There is theoretical significance to studying states and nations at their metaphorical and literal ‘borders’. Focusing on the contested border region of southeastern Anatolia, this contribution highlights the tensions, contradictions, and recent shifts in state-society relations in the rural spaces of the southeast. As I detail, state delivery of irrigated agriculture represents a recent and significant chapter in the evolving state-society relations in this contested border area, with significant Arabic and Kurdish speaking minority populations. With contemporary changes associated with the large-scale Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP), state influence in rural areas and encounters with the state by rural populations are intensified. This occurs both horizontally, in terms of infiltrating new spaces and life practices, and also vertically, in terms of intensified interaction, such as that associated with the increased incorporation of rural residents into the Turkish economy or the increased dependence of villagers on state services. Reading the state ethnographically through the differentiated responses of villagers to recent irrigation-related changes, and drawing on interviews and survey data, my aim is to analyze how the state is lived, in very real terms, in the fabric of everyday life, and to consider what this suggests for understanding state-society relations and the changing citizen subjectivities in the liminal spaces of Turkey’s southeast. Consistent with broader themes of interest to the panel, I will also consider the limits of ethnographic work of this type, in terms of attempting to situate and understand the stories that are told, or not, by informants. To do so, I will highlight several key moments of interest where there was more or less openness to ‘reading’, ‘speaking’ and ‘critiquing’ the Turkish state.