Between nation and state: Boundary infrastructures, communities of practice and everyday nation-ness in the Chinese rail system

Abstract

This paper draws on thinking within political geography and science and technology studies to examine how the infrastructure of the Chinese rail system situates the practices of individual passengers within the national community. Specifically, I employ Star’s boundary object framework to trace how hot water taps and their associated objects integrate multiple communities of practice into rail space while also producing fractures within the ridership. The practice of hot water drinking, like rail infrastructure, is the product of Chinese state-making. In contemporary China, however, thermoses and instant noodles have become markers not just of Chinese nation-ness but of particular sub-national communities of practice. I argue recent conflicts over their use and even presence in rail space reflect and realize fractures within broader society. This paper’s analysis of the Chinese rail system contributes to a clearer understanding of how top-down and bottom-up forces interact within China’s domestic infrastructural development. Incorporating the materiality of infrastructure allows political geographers to better understand how the nation-ness of certain bodies and practices are entangled with the built environment, moving from imagined communities to communities of practice.