Brana, the civil governor of the Spanish prov ince of Cadiz, turns the positive image of the 'noble smuggler's' into a negative one by com paring Bossano with Drake: like the raider of Spanish silver transports in the 1 71h century, Gibraltarians under Bossano attack Spain's economy with their speed boats, with drug smuggling and money-laundering.20 Drake has positive associations in the British context, be cause symbolically he is the one who laid the foundation stone for the British Empire. The Drake metaphor offers a perfect vessel for asso ciations ofBritish maritime superiority, as he is thought of as the hero who successfully defeat ed the Spanish Armada. As in 1588, small Brit ish ships (= Gibraltarian speed boats) turn out to be superior to the big Spanish galleons. The Armada image also is evident in another meta phor often used by locals: Gibraltarians as Dav id fighting against Goliath, who, by virtue of strategy, intelligence, smallness and the ability to outmanoeuvre quickly with their pateras,they manage to out-wit the sluggish Spanish police armada. This idea has become iconicized in a local series of postcards, amongst them one showing an ape (symbol for Gibraltarians) in a patera loaded with cartons of Winston tobacco and displaying its thumb as a symbol for the victory over Spain .
These metaphors and associations not only describe the tactics Gibraltarian smugglers perform with their speed boats, but, in a way, the tactics themselves become shaped accord ing to these metaphors. Indeed a smuggler's speed boat action is described and rated by other smugglers as aesthetic or as non-aesthet ic, as bravado or as timid. In this sense, meta phors materialize as behaviour.
In Gibraltar as well as in the hinterland, smuggling (with the exception of drug-smug gling) is considered a normal and a legitimate economic activity. Gibraltarians and Campo people share this conviction with other border landers.21 In local discourse, smuggling is con sidered a legitimate means of resisting Spanish policy which, as already mentioned, is believed deliberately to hamper the economic develop ment. To Gibraltarians therefore, smuggling is one of the very few effective ways of harming the enemy.
James Scott ( 1990: 44) has suggested that subordinate articulate ideas and values that reverse and negate those generated by the dom inant group, via what he calls a hidden tran script. Interestingly, and contrary to Scott, Gi bra lta r i n n s do not res ist d o m i nant dep ictions of th em a ::; s m u gglers by co u n tering those por trayals w i th alte rnative and oppositional por traya l s of th e i r own design . Although in fear of Spa n i s h accusations, many Gibraltari ans often negate tho very existence of smuggling to the foreign er, but claim that 'everybody in the re gi on, i n clud i ng th o Spanish authorities, is in volv ed in smuggling'; or when proudly display ing the image of the positive smuggler, they draw on precisely those notions and use them to the i r own advantage.

Be auty Contests
A second effect of the bo rder on body and habi tus is related to the boom in beauty contests in Gibraltar. Again , I will analy1.e these contests as a form of national identifi cation and of sym bolic resistance to the Spanish claim to Gibral tar.
Participation in beauty contests is extremely popular amongst liLtle girls and young women, and, increasingly since the mid-90s, also amongst young men. In tho first weeks of my ing preoccupation with the body, which men pursued in relation to sport, while women be came more and more interested in beauty con tests. Increasing preoccupation with the body was explained by boredom with life in the tiny and isolated community. Moreover, the limita tions of living in what was then only 6 km of space led to the need to expand at least physi cally and the need to self-experience. Although the first beauty contests arose from a need to expand out of small-town boredom, this does not explain why the contests were still popular in 1996 at the time of fieldwork, 14 years after the border was opened, nor why they boom in Gibraltar today.
There are, of course, many factors operating here. Participants may have one set of motiva tions, their parents another, while participation itself may have very different significance to the different women involved. For example, the contests offer the possibility for a young woman to realize certain fantasies, such as to achieve reputation amongst peers, to become famous locally or to start an international career. It is impo rta n t to keep i n m i n d thut one woman out of 1 ,84 0 (of' the age co hort l G-24 ) w i l l partici pate us Miss Gi hmltn.r i n the Miss Wo rld-Con test -th ere is h ard ly u bette r ch a n ce fi1 r a yo u n g wom a n i n a n y other co u ntry t o participate i n this wel l -known i n ternati o n a l bea uty co ntest. Preparation for contc:;t:; gen era l ly i nvolves all fam i ly me mbe r:; o f' th e pa rtici pa nt;;' k i n :;h i p networks, thei r fr iends and n eighbou rs. Moth ers, aunts and grandmoth ers arc involved i n all kinds o f preparations. r n contrast to bea uty contests i n nation states, the orga n i ze r:;, the parti cipants and th eir f un i l ies a rc person ally known to each oth e r. Parental and familial control over a da u ghte r's pa rtici pation and the possible threats to her rep utation is guaran teed . Contests rei n force family tics.
The many di ffe rent local con tests operate independently from the original (Miss Gibral tar) contest, for they have become an important source of income for the organizing modelling agency, which is run privately by Mrs G. , an enterprising lady, who controls all local public relations for the contest. Moreover, via her week ly column in the local paper (with the title Lij" e & Style), she dominates local media discourse on all matters of gender relations as well as on (female and male) beauty. Even though the Gibraltar Government endows all participants in the Miss Gibraltar Contest with a certain sum of money, participants (with the possible exception of the winner)2" hardly win financial ly, for participation in the various events which precede the actual contest is costly: taking dif ferent modelling courses to be prepared for the catwalk is a necessary prerequisite and has to be done in Mrs G.'s agency; a successful applica tion to participate involves sitting a modelling exam, which costs extra money; and the diplo ma has to be paid for extra, too. Once the diploma is obtained, modelling practice is nec essary, again organized by Mrs G. Two possibil ities exist: either, the young women 'job' as hostesses, for example during a conference or when a new shop is opened. The customers (e.g. hotels, shops) pay for hiring the young women, and the women themselves pay for the arrange ment. Or, they may participate in other beauty contests (which are also organized by Mrs G.'s agency), which again costs money.
Yet, ind i v idual motivation, fa m i ly cohes ion a n d entrepreneu rship do not fu l ly explain why contests rece ive the high degree of" local med i a coverage and the interest oflocal pol iticians. A:; I mentioned before, parti cipation is not only a m ajor eve nt fo r the young woman and her family but for the community as a whole, as i t offe rs t h e poss i b i l i ty ofsymbol ic rep resen tati on and of resistance to the enemy. Gibraltar's par tici pation in intern ati onal contests and compe titions i s al most always blocked by Spai n . Th c rc arc only a few international contests where Gi braltar is not vetoed by Spain, such as th e world hockey championship and the Miss World Contest. Hence, symbolically, participation i n the Miss World Contest oilers a rare chance for Gibraltar to represent the community as a nation before a global audience. H create:; the illusion that Gibraltar is on an equal footing with existing nati on states. 30,000 people arc represented alongside Miss India, that repre sents 900 million people. Participation offers the unique possibility of collective representa tion, which is a means to resist Spain and her claim over Gibraltar.

Conclusion
The notion of the border is one of the basic metaphors of our discipline. Astonishingly, this has not led us to view borders between states as privileged sites to carry out research -a fact which is even more of a surprise given that state borders are places, where many central con cepts of cultural anthropology, such as territory, identity and nationality, are exposed and per formed, staged and negotiated. In this article, I have analyzed the border between Spain and Gibraltar as a productive element in the habit ualization of a Gibraltarian national identity. I focused particularly on how the border influ ences bodily experience, and how this experi ence is linked in local discourse to national identification. Anderson ( 1983) calls nations 'imagined com munities', entities, within which the individual imagines a common 'national' bond with others. The cognitive approach reflected in 'believing' and 'imagining' has to be combined with the phenomenological approach of bodily 'feeling', bri dgi ng the ga p between d i scourse and body. Nati onul identi ficu tion , T would a rgue, is not simp ly u cogn i tive p rocess, but can only be fully understood if we u l:;o consider the habi tualiz ing e ffects of power ( i n this case: national pow er) on the bodi es (and emotions) of individuals.
Emotions as bod ily experi enced feelings, dis likes a n d obsession s, the feelings of emptiness and fu lJilment, of arousal and indifference, of fear, happiness or hate arc more than just expressions of individu al experience; they arc alwuys e m bedded in cu ltu re and society and therefore able to establish closeness or dis tance, idcntiiication or lack of identification with others. Coll ective identification in Gibral tar is, as my examples show, strongly influenced by the physical experience of diflerence at the border. I tried to illustrate this in two ways.
Firstly, by showing how the border functions as a means through which Spain habitualizes the pcrformativity of impotence by subjecting Gibraltarian bodies to constant humiliation, year after year. Th is border is a privileged site to show how (Spanish ) nation al identity is made physically tangible to individuals, because it is here, that various controls, measures, and har assing experiences provoke emotions of uncer tainty, tension, stress and the like. These emo tions are communicated in narratives about border experience and in anti-Hispanic rheto ric. Both means of communication generate a feeling of solidarity and help to strengthen the development of a distinctive national identity.
Secondly, I tried to show that apart from being subjected to border controls, bodies, sov ereignty and the border are also related in more indirect ways. Smuggling and beauty contests are not only linked to the border as effects ofthe conflict of sovereignty. They are also forms of resistance to the Spanish claim on Gibraltar, as they are arenas in which the enemy can be challenged and damaged: smuggling being both an important source of income and the very symbol of strength and independence, beauty contests being a means to present Gibraltar as a 'national' entity on the world stage and so undermine Spanish intentions to prevent such an attempts. Moreover, as physical expressions, they embody the very difference between Gi braltarians and Spaniards.