Heidegger informs us that we must "think for the sake of dwelling," but what exactly does it mean to dwell in the contemporary world? Since the Second World War the concepts of "dwelling" and "place" have come to occupy a unique position in global politics. Yet despite the overwhelming dominance of global capitalism, the concept of borders refuses to succumb to a global agenda. Crossings seeks articles dealing with the concept (s) of dwelling and dwelling places as they have functioned since the end of World War II. We are especially interested in articles discussing the relationship of dwelling places to notions of history and subjectivity; states of emergency; homelessness; cities; desire; sexuality; the construction of new spaces, such as the World Wide Web; as well as more abstract dwelling places like musical compositions, textuality, the plastic arts, and cinema. As global politics moves increasingly toward the creation of a permanent security state, the question arises of what it means to dwell in the world. Moreover, with the apparent stalling of the Middle East "peace process" and Ariel Sharon’s implementation of a fence to physically divide Israelis and Palestinians, the struggle over Kashmir, and the emergence of a rhetoric of the "homeland" in the United States, the issue of "rights" in relation to dwelling becomes increasingly problematic. Indeed, the radical intimacy between dwelling and human existence (as a zone of indistinction between living and existing) only serves to highlight what is at stake (politically, philosophically, and existentially) in this problem. In other words, to contemplate what it might mean to dwell in the world may be to contemplate (and confront) the fate of existence itself in the post-war era. This is the political terrain of a new form of biopolitics, whose center is nowhere and whose periphery is everywhere. Articles might address the notion of dwelling and dwelling places as either contributing to—or deconstructing—traditional notions of how we live in a world that is evolving from a disciplinary society to a society of control—that is, a world that is increasingly governed by a permanent state of emergency.