ИСТИНА

In connecting people’s expectances and reality, border crossing has certainly a considerable impact on human behaviour and mind, especially in case if this act becomes an individual’s regular practice and/or a mean of existence. In this case, borderland can be transformed into a space of everyday interactions between the people and radically changes their life. The authors try to summarize the definitions of everyday life and theoretical approaches to its study used by different experts. The hypothesis is that everyday practice does not simply show distinctions or similarities of the people living close to the boundary on its both sides but allows understanding the shaping of different socio-cultural spaces and the differentiation of border regions as a whole. The objective is to consider local communities’ cross-border practices which determine their life. The paper is based on the materials of numerous field studies conducted in 2010-2017 in border regions of Russia and neighbouring countries resulted in more than 600 interviews with experts. The guide included 20 questions which can be divided into three blocs: 1) the perception and the role of borders in the life of the expert and his/her region; 2) cross-border interactions (their frequency, objectives, character) and the image of the neighbour; 3) the extension of the cross-border area of the people’s activity. The authors estimate the opportunities and constraints created by the boundary and motivating its crossing, analyze its reasons and directions at all sections of Russian land borders. They focus on the socio-economic and socio-cultural discrepancies, and the features of neighbouring areas stimulating specific practices distinguishing borderlands from the rest of the state territory.