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- Convenors:
-
Ilka Thiessen
(Vancouver Island University)
Goran Janev (Sts Cyril and Methodius University Skopje)
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- Formats:
- Workshops
- Location:
- S301
- Sessions:
- Wednesday 11 July, -, -, Thursday 12 July, -
Time zone: Europe/Paris
Short Abstract:
This panel will explore the responses to the post-1989 transformation of European capitals, as well as recent responses to the financial crisis, by looking at how the symbolic power of cities experience the transformation of public spaces.
Long Abstract:
Just twenty years ago half of Europe hastily jumped from socialism towards capitalism. Reinforcing nationalism was one of the ways to overcome the transitional anxiety. The European version of cosmopolitan supra-national identity had and still has to compete with particular nationalist representations in the 'new' countries of a united Europe.
As most revolutions happen in capital cities, we seek for ethnographic accounts, that reveal the discrepancy between the imposition of the governmental symbolic order in the public space of capital cities, and creation of everyday lived spaces. Considering the symbolic power that capitals pose, the transformations of the public space in these cities can reveal the aspirations of the political elites in these countries. This panel will explore the responses to the post-1989 transformation of European capitals, as well as recent responses to the financial crisis, and constant threat of recession and economic downfall. We are interested both in the nation-state abuse of the idea of capital cities, and the production of appropriate political subjects. Following this, we will look at the resistance produced by ordinary citizens, artists, and other actors who exercise their right to create a public space that is an inclusive open democratic space.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Wednesday 11 July, 2012, -Paper short abstract:
Warsaw’s relationship with the Palace of Culture demonstrates how interactions between buildings and cities can be grasped by an approach which, when confronted with complexity, aspires to reduce it (Luhmann 1995), rather than to celebrate its irreducibility (Latour 1988).
Paper long abstract:
The Palace of Culture and Science is a Stalinist skyscraper, which has dominated the centre of Warsaw since its completion in 1955. Citing the example of Warsaw-Palace relations since the fall of the Polish People's Republic in 1989, I want to claim that the place and role of architecture in a given social setting is 'determined in the last instance' (Althusser 1966) by its relation to the (political) economy. The task of an anthropologist is to test the strength of the last instance; to illustrate whether and how the determination of the built environment by the mode of production is mediated by a 'concrete diversity' (Godelier 1974) of 'relatively autonomous' material and immaterial entities.
The Palace has a tangible and powerful impact on the city's architecture, on its political, bureaucratic, 'cultural', commercial and educational lives, on the bodies and minds of its citizens. The Palace's presence in Warsaw is so prominent, that it sometimes seems to elide its political economic 'conditions of existence': it has evinced an extraordinary 'obduracy' (Hommels 2005) in the face of post-socialist proposals to demolish it, or otherwise undermine its dominance over Warsaw. But, in the end, things are not as complicated as they seem. The Palace - inside, outside and around - has already been profoundly transformed by the market economy. Architecture remains a faithful servant of the mode of production - whether the one which allowed it to come into being, or the one which allows it to remain standing.
Paper short abstract:
A number of processes happening simultaneously in a rather short period of time including post-war recovery, economic transition social and political transitions from Socialism to Post-Socialism, European Integrations, Globalization EU-ization lead to unsustainable development of the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo.
Paper long abstract:
A reshaping the urban system of capital cities in SEE Region has occurred in the contest of rapid institutional transformation, unlike in Western Europe where societies have had a chance to test these trends and respond accordingly by formulating public policies mitigating their most negative impacts. As a consequence, in SEE countries, institutions established tend to be immature and in a state of flux. This institutional incompleteness characterizes local entrepreneurialism, city image building and strategic planning in post-socialist cities. There are many signs showing that the majority of urban changes taking place since the early 1990s are moving post-socialist cities in the direction of unsustainable growth.
As the new capital, formed by the disintegration of SFR Yugoslavia, Sarajevo gained new functions. All irregularities and dysfunctionalities of the institutional bodies' of Bosnia and Herzegovina being in transition best represent themselves territorially in the capital of BiH, Sarajevo, where the aforementioned shifts left their footprints on the urban tissue. These side effects of post-socialist planning happening not only in Bosnia but in the neighborhood as well include the emergence of urban sprawl, illegal building, land speculation, gentrification, and social stratification. As a gateway city, a country capital has new administrative, economic and political roles, a rising number of international contacts, growing foreign direct investment etc.
Finally, the decline of urban areas and the overall quality of life, growing social stratification, the disappearance of urban green and open spaces, the increase of traffic congestion and air pollution, can not be resolved without strengthening the active government involvement in the process of urban development.
Paper short abstract:
The paper explores how city spaces of Prishtina, Kosovo's capital, are used and given meaning in the uncertainties of everyday life, given a development structured by the intertwined forces of international political control, transnational migration and an expanding and demanding global capitalism.
Paper long abstract:
This paper attempts to ethnographically explore how city spaces of Prishtina, Kosovo's capital, are used and given meaning by residents in the situatedness and uncertainty of their everyday lives, given the changes marking the city in the last decade.
In 2008, nearly ten years as a UN protectorate after the war with Serbia, Kosovo was declared an independent state. To celebrate and commemorate this historic, yet controversial, event a new kind of monument was erected near the popular Yugoslav shopping mall - huge yellow block letters forming the word NEWBORN, in English. This greatly differs from the imposing statue of the Albanian medieval hero Skanderbeu in the center of Prishtina, mounted on his horse as if in retrieval of the city, and the land, that was once lost to the Ottoman empire. More importantly, it signifies a retrieval from recent Serbian rule. Nearby, rises the modernistic Yugoslav monument of Brotherhood and Unity, stretching its symbolic fingers as it stands on the fringe of the old renown bazaar, demolished during the Socialist era.
Bearing such diverse politicized insignia of its history, Prishtina has nonetheless developed with little or no state regulation in terms of urban planning. There is instead an ongoing frenzy of building projects in all directions, a development structured by the intertwined forces of international political control, local and transnational migration and an expanding and demanding global capitalism. The question then is how the diverging practices of everyday life unfold in this city at this point of its political history.
Paper short abstract:
The creation of new, heavily controlled open spaces in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku leaves people with an increasing feeling of uncertainty in the public sphere. This paper asks how inhabitants deal with this feeling and what kind of strategies they develop in order to create their own places.
Paper long abstract:
When the so called "Second oilboom" started in the mid-1990s, the Azerbaijani government set up to represent its new wealth in the capital Baku by creating more and more places where the citizens feel heavily controlled through cameras, police or private security companies patrolling squares, parks and malls. Public assemblies are forbidden almost everywhere in order to prevent public demonstrations and unrest. Within the elder generation this leads to an increasing sense not to belong to the city anymore. Due to the living conditions it is even more difficult for the younger generation: Most of them stay with their parents or other relatives until they get married and even then many of them do not find an affordable apartment to move out from their parents. Meeting in the public sphere is often the only way to get together with friends or encounter the other sex. Though in this controlled environment those free spaces are limited, and semi-public places such as cafes and restaurants and clubs are usually expensive and also well-guarded. The paper shows how young people create mostly temporary free spaces through unofficial gatherings such as flashmobs and examines how the official side and other inhabitants respond to these actions. The upcoming Eurovision Song Contest will challenge the fragile balance between controlling and contesting public spaces even further.
Paper short abstract:
The paper intends to explore and analyze the public response to the recent ‘handled down’ project of renovation of Kontraktova Square in Kyiv, that exploits abstract historic forms and images from the global network, thus offering a kind of national memory enforcement strategy alienated from the local memory and tradition.
Paper long abstract:
Cities in transition is a challenging topic for scholars who aim at re-conceptualizing the role and relationships between "cities", "civic tradition" and "transformation of public spaces" as specific complex of narrative, spatial or visual strategies. Since 1991, Kyiv experiences drastic metamorphoses in ascending from administrative center to metropolis/capital-city. It is here, that global, national and local identity meet, overlap and stay in conflict. Kyiv provides a perfect site to analyze how "the invention of tradition" or attempts to create a kind of overlapping 'national ideology' confronts "urban memory" or identity of its citizens. But does 'the scene of the civic' necessarily need to become the scene of conflict?
In my presentation I intend to analyze the public response to the recent official project of renovation of Kontraktova Square (a rather weird mix of abstract historic forms, consumerist ideology and images from the global network.) This public response could be regarded as a claiming a right to the city - a public campaign that culminated in presenting alternative projects of public spaces in Kontraktova.
Analyzing the alternative projects I'll try to focus on the following questions: In which ways the 'global', the 'national' and the 'local' are to be represented/translated/articulated in urban form? Is it possible to think of new articulations of 'place' (town square as a paradigm public space) transgressing the opposition of trans-national - local? Is a notion of 'community resilience' applicable in this case? How local could be placed within the broader mega-networks of cultural or social belonging?
Paper short abstract:
This paper will examine the transnational project of Strasbourg and its German neighbour city Kehl and the role of memory, oblivion and democracy as its constituting elements. In spite of the opportunities of such a project, it is also in conflict to Strasbourg’s European ambitions and democratic self-understanding.
Paper long abstract:
The NATO summit in April 2009 celebrating the 60th anniversary of the institution took place in the French city of Strasbourg and the German cities of Baden Baden and Kehl but without its habitants forced to leave theirs residences during the summit. The choice of neighbouring cities in different countries that share a common, conflict-laden history is highly symbolic as a sign of Franco-German reconciliation. But this was done without people's participation. That's why civil associations organized protests against the suspension of several liberal rights and the exclusion of civil society.
The same year was signed a prospective political project to constitute a transnational municipality (Strasbourg-Kehl) with legal instruments and an own budget.
This paper will examine the project of a transnational border city and the role of memory, oblivion and democracy as its constituting elements. As representations have historical and geographical functions, the analysis will focus on the following issues: the rewriting of history, the "esthetization" of the past and the public space, and the multiple and sometimes contradictory demands for recognition. One delicate aspect of the transnational project is that the creation of a Greater Strasbourg that includes its neighbouring German town was already realized by the Nazis during World War II, a "detail" which is "forgotten" in our days.
Democratic practices differ very much in France and Germany. How a transnational
city can consider these different traditions? Will citizens be included in the elaboration of a transnational project?
By reference to historical occurrences at current actions in the French-German border region we hope to get some answers to our questions.
Paper short abstract:
This paper elaborates on the character and meaning of “the new” as it emerges in a broad range of areas of metropolitan life in Madrid City. Through nine situated ethnographies we relate this to contemporary processes of metropolitanisation.
Paper long abstract:
Since the work of Simmel and Park, the metropolis has been a privileged site for anthropology to think about novelty and the human response to it. Whether theorized today as world cities (Hannerz) metàpoles (Ascher), global cities (Sassen), megápolis (García Canclini), creative cities (Florida) or informational ones (Castells), today's major agglomerations are a key stage for the emergence of the trendy, the new and the unexpected.
This paper presents the collective, multisited ethnography in Madrid City by a team of ten anthropologists. Our goals are (a) to identify and document a broad range of emerging phenomena (new practices, structures and objects) that express the ongoing transformations of Madrid in the cultural realm; (b) to explain them in terms of the processes of metropolitanisation experienced from the last two decades by a capital city increasingly global; (c) to discuss the local meanings and uses of the novelty embedded in the practices considered.
Our fieldwork covers nine "ethnographic windows": (1) Network locality and redefinitions of space; (2) Metropolitan intimacies -invisible transformations of the private, domestic and intimate spheres; (3) Corporate changes issued by the New Economy, economies of knowledge and creative local policies; (4) Musical industry and changes in production/consumption of music; (5) Net-city and net-actors; (6) Expert systems and planning of urban risk management; (7) Esthetic and artistic irruptions in the public domain; (8) Cosmopolitan and ethnical restructuring of the city images; (9) Young tech-setters, cultural trendys and their use of TICs.
Paper short abstract:
I will look at the current debate amongst citizens over the governments “ Spiritual Revitalisation” of the city of Skopje through erections of monumental statues and buildings via that the eradication of green spaces and socialist history. The significant issue of Skopje 2014, putting aside the cost aspect of this project, is, that the concrete ‘erections’ serve no other purpose but to be erected. The project is led by politicians who define the style, the kind and the ‘story’ of Skopje 2014’s cementing over Skopje’s socialist and Ottoman past according to some, whereas others call it an ‘art-revolution.
Paper long abstract:
Skopje 2014 is a highly advertised and contested re-modeling of the city of Skopje, capital of the Republic of Macedonia. Having been rebuilt once before after the devastating earthquake of 1963 in which 80% of the city was destroyed Skopje today is being re-build as' timeless capital.' In my ethnography I will explore the environmental, aesthetic, political and economical contentions amongst Skopje's citizens about Skopje 2014. I am not asking why or by whom Skopje 2014 is being created, but what is being created? Alongside Skopje 2014, school-books and rituals are being changed as well. Whereas before Slavic tribes immigrated 600 A.D. into ancient Macedonia, today, with Skopje 2014, the Republic of Macedonia is inhabited by genetically true and ancient Macedonians refuting the Southern's Neighbours' claim on Macedonian identity and its subsequent exclusion from the European Union and Nato. As such I will be looking at the creation of truth and political and educational enforcement of legitimacy via Lions, Bulls and a Warrior on a Horse.