“Virtual Paradise”. Urban space utopias and politics
The Symposium on Urban Anthropology –
th Edition 24th – 25th of October 2024
“Virtual Paradise”. Urban space utopias and politics
This year’s symposium theme addresses the shaping of urban space through processes of social production and urban space policies (e.g. planning, design, systematization, legislation, reform), through which the elite negotiates future images of the city, more or less consistent with the daily needs and experiences of the inhabitants. In recent decades, numerous anthropological studies have criticized the discrepancy between urban transformation/modernization projects and the realities of everyday life in these rational spaces, highlighting the limits of implementation, and seldom, the evasion of humans from the equation. When considered, the city dweller is included in a form of social engineering, reflecting ideological constructions of what a good city, a good society, or a civilized man should look like. Through projects that outline cities of the future, social reformers (urban planners, anthropologists, sociologists, architects, politicians, doctors, etc.) aim to solve a multitude of social and environmental problems, but some of the last century examples prove to us that changing the informal living environments do not always bring well-being and do not change the life projection of the inhabitants, especially those in disadvantaged urban areas. Moreover, it promotes gentrification and the poor population displacement, which is increasingly pushed out of the cities.
Of all the promised paradisiacal projections on a historical scale, the virtual one seems to be the closest to an immediate reality, being within reach, easy and at will.
Through the proposed studies we wish to compose a timeline of projects, perspectives and solutions for the urban space, together functioning as a palimpsest in which a map of the ideal city can be glimpsed. Contributions can be registered in the following subthemes and research directions:
Utopias and re/constructions
In the last two centuries, amid conflicts, regime changes, modern aspirations and identity politics, many urban landscapes have changed radically, most often through a polarization between a new, modern center and an old, traditional one, but also through innovative projects. Among the proposed solutions, the best known are the projects inspired by the “garden city” movement manifested in Western Europe and the United States at the beginning of the 20th century, rooted in the socialist and utopian ideas of the previous century. The movement promoted the development of satellite communities around a central city, which encompassed the benefits of both rural and urban environments, avoiding the disadvantages of both.
After the publication of Ebenezer Howard’s Garden Cities of To-Morrow (1898/1922), urbanism—as a set of practical urban solutions and academic discourses related to the urban—turned toward futuristic projects. Today, the utopian impulse to radically improve cities through planning is most evident in post-conflict and post-disaster urban reconstruction efforts. In many cases, urban reconstruction goes hand in hand with state reconstruction, being promoted by groups in power as a way to legitimize and consolidate their position.
The 21st century symbol project is the “smart and green city”. It involves both the use of alternative technologies and technological innovations in urban environments—along with an increased focus on urban agriculture, energy efficiency, green planning and architecture—and the formulation of solutions to issues of social justice and equity in the urban environment.
The virtual city. Dangers and behavioral/identity patterns
While virtual worlds (video games, social networks, metaverse) have existed for many years, their systematic study is still at the begining, divided into two main approaches. The first tries to discover and deepen parallels between people’s online and offline behavior to gain more knowledge about the real world. The second approach focuses on understanding phenomena in virtual worlds. Current research has indicated that virtual worlds are subject to the same social rules as other societies, paving the way for large-scale controlled social experiments.
Criticisms against the utility of anthropological research in virtual worlds argue that participants use them as a means of escaping reality, therefore online behavior cannot be taken seriously. But if we understand identity as a flexible and fluid construction of different aspects of a person’s life, which declines according to social context, then we can integrate the avatar in one’s identity.
Because they operate according to a regulation and involve a high degree of content control, virtual communities (eg Second Life) appear to be better organized than those in everyday life. To be able to build the virtual society according to their imagination and needs, users adhere to principles that qualify them as “good citizens” and develop an identity based on shared values in the online environment (sometimes completely different from the real one). From online activity and interaction, solutions can emerge for the problems faced by real communities, solutions that reflect the ethos of an utopia, a world without social stigmatization based on age, sex, race, etc. Such real ramifications of virtual worlds are in continuous diversification, which implies new forms of culture and new identities (a combination of classic and virtual identity).
The metaverse comes with its own set of issues related to identity monetization, information privacy, addiction, and user safety that stem from the challenges facing social media and the video game industry as a whole.
Legislation and reforms
Urbanization and industrialization, which intensified in the second half of the 19th century, led to the development of peripheral areas in large cities, where factory workers and their families lived in squalid conditions, in housing without water supply or sewage. Overcrowding and poor living conditions, responsible for the spread of diseases such as cholera, typhoid fever or tuberculosis, required the formulation of long-term solutions. With advances in medical science focusing on the role of the environment in the spread of disease, physicians and policy makers began to see the lack of urban sanitation as a threat to public health. Doctors were the first to insist on building new housing for the poor and working class as a solution both to the “housing issue” and to extinguishing the various epidemic outbreaks. Health reformers were concerned with environmental factors as well as “unhealthy and immoral behaviors,” their proposals being a combination of infrastructure improvements, legal or administrative measures, and moral and educational strategies. The basis of these measures was mainly the need to maintain a healthy urban workforce. These attempts to clean cities of dirt to prevent disease also had a discriminatory side, reinforcing social, racial and spatial hierarchies as well as existing power structures, a phenomenon that continues to this day.
The sanitary reform is just one example of the many projects to reshape the urban fabric in the light of new cultural paradigms.
Neighborhoods and urban communities
Neighborhoods are both administrative units and socially constructed structures by the people living in a given urban area, who develop a common place-based identity involving shared norms and aspirations. Current anthropological studies focus especially on peripheral, socio-economically marginalized urban communities and on the study of inequity in the urban environment, a discourse integrated into a larger political and economic context. It also analyzes the relationships between these communities and the city as a whole or with other communities outside it, which can cause segregation, discrimination, gentrification or migration phenomena, sometimes bypassed by the authorities as part of the urban regeneration or revitalization discourse.
Cities around the world have such informal settlements (usually located on the outskirts) where low-income residents improvise houses that municipalities try to demolish or include in various social programs. Although these communities have improved their socio-economic position, they suffer from inequity, which has become more entrenched, exacerbated by crime and social prejudice. The situation will not change as long as policy makers continue to confuse economic development with community development. Community development is a complex and nuanced process that is based on creating or recreating affective bonds between people and their participation in generating a shared vision for the future of their community. Planning, political action, arts and culture all play an important role in how we can physically transform our neighborhoods and re/build community.
Through this symposium, we aim to offer specialists and young researchers a platform to present the latest studies in related fields (anthropology, sociology, history, social history, urbanism, architecture), thus contributing to the activation of an interdisciplinary dialogue, at national and international level, having as a starting point established themes of urban anthropology, which need a constant recontextualization.
The presentations will be given, at choice, in Romanian or English, and the abstracts will be bilingual. All those who wish to attend the lectures in the program are invited to this symposium.
The deadline for registration and submission of abstracts is Saturday, September 2, 2024.
The results will be announced by Monday, September 9, 2024. The proposal will include the title of the paper, an abstract of 250-500 words (ENG) and an updated CV(ENG).
The Symposium on Urban Anthropology –
6th Edition 4th of November 2021
”Medicine, an instrument for social and urban modernization in Romania, 1850-1945”
Considering your expertise, we are honored to invite you to participate in the scientific event that will be held at Filipescu-Cesianu House, Calea Victoriei, no. 151, sector 1, Bucharest, if the sanitary situation will allow it, in compliance with the latest regulation in order to prevent the spread of SARS-CoV-2 or online if, on the date of the symposium, additional restrictions on public meetings indoors will be in force.
By the theme chosen for the 7th edition of the Symposium on Urban Anthropology, we aim to answer the question of how the Romanian society has been modernized over time, through implementing medical standards. We will emphasize both the identification of medical modernization instruments (legislation, institutions) and the biography of the medical staff, understood in the light of a professional elite that built the process of Romania’s integration into Western civilization. The research requires a double recurrence: from the level of medical practice itself to the modernizing environment of the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The paper of the symposium will be published in the Journal of Urban Anthropology. The below registration form will be submitted by October 30th, 2021. After confirming the participation, we will return with additional data. For more information please contact: antropologie@muzeulbucurestiului.ro.
In hope of your positive response, thank you!
On behalf of the Organizing Committee of the Symposium on Urban Anthropology,
Dr. Adrian Majuru – General Manager of the Museum of Bucharest
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The International Urban Anthropology Conference
6th Edition 13th – 14th of November 2020
Public spaces:
places of the city, places of memory
Dear ladies and gentlemen, Dear friends,
Given the evolution of the pandemic and travel restrictions, we are forced to postpone the International Conference on Urban Anthropology scheduled for November 13-14, 2020, now in its sixth edition. The period considered for rescheduling at this time is April 2-3, 2021, which coincides with the spring break of our guests at the University of Valladolid, Spain. However, we will return with a concrete calendar, including for the delivery of the works in written format for publication, depending on the evolution of the situation. All accepted entries remain, of course, valid.
Thank you for your interest, we were pleasantly surprised by the large number of papers proposed, and we assure you that this conference will take place in the best possible conditions.
With all due respect,
Dr. Adrian Majuru
general manager of the Museum of Bucharest
Dr. Cătălin D. Constantin
vice dean, Faculty of Letters, University of Bucharest
conference coordinator
The Bucharest Municipality Museum, The Faculty of Letters of the University of Bucharest, the “Ion Mincu” University of Urbanism and Architecture of Bucharest, Romania, the University of Valladolid, Spain and the Embassy of Spain in Romania, announce the 6th edition of the International Conference of Urban Anthropology, with the theme Public spaces: places of the city, places of memory, in Bucharest, November 13th and 14th 2020.
A city can be read just as one reads a book. The place of letters is taken by buildings, street networks, the marks left on constructions over time, by the way people walk around the city and by how vehicles move about in urban spaces. Cities are a mixture of people and buildings, and the relationship between community and the built space is more complicated than it may appear at first glance. People make buildings, and, over time, these constructions and the spaces in-between form cities. Once built, cities gain identity, they decisively influence the way of being, acting, thinking of people who inhabit them. The relationship between a community and its space features multiple nuances, stratified, sometimes not apparent at first.
The theme of the 6th Edition of the Conference of Urban Anthropology is constructed around relationships between the public spaces of cities, the people who cross them and the community that created them, in an anthropological reading.
In The City Assembled, Spiro Kostoff shows that, although public space is a rather unclear concept, and, despite how it is often difficult to trace a clear line between public and private, two aspects of urban life support the pertinence of the idea of public space. We cross the city to meet friends or acquaintances, S. Kostof states, at the park bench, in the large square or in front of the cathedral. But everyone, he adds, has the right to cross or be late in public spaces, so in such places one can meet anyone, and the gestures of strangers can be unpredictable. Public space is, first of all, a stage for daily life, for the familiar and the unusual in equal manner, and the freedom to act, as well as the right to remain inactive within these spaces are intrinsically linked to their character as territories of day-to-day life.
On the other hand, public spaces are stages for rituals. They host community activities, very varied – from concerts and festivals to religious ceremonies, historical or political celebrations or, in older times, public executions. This is why public spaces carry the marks of the city’s memory. The way they are conceived, structured, embellished with monuments, capable of glorifying moments or characters belonging to the place’s history, underlines this ritualistic character of public spaces.
A reality of fluctuating geometry, the public space is a witness of continuities and ruptures, of the history of architectural fashions, currents and models, also containing the volatile images of societies that created it or knew it during a particular sequence of time. As in Honoré de Balzac’s novel, foregoing the separation of territory descriptions from descriptions of communities which shaped them, the memory of places is, in fact, the memory of those who, at one point, took on these spaces. And the landmarks of this memory are monumental, perceived as a link between generations, an instrument to prompt the flux of memories and an artefact risen against the perishability of things. The columns, statues and arches of antiquity are nowadays replaced with other types of structures meant to make absence present, and to bring the fragments of yesterday into today.
Public space can give birth to a plethora of interpretations from the most varied fields, from history to architecture and urbanism, from sociology and urban anthropology to philosophy, politics, geocriticism and sciences of communication.
The main theme of the symposium will be split into four axes, organised in different sections:
- Spaces, places and public speeches. Squares, streets, parks, monuments;
- Daily life of public spaces;
- Public spaces and rituals;
- Writings on cities and cities in writings.
Memory, S. Freud wrote in Civilisation and Its Discontents, is structured like a city. The example he proposes is Rome, because Rome maintains the different layers of past developments. One century after Freud, we can reverse the terms of the comparison. A city is like memory, it conserves different layers of past developments and public spaces shine the spotlight, more or less discretely, on these superposed lives of the city.
Calendar
April 15th 2020 – Deadline for the abstracts (max 4.000 characters)
May 30th 2020 – Conclusion of abstract selection and communication to selected authors
September 15th 2020 – Deadline for final papers (max 30.000 characters)
Please send the abstracts and the final papers via e-mail at antropologie@muzeulbucurestiului.ro.
Abstracts and papers can be in English, Spanish, French or Romanian.
The presentations selected will be published in the Urban Anthropology Magazine.
Presentations will be in English, Spanish, French or Romanian.
The Organising Committee is composed of:
Eliana Radu, Maria Sfrijan, Silvia Zamfir (The Bucharest Municipality Museum);
Lecturer dr. Cristina Bogdan, Lecturer dr. Alexandra Crăciun (The Letters Faculty – University of Bucharest);
Professor dr. Augustin Ioan (the “Ion Mincu” University of Urbanism and Architecture);
Professor dr. Mercedes Cano Herrera (University of Valladolid).
The Scientific Committee is composed of:
- Adrian Majuru, dr. Dan Pîrvulescu, dr. Vasile Opriș (The Bucharest Municipality Museum);
Professor dr. Mercedes Cano Herrera (University of Valladolid);
Professor dr. Carmen Mușat, Lecturer dr. Cristina Bogdan,
Lecturer dr. Cătălin D. Constantin (The Letters Faculty – University of Bucharest);
Professor dr. Sorin Vasilescu (the “Ion Mincu” University of Urbanism and Architecture);
Professor dr. Doina Ruști, dr. Andreea Răsuceanu (invited members).
The symposium will be free access.
Urban Anthropology Simposyum
5th Edition – 13th, 14th of June 2019, Bucharest
As decades after 1989 meant the return of politics to Romanian society, political decision-makers expect strategies to generate economic development and prosperity. The increase in the share of urban urban transport compared to the previous public decade, inversely proportional to the state of the communications channels, has made trafficking a major theme in the articulation of political programs and options. Thus, a first conviction of public perception of transport is the dependence of urban mobility on political interests. Reducing politicization thus becomes a way to counteract illegitimate interests and to rely on the benefits that development strategies would bring.
A second major change in public perception of urban mobility is the re-evaluation of the socio-economic status of the individual. Increasing the number of personal transport means, cars, and increasing their quality is seen as a sign of increasing levels of living. Considered by many hegemonic means of transport, the car leads to a review of the place of alternative personal transport means such as motorcycle, scooter, moped, bicycle, trotter, rollers etc. as well as the place of public transport.
The urban anthropology symposium organized by the Bucharest Museum of Urban Mobility aims to observe, analyze and draw conclusions about the changes that take place on citizens, which influence their values according to the time, comfort, pace of a day spent in a means of movement. As the big problem of the daily in a big city is agglomeration with everything it implies, mobility, in keeping with the daily personal agenda, becomes essential. In particular, the symposium intends to formulate conclusions for an embedded urban transport where both traditional and alternative means of transport, or with an important weight in the near future, are complementary and operate more effectively than before.
Symposium “Urban, Inc. Mobility and Anthropological Transformations ” is organized by the Museum of Bucharest at Casa Filipescu-Cesianu on 13-14 June 2019.
All those who wish to participate are invited to submit the title of the contribution, a summary of it, a short presentation of the author and the institution which it represents. The scientific board of the symposium will make the final selection of the proposals. The deadline for submission is 15 May 2019, at the e-mail address: relatii.publice@muzeulbucurestiului.ro , with the mention “for symposium”.
Urban Anthropology Simposyum
4th Edition – 14th, 15th of June 2018, Bucharest
Schedule :
Thursday 14th of June 2018, Casa Filipescu-Cesianu (Calea Victoriei nr. 151, București)
- 16.00: Registration
- 17.00: “Urban anthropology as methodological avant-garde”, Nicolae Panea, PhD, University of Craiova
- 17:30: “Urbanisation and historic destiny: Romanian cities and medical institutions”, Dr. Octavian Buda, “Carol Davila” University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Bucharest
Friday 15th of June 2018, Muzeul „Dr. Nicolae Minovici” (Str. Dr. Nicolae Minovici nr. 1, București)
- 10.00: Welcome coffee
- 11.00: “The internet and the dynamic of tribalisation in the cities of today”, Ionuț Purica, PhD, The Romanian Academy, The Institute for Economic Forecasting, Bucharest
- 11.30: “Aspects concerning the second hand phenomenon in post-communist Romania”, Sultana Avram, PhD, the Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu, Faculty of Humanities
- 12.00: „Bucharest in cartographic sources: the old maps displayed at the Museum of Ages”, Tudor Mihăescu, Museologist, The Bucharest Municipality Museum
- 12.30: “The Bucharest that is gone – The Bucharest that was. The Jewish Quarter Center, a case study”, Sorin Cleșiu, Museologist, The Bucharest Municipality Museum
- 13.00: Pauză
- 14.00: “Urban Cemeteries – The Parade Place of the City”, Silvia-Valentina Zamfir, Museologist, The Bucharest Municipality Museum
- 14.30: “From Saint Joseph Cathedral to Cathedral Plaza: the boundary between sacred and secular spaces in the urban environment”, Adrian Pogar, University of Bucharest, PhD candidate
- 15.00: “The Development of Aromanian Urban Life in the Ottoman Western Balkans. Case study: Moscopolis”, Vladimir Crețulescu, PhD, Museologist, The Bucharest Municipality Museum
- 15.30: Imagini ale orașelor renașterii naționale bulgare: Schimbări ale prezentării de sine, Iskren Velikov, Curator, Muzeul Regional de Istorie din Ruse, Bulgaria
- 16.00: Closing of the Urban Anthropology Symposium
Urban Anthropology Simposyum
3nd Edition – 25th, 26th of August 2017, Bucharest
Topic: Urban Forecast: Maps in continuous movement
The Museum of Bucharest, the Francisc I. Rainer Anthropology Institute and the Academic Society of Anthropology invite you to the 3rd edition of the Urban Anthropology Symposium, held between 25 and 26 August 2017 in Bucharest.Through this annual symposium, carried out in collaboration with other institutions, the Bucharest Museum intends to provide specialists with a platform for presenting the latest research in the field, to facilitate the communication of anthropologists at national and international level and to discuss topical topics related to urban anthropology , social and medical. Various topics related to institutional evolution, cultural changes and changes in citizens’ perceptions at the level of nations, pressure on the population, and the impact of economic growth on human development will be discussed.
Schedule :
Friday, August 25, 2017, Grand Hotel Continental, Calea Victoriei nr. 56
- 9.30: Registration of participants10.00: Opening of the Symposium, Prof. Dr. Octavian Buda, University of Medicine and Pharmacy “Carol Davila”
- 10.30: “The elderly asylum in Romania today, or the path from abandonment to resignation”, Dr. Sultana Avram, “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu
- 11.00: Break
- 11.30: “How Healthy is Drinking Water in the Towns?”, Dr. Emilia Tomescu, “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu
- 12.00: “Ecological model for assessment of violence in pupils – pressure factors impacting the behavioral sphere”, Dr. Petru Sandu, National Institute of Public Health – Cluj Regional Public Health Center, Cluj – Napoca; Co-authors: Dr. Ileana Maria Mirestean, Dr. Sorina Irimie, Psih. Ioana Beldean Galea, Dr. Anda Ioana Curta, Dr. Cosmina Samoila
- 12.30: “George Orwell: On the Priority and Dated Forecast of the Last”, Dr. Viorella Manolache, Dr. Andrei Kozma, Academic Society of Anthropology
- 13.00: Break
- 14.00: “Urban space and school space. About the Spatial Distribution of Schools in Bucharest “, Dr. Carol Capita, Faculty of History, University of Bucharest
- 14.30: “Structural Violence in the Context of Contemporary Resource Allocation Mechanisms”, Drd. Alexandru Vasiliu, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Bucharest
- 15.00: “Collective behavior in a city modeled as a reactor of agents”, Dr. Ionuţ Purica, Romanian Academy, Institute of Economic Forecasting, Bucharest
- 15.30: Urbanization and Medicine: the hypotheses of modernization, Prof. Dr. Octavian Buda, University of Medicine and Pharmacy “Carol Davila”
- 16:00: Conclusions
Saturday, August 26, 2017, Casa Filipescu-Cesianu, Calea Victoriei nr. 151
10.00-12.00:
- Visit at the “Museum of the Ages”, the first exhibition project of a museum with an urban anthropology profile in Romania, followed by a debate on the exhibition concept
- “Reconstitution of the Physiognomy after a Historical Skull: Mihai Viteazul”, Radu Panait;
- Presentation of the exhibition “Goddesses and shamans in ancient beliefs. Anthropo-zoomorphic plastic – from art to identity “, Theodor Ignat, curator.
The event is conducted under the close coordination of a Scientific Council made up of: Prof. Dr. Alexandru Ispas, Director, Francisc I. Rainer Institute of Anthropology, Dr. Cristiana Glavce, scientific researcher gr. 1, Institute of Anthropology “Francisc I. Rainer”, Prof. Dr. Octavian Buda, “Carol Davila” University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Dr. Andrei Kozma, President, Academic Society of Anthropology and Dr. Mihai Constantinescu, Head of Social Anthropology Section and Urbană, Museum of Bucharest.
Organizing Committee of the Bucharest City Museum: Dr. Adrian Majuru, Director, Dr. Dan Pirvulescu, Deputy Director, Dr. Lelioara Zamani, Head of Bucharest History Office, Dr. Theodor Ignat, Archeology Section Coordinator, Angelica Iacob, Chief of Public Relations, Marketing, Cultural Projects and Horia-Ioan Iova, Museographer.
Urban Anthropology Simposyum
2nd Edition – 8th of July 2016, Bucharest
Topic: Cultural outskirts and Global spaces
The Bucharest Municipality Museum, “Friedrich Schiller” Universität Jena, Germany, The „Francisc I. Rainer” Anthropology Institute of the Romanian Academy, Le Centre d’histoire orale et récits numérisés of Montréal and L’Institut National de la recherche scientifique, Centre – Urbanisation Culture Société, Québec, Canada, The Association for Urban Anthropology and the Academic Anthropology Society of Romania invite you to attend to the second edition of the Urban Anthropology Symposium, which will take place in Bucharest.
By means of this annual symposium, organized in partnership with several other institutions, The Bucharest Municipality Museum aims to offer specialists in the field of anthropology a platform for the presentation of the latest research, to facilitate communication between anthropologists on a national and international level and to incite debates over current themes of interest in social, urban and medical anthropology.
The Urban Anthropology Symposium is moderated by Dr. Cătălin Constantin (University of Bucharest, Faculty of Letters, the Cultural Studies and Ethnology Department) and will focus on the topic of Cultural peripheries and global spaces. The event is organized under the supervision of a Scientific Council, comprised of: Dr. Cristiana Glavce, Director of the “Francisc I. Rainrer” Institute of Anthropology, Prof. Mag. Dr. Thede Kahl, „Friedrich Schiller” Universitat Jena, Germania; Prof. Dr. Octavian Buda, “Carol Davila” University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Dr Andrei Kozma, President of the Academic Anthropology Society and Dr. Adrian Majuru, Director of the Bucharest Municipality Museum.
The organization of the event is managed by a Comity comprised of: Angelica Iacob, manager of the Public Relations, Marketing and Cultural Projects Department (Museum of the Municipality of Bucharest), Dr. Lelioara Zamani, manager of the History of Bucharest Department (Museum of the Municipality of Bucharest), Dr. Dan Pîrvulescu, Manager of the History Department (Museum of the Municipality of Bucharest) and Lect. Univ. Dr. Cătălin D. Constantin, University of Bucharest, Faculty of Letters, The Cultural Studies and Ethnology Department.
Organized by:
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The Bucharest Municipality Museum
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“Friedrich Schiller” Universität Jena, Germany
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The „Francisc I. Rainer” Institute of the Romanian Academy
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Le Centre d’histoire orale et récits numérisés, Montréal
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L’Institut National de la recherche scientifique, Centre – Urbanisation Culture Société, Québec
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The Association for Urban Anthropology, Romania
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The Academic Society of Anthropology, Romania
Schedule (Grand Hotel Continental, Calea Victoriei nr. 56, Bucharest):
- 9.00: Registration
- 10.00: Researcher, topic, participant – linguistic minorities in dialogue: Maya, Sephardic Jews, Kalmyk and Băieși, Ioana NECHITI, University of Vienna, Institute for Romance Studies
- 10.30: The myth of the “encounter”: power dynamics and inequities in the stories told by the Innu of Nutashkuan, Aude MALTAIS-LANDRY, Concordia University Montreal, Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling
- 11.00: Indigenous social innovation: mobilizing knowledge, Ioana RADU, The scientific research institute – Urbanisation, Culture Society Centre, DIALOGUE Network: The network of research and knowledge on autochthonous peoples, Montreal
- 11.30: Aboriginal and Diasporic: An Impossible Predisposition? When Urban Aboriginal Institutions discourses enlighten theoretical debates, Ioana COMAT, The scientific research institute – Urbanisation, Culture Society Centre, DIALOGUE Network: The network of research and knowledge on autochthonous peoples, Montreal
- 12.00: Reduced waiting times for elective surgery, Alexandru POPP, University of Saskatchewan, Mechanical Engineering and Medical Imaging Departments
- 12.30: Live and let live! Alternative spaces in Ceauşescu’s Romania, Ruxandra Iuliana PETRINCA, McGill University Montreal, History Department
- 13.00: Coffee break
- 13.30: The Zoroastrian houses of Yazd, Iran, Drd. Hakim nia MOSTAFA, „Ion Mincu” University of Architecture and Urbanism
- 14.00: Geographical characteristics of Kandovan village and their impact upon the lifestyle of its inhabitants, Drd. Bahareh BATHAEI, “Ion Mincu” University of Architecture and Urbanism
- 14.30: Bucharest framed within its integrated urban systems ~ on identity and prestige, center and periphery, local and global, Conf. Dr. Arh. Victoria Marinela BERZA, The Faculty of Architecture – “Spiru Haret” University
- 15.00: “They come to leave empty-handed”: Birth control in contemporary Romania, Dr. Lorena ANTON, Faculty of Letters – University of Bucharest
- 15.30: The destitute from Cluj Asylums during the second half of the 17th century, Prof. Univ. Dr. Șarolta SOLCAN, Faculty of History – University of Bucharest
- 16.00: The role of theatre in defining social identities: A study on the „Sucre, venin et fleurs d’oranger” play, in the context of the Moroccan community in Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, Brussels, Horia Ioan IOVA, the Bucharest Municipality Museum
Presentations:
Researcher, topic, participant – linguistic minorities in dialogue: Maya, Sephardic Jews, Kalmyk and Băieși - Ioana NECHITI
As part of the empirical research, we became aware of how our own identities shape what we notice as researchers and also what we don’t, as well as how they change people’s attitudes towards us (De Costa 2015: 105). Since the 60s, there has been an ongoing debate about the researcher’s approach and participant’s observation in social sciences where the notion of what participant observation means, has been problematized. Tedlock (1991) draws the attention on a transformational shift from a detached “participant observation” to a more reflexive observation of participation, which Davies (2008) considers to be a “turning back to oneself” or a “process of self-reference”. Empirical studies require, as Paul (1953: 441) pointed out, “emotional involvement” which, depending on the aim of research, imposes a well-planned graduation of the researcher’s involvement because our involvement may change the object of study (Labov 1972) as much as a range of research practices can affect the co-production of data.
This presentation will focus on the relationship of field linguists with both the academic community and the speech community from a contrastive point of view. Special attention will be paid to the researcher-participant dynamic with observations on the researcher’s active/passive, close/remote involvement respectively and to the possible consequences on the community’s linguistic behavior. Furthermore, it will explore methods of data collection from different types of speakers with different empirical goals. It will contrast empirical research experiences from Guatemala (Maya), Turkey (Sephardim), Kalmykia (Kalmyk) Hungary and Greece (Boyash) (synchronic) and complement it with individual examples of diachronic empirical data.
Of main concern is the observation of the diversity of actors and speakers involved in the process of revitalization of endangered languages and varieties in different parts of the world and the challenges that arise for the researcher when carrying out contrastive research. To this purpose, the following questions will be addressed: (1) which working parameters need to be established with a diversity of speakers, what working typology needs to be drafted for each of these language groups different from a geographic, cultural, linguistic religious etc. point of view?; (2) how to balance demands from the academic world with demands and needs for revitalization on the part of the community?
The presentation will be empirically supported by qualitative research data that I collected between 2010 and 2016 and complemented by quantitative interview data.
Ioana NECHITI,
University of Vienna,
Institute for Romance Studies
The myth of the “encounter”: Power dynamics and inequities in the stories told by the Innu of Nutashkuan - Aude MALTAIS-LANDRY
The question of the “encounter” is crucial to the history of relations between Europeans and Indigenous peoples in Quebec and in Canada. Often referred to as a so-called “nation-to-nation” relationship, the encounter is often placed at the core of a reassuring national narrative that undermines the fact that a real “interculturalism” never occurred between Europeans and Indigenous peoples on North American soil. The creation of the Indian Act at the end of the 19th century crystallized the dispossession of Indigenous peoples from their rights and lands, through the attribution, amongst others, of small “Indian reserves” where they lived as second-class citizens, isolated from the Settlers’ towns and cities.
During the course of my research project, I wanted to explore the creation of those “Indian reserves” through an oral history project with the Innu community of Nutashkuan, an Indigenous people of Quebec who settled on their reserve in the 1950s. Interviews were conducted with members of the community, who referred to various encounters in their recent history. One of the stories related a meeting between the Band chief and an Indian Affairs representative, in the course of which a site for the future reserve was chosen, effectively dispossessing the community from its territory without their full understanding and consent. Other stories told of encounters between the Innu and the neighboring villagers of Natashquan in specific sites such as the general store or the church, and spoke to a latent racism that is often denied, today, by some villagers.
If it is generally admitted that the relations between both communities were often marked by the seal of mutual aid, the stories that participants told me, which are grounded in specific places of the land and village, evoke mostly a recurrent tension between the two groups. By complicating the narrative of the “encounter”, the stories told by the Innu of Nutashkuan speak more largely to the importance of addressing the inequity of past and present relationships, before engaging on the path of a true reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in Quebec and Canada.
Aude MALTAIS-LANDRY,
Concordia University Montreal,
Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling
Indigenous social innovation: mobilizing knowledge - Ioana RADU
The presentation will focus on the results of an oral history project in the Cree Nation of Chisasibi (Eeyou Istchee, Quebec, Canada) that explored the links between autonomy and wellness in Indigenous contexts. Together with decolonizing theories and critical studies, oral history theory and practice formed the basis of developing the community-based research partnership that concretely applied concepts of sharing authority and intersubjective dialog in defining an Indigenist research paradigm.
I will present the research-creation aspect of the project that includes a website, www.chisasibi-healing.ca, and a short documentary (35min) to show how academic knowledge can be mobilized to support community-based priorities as well as addressing social justice and reconciliation in Canada. In the first instance, by putting individual interviewees in a conversation, it aims to uncover potentially difficult aspects of healing and provide a multivocal reflection on local autonomy and decolonization. In the second instance, by presenting a multidisciplinary theoretical discussion of main research themes, the website aims to increase non-Indigenous peoples’ awareness of decolonization and promote Indigenous social innovation.
Ioana RADU,
Institut de Recherche Scientifique – Centre Urbanisation Culture Société,
Réseau DIALOG: Le réseau de recherche et de connaisances relatives aux peuples autochtones, Montreal
Aboriginal and Diasporic: An Impossible Predisposition? When Urban Aboriginal Institutions discourses enlighten theoretical debates - Ioana COMAT
With the application of the Indian Act (a law enacted in Canada in 1876 that controls Aboriginal citizenship and public administration), the colonial relationship between Aboriginal Peoples and the federal government led to the sacralisation of the reserve as Indian natural milieu. Based on the statement that Aboriginality is directly associated with rurality, the urban presence consequently implies a rural migration phenomenon and a necessary cultural dissolution in the host society. However, nowadays the city plays a major role as a hub for many First Nations, which would otherwise remain apart. As an important dimension of Aboriginal modernity, the rise of an urban society not only means occupying a « new » place, but also remapping Aboriginal contemporary territories by imposing a more reticular organization including connections between cities and reserves.
In this context, the idea of Diaspora is used by the network of Native Friendship Centre in Quebec (Canada) to rethink their place in Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal civil society. Although this rhetorical use lies on the concrete spatiality of their people, it raises some theoretical and ontological problems that may nourish the diaspora field of study. As James Clifford points out: what is the legitimacy of this analogy when it is proclaimed by those who seem to precisely match the archetype of the local population, those who were “there before everyone else”? This presentation will discuss the issues raised by this geographical parallel in the context of the circularity of social knowledge and globalization as featured in late modernity.
Ioana COMAT,
Institut de Recherche Scientifique – Centre Urbanisation Culture Société,
Réseau DIALOG:
Le réseau de recherche et de connaisances relatives aux peuples autochtones, Montreal
Reduced waiting times for elective surgery - Alexandru POPP
Currently, the positioning of patients on elective surgical procedures wait lists is carried out through a decentralized approach involves a complex set of interactions between hospital capacities and patient demands in Quebec.
The primary goal of the research is to determine if a centralized vs. the present decentralized organizational system is beneficial for the patients, in such a manner that the priority on the waiting lists of patients is updated to reflect the amount of time they have waited. The current study combines quantitative computer simulations and qualitative interviews that help in the understanding and interpretation of the simulations’ results. The qualitative and quantitative results are triangulated in order to provide better analysis of the results.
The qualitative portion of this examination, based on different literature reviews as well as on 12 interviews performed with the hospital’s staff, aims at understanding the environment and what pressures the hospital staff face in their procedures to create the elective surgeries schedule. The results show that different surgical units within the same hospital have different methods to plan the surgical schedule.
The quantitative analysis is based on simulating a centralized planning method of elective surgeries planning for five different surgical units in order to provide different perspectives vis-à-vis the current decentralized planning method. The difference between the approaches is provided in order to obtain the best method that minimizes elective surgery waiting time, taking in consideration certain factors.
The results of the simulations show that centralization is beneficial for certain surgical units and for specific indicators, where decentralization is beneficial for other units and/or indicators. However, there is no definitive overall conclusion that centralization is better than decentralization or vice-versa.
Alexandru POPP
University of Saskatchewan,
Mechanical Engineering and Medical Imaging Departments
Live and let live! Alternative spaces in Ceauşescu’s Romania - Ruxandra Iuliana PETRINCA
During the socialist era, the border villages of 2 Mai and Veche, two small communities located on the Romanian shores of the Black Sea, became renowned oases of individual freedom. Far from the prying eyes of what was then an authoritarian socialist state, Romanian intellectuals, students, professionals, and even Party’s luminaries chose these sites as an escape from the burdens and limitations of city life. Some stayed in tents on the beach, others rented rooms from peasants in the tiny villages. They dozed, swam, or sun-bathed naked, did yoga, performed sketches, folk and rock and roll songs, updated their collection of jokes, exchanged smuggled books, wrote, and discussed philosophy or their latest manuscripts on the sandy beach, sitting under reed umbrellas. Resistance and collaboration were embodied locally; categories of otherwise mutually exclusive types of behaviour overlapped, and social and gender norms dispersed as even famous members of the RCP departed from party prescriptions. The study of Vama Veche and 2 Mai as sites of behaviour tolerated but not fully controlled by the communist party suggests that individuals interacted with each other and the state authorities in ways different from their interactions in other spaces or localities. To paraphrase historian L.P. Hartley’s well know remark that “the past is a foreign country,” one could say that dissidence was another locality for these vacationers.
The purpose of this study is to unearth stories of alternative cultural activities under communism and explore the spatial dimension of dissent. Why did Romanian intellectuals from all economic, political and geographical backgrounds choose 2 Mai and Vama Veche as vacation places? What do they mean by the sense of freedom they all claimed to have experienced, and how does it relate to the authoritarian state presence, socialist morality and everyday life? How did gender, class and ethnicity affect the interactions between local inhabitants, tourists and police agents? Is the personal political, and if so, in what way?
Ruxandra Iuliana PETRINCA,
McGill University Montreal, History Department
The Zoroastrian houses of Yazd, Iran - Drd. Hakim nia MOSTAFA
Iranian traditional architecture is one of the world’s architectures par excellence. Iranian architecture has developed over millennia in response to its religion. Many traditional and vernacular buildings in Iran show that the architects had been so clever in harmonizing the Iranian religion and architecture in the past. The architects know how to adapt architecture to Iran’s conditions. This article will explain the impacts of Iranian religions (Zoroastrian and Islam) on its architecture, and the major focus of the paper is to introduce how Iranian architecture has been influenced by the religion. It will analyze the Iranian architecture in the past and will show how the Iranian architecture was in harmony with Iranian religion, as well as its ideology. This article shows the difference between Zoroastrian house and their neighbors in Yazd, Iran.
Drd. Hakim nia MOSTAFA,
„Ion Mincu” University of Architecture and Urbanism
Geographical characteristics of Kandovan village and their impact upon the lifestyle of its inhabitants - Drd. Bahareh BATHAEI
Kandovan is a village in Sahand Rural District, in the Central District of Osku County, East Azerbaijan Province, Iran. This village exemplifies manmade cliff dwellings which are still inhabited. The troglodyte homes, excavated inside volcanic rocks and tuffs similar to dwellings in the Turkish region of Cappadocia, are locally called “Karaan”. Karaans were cut into the Lahars (volcanic mudflow or debris flow) of Mount Sahand. The cone form of the houses is the result of lahar flow consisting of porous round and angular pumice together with other volcanic particles that were positioned in a grey acidic matrix. After the eruption of Sahand these materials were naturally moved and formed the rocks of Kandovan. Around the village the thickness of this formation exceeds 100 m and with time due to water erosion the cone shaped cliffs were formed. At the 2006 census, the village population was 601, in 168 families.
In this village, houses are not built on a mountain, but within a mountain. Another interesting aspect is the fact that the rock acts as an energy efficient material, keeping the house cool during summer and warm during winter. This is why most of the inhabitants here do not use heaters or air conditioning systems.
The intriguing architecture of this village seems to defy all rules and travelers are usually fascinated by its incredible slopes and irreverent paths. Recently a hotel was built, inspired by and connected to the “style” of the village. The “Rocky Hotel” features beautiful cave interiors with very comfortable living spaces. What we found interesting is that it takes ten months for four people to dig a room.
In this research, human lifestyle factors and the physical environment as well as their relationships with each other, will be studied in socio-economic backgrounds. Generally, influence of the shape of human life in relation to the geography of the area, will be investigated.
Drd. Bahareh BATHAEI,
“Ion Mincu” University of Architecture and Urbanism
Bucharest framed within its integrated urban systems ~ on identity and prestige, center and periphery, local and global - Conf. Dr. Arh. Victoria Marinela BERZA
The article presents common issues for cities nowadays and the way in which levels of attractiveness and quality of life are influenced by malfunctions which exist in any field of fundamental guiding forces of urban development. Urban and unincorporated territories are ranked – for integration [global] some territories have a local short-term importance, others have a strategic importance; their hierarchical position is determined by the characteristics of urban syntax, the characteristics of subsystems components, anthropogenic and natural; the level of global integration is determined by the quality of connectivity and accessibility levels on a micro-scale, meso-scale and macro-scale. Bucharest has a triple role within the urban systems it belongs to – the role of human settlement, that of European metropolis and that of a Capital city of Europe. Different generations of people have different needs and different value systems; today’s young people live in cities structured by older generations and seek to create a living environment compatible with their needs; in turn, the young generations will age and see life in a different way than their previous views, and different from the new young generations. The coagulation of compatible solutions, for the issues of current and future generations, is only possible through flexibility and a permanent adaptation, through the continuous harmonizing of value systems. The principle of sustainability should guide the path of urban development – and out of the resources involved, the resources which confer identity to a place, such as the cultural and prestige resources, should play a key role in the determining of a territory’s level of attractiveness. This paper provides a general framework for the understanding of interdependencies between urban territories’ components, and for the acknowledgement of directions for action and intervention meant to ameliorate or remove dysfunctions within the action plans administrative entities exercise their authority in.
Conf. Dr. Arh. Victoria Marinela BERZA,
The Faculty of Architecture – “Spiru Haret” University
“They come to leave empty-handed”: Birth control in contemporary Romania - Dr. Lorena ANTON
Reproduction control (1966-1989) in Ceușescu’s Romania is considered to have been one of the most repressive political demographies in twentieth century Europe. Immediately after the fall of the communist regime, the new Romanian government legalized abortion on request. In the last decade, Romania’s abortion rate is still among the highest in the European Union (according to the National Institute of Statistics, 21.3 for 1000 women in 2009, versus 44.6 in 1999 and 177.6 in 1990) and maternal mortality due to unsafe, illegal abortion is still reported.
Stating from a long-term ethnography on reproduction-control in post-communist Romania, in Bucharest and Prahova County (2013-2017), this paper addresses the ways the pronatalist past, as well as the recent economic crisis, is negatively influencing reproductive health services and their access in contemporary Romania. Is ‘femeia-mamă’s health’ still a central point on the State’s agenda, or has it become peripheral? How was the ‘abortion culture’ rephrased after the 1990s, and how was it reframed with the help of official discourses and public policies? What are the limits of an urban anthropology of reproduction in nowadays Romania/Europe?
Dr. Lorena ANTON,
Faculty of Letters – University of Bucharest
The destitute from Cluj Asylums during the second half of the 17th century - Prof. Univ. Dr. Șarolta SOLCAN
In Transylvania asylums existed ever since the second half of the 14th century. They were founded near cities and benefited from the support of authorities as well as from the donation of several people. There were at times even two or three asylums in the surrounding areas of cities, and these institutions were meant to aid the destitute, the sick, and widows. In this present work I aim to reconstruct the life led by those who found shelter in two Cluj asylums – Saint Elisabeta and the Holy Spirit – during the first half of the 17th century. The main sources I used are the account registers for these two asylums, recently published by T. M. Marton, A. Flora and A. Mihaly.
These sources allow us to get better acquainted with the role of asylum in city life, as well as in the lives of those who took shelter between these institutions’ walls.
Prof. Univ. Dr. Șarolta SOLCAN,
Faculty of History – University of Bucharest
The role of theatre in defining social identities: A study on the „Sucre, venin et fleurs d’oranger” play, in the context of the Moroccan community in Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, Brussels - Horia Ioan IOVA
This study was developed as a Master Paper for the Centre of Excellence in the Study of Images, of the University of Bucharest and consists of an analysis of the defining elements of the Moroccan community in the Brussels commune of Molenbeek Saint Jean, from the perspective of the cultural performances in which its members take part. Even before having been labeled as the „European capital of terrorism” following the recent attacks in Paris and Brussels, the neighborhood, an old industrial area of the city, was already confronted with serious social problems, caused by poverty, unemployment and its character as a Muslim cultural enclave.
The 21st century comes up, for the globalizing European society,with a postcolonial and post nationalistic reality, with new forms of relationships between identity and alterity. A new subject for anthropology emerges: the immigrant, a person living in a society whose defining elements are very different to his own cultural experience.
In a study on cultural identities in postmodern context, Richard Schechner, performance studies researcher, stated: „Cultures are most fully expressed in and made conscious of themselves in their ritual and theatrical performance.[…] We will know one another better by entering one another’s performances and learning their grammars and vocabularies.”[1], herby suggesting the role of performance studies as an instrument for.
This study defines the theatrical show as a sample for the structural and functional elements of a given culture, according to the theories of Erike Fischer Lichte[2]. In her view, cultural performances – ceremonies, concerts, shows etc. – are but re-enactments of the daily life, and differ from it only by power of the dramatization (staging) process, to which they are subject. Cultural performances contain, thus, valuable information on the structure of a community.
Theatre directors of the 20th century, such as Augusto Boal or Joan Littlewood, have laid the basis of a theatre of minorities, meant to improve social awareness and self-awareness through artistic experiences of theatrical improvisation and stage play. Their work was focused on culturally vulnerable groups, such as factory workers or vagrant children.
The „Sucre, venin et fleurs d’oranger” show is a result of three year-long theatre – workshop process, which involved eight Moroccan women, members of the Molenbeek commune. The show tells the story of four generations of immigrants and tackles current issues of the Moroccan communities living in Belgium: the relations between the minority and the broader society, the relations between men and women and the status of the Maghreb Muslims in comparison to the status of the Gulf Muslims.
The applied research of the paper is built around the social role of the immigrants in the commune of Molenbeek, with a focus of the way in which they transpose their daily role into a stage role, taking into consideration the reactions of the public and their perception on these forms of cultural performances, in the context of a periphery neighborhood.
Horia Ioan IOVA,
The Bucharest Municipality Museum
[1]Richard Schechner, Performance studies in/for the 21st century”, Anthropology and Humanism, Vol 26. No 2., Department for Performance Studies, New York University, New York, pp 158-166, p. 163
[2] Erika Fisher-Lichte, , The Routledge Introduction to Theatre and Performance Studies, Routledge, digital version, 2014, p.164
Urban Anthropology Symposium
1st Edition – 15th of July 2015, Bucharest
Muzeul Municipiului Bucureşti, Centre for Medical Humanities – Oxford Brookes University, Institutul de Antropologie „Francisc I. Rainer” al Academiei Române, Asociația pentru Antropologie Urbană, Societatea Academică de Antropologie şi Facultatea de Urbanism a Universităţii de Arhitectură şi Urbanism „Ion Mincu” a organizat prima ediţie a Simpozionului de Antropologie urbană, desfăşurat la Bucureşti în ziua de miercuri, 15 iulie 2015. Prin acest simpozion anual realizat în colaborare cu alte instituţii, Muzeul Municipiului Bucureşti îşi propune să pună la dispoziţia specialiştilor o platformă de prezentare a ultimelor cercetări din domeniu, să faciliteze comunicarea antropologilor la nivel naţional şi internaţional şi să problematizeze teme de actualitate referitoare la antropologia urbană, socială şi medicală. Simpozionul de Antropologie urbană face parte dintr-o serie de evenimente similare, pe diferite domenii, iniţiate de Muzeul Municipiului Bucureşti.
Amintim Conferinţa Imagine şi identitate vizuală în marketingul muzeal, organizată de Muzeul Municipiului Bucureşti şi Facultatea de Administraţie şi Afaceri, Universitatea Bucureşti în luna decembrie 2014, precum şi Simpozionul de arheologie, aflat la prima ediţie, desfăşurat în ziua de 26 iunie 2015 în colaborare cu Muzeul Civilizaţiei Gumelniţa Olteniţa, Muzeul Regional de Istorie Ruse şi Muzeul de Istorie Turtucaia. Simpozionul de Antropologie urbană este realizat sub atenta coordonare a unui Consiliu Știinţific alcătuit din: Dr. Cristiana Glavce, Director, Institutul de Antropologie „Francisc I. Rainer”, Academia Română, Dr. Marius Turda, Director, Centre for Medical Humanities, Oxford Brookes University, Dr. Andrei Kozma, Preşedinte, Societatea Academică de Antropologie şi Dr. Adrian Majuru, Director, Muzeul Municipiului Bucureşti.
Presentations:
Investigarea a unor artefacte de piei umane tatuate utilizând metode analitice nedistructive - Maria-Mihaela MANEA, Cristina IONESCU, Liviu-Stefan CRACIUN
Conservarea şi protejarea patrimoniului cultural reprezintă astăzi una dintre preocupările majore ale comunităţii europene, cercetarea ştiinţifică prin metode avansate moderne de analiză fiind indispensabilă pentru cunoasterea şi valorificarea patrimoniului cultural naţional şi universal. Această cunoaştere este necesară pentru studii de provenienţa şi autentificare, pentru păstrarea, protejarea şi transmiterea patrimoniului cultural din generaţie în generaţie prin adoptarea unor tratamente de restaurare şi conservare sigure şi eficiente.
În lucrarea de faţă s-a urmărit investigarea unor mostre de piele umană tatuată de la subiecţi decedaţi la începutul secolului XX şi a unor mostre de piele de animal în scopul stabilirii condiţiilor optime de conservare. Investigarea probelor s-a realizat prin metode analitice nedistructive: spectroscopia de infrarosu (FTIR) si Raman (FT-Raman) si microscopia de forţă atomică (AFM). Prin metodele de spectroscopie de vibraţie s-a caracterizat structura moleculara a pielii şi s-au identificat pigmentii utilizati în realizarea tatuajelor, iar prin microscopie de forţă atomică s-a investigat suprafeţa pielii la nivel nanometric si s-a urmărit obţinerea topografiei şi a rugozităţii suprafețelor.
Eugenism si deficientele istoriografiei romane actuale - Dr.Marius TURDA
Dupa 25 de ani de la caderea comunismului istoriografia romaneasca a facut progrese putine in ceea ce priveste reflexia critica asupre trecutului. La momentul actual oferta istoricilor romani oscileaza intre eseul istoric, superficial si usor provocativ (L. Boia) si meta-naratiunea nationalista (I. Scurtu). Desi noile generatii de istorici, atat in Romania cat si in strainatate, au incercat sa ofere interpretari critice, bazate pe o buna cunoastere a surselor si la zi cu metodologia si dezbaterile istoriografice ale momentului, foarte putini au reusit sa captiveze publicul larg din Romania. Folosind istoria putin cunoscuta a eugenismului romanesc doresc sa discut cateva din temele majore ale istoriei Romaniei din perioada 1918-1944, cum ar fi modernizarea si Romanizarea.
Dr. Marius Turda
Semana Santa la Valladolid - Dr.Cătălin D. Constantin
In Spain, important processions take place during the Holy Week: the statuary groups representing scenes from the life of Jesus are taken out of churches and monasteries and slowly worn on city streets, accompanied by huge crowds of locals. Two regions stand out in this process. Andalusia in the south. Castilla y Leon, in north-central Spain. If cities of Andalusia attract plenty of tourists during this period, the processions of Castilla y León are primarily manifestations of locals and foreign visitors are present only incidentally. Less colorful and noisy than those in Andalusia, Castilla y Leon processions are more interesting for an anthropologist eye.
The author observed directly, during three weeks in 2010, the preparations and then the processions in Valladolid. 2010 was a symbolic year, it was the celebration of 200 years since the very first procession on Good Friday took place in a very particular context: the city was for the first and the only time in its history under foreign occupation. Napoleon had set his camp there and his troops hesitated upon putting a ban on processions or grouping them all in one day, to easily control the crowds. Although born in a very restrictive context, the procession on Good Friday, climax and spectacular summary of the processions of Semana Santa in Valladolid, resisted and gained tradition.
The article chiefly analyzes the relationship between the procession route and the symbolic space of the city.
Anthropological aspects of health equity of children in Romania - Dr.Andrei Kozma, Dr.Ecaterina Stativa
Present work explores how socio-economic conditions of the environment, in which children live, differ regarding the right to normal health care and its effect on the duration and quality of life..
In the last 25 years, studies on nutritional status of women and children in Romania showed a progressive polarization of life chances and healthness, according to the environmental standard conditions of living. These inequalities were generated by differential influence on the living environment, respectively an unequal distribution of resources, between urban and rural areas. Consequently we have, an increasing number of socially disadvantaged people who have less access to preventive, curative or for recovery care.
This paper treats the issues related to life expectancy (longevity), the quality of life in terms of food from pre and postnatal period – both in terms of child and mother – differentiated by urban/ rural by taking into analysis their effects on the future development of the child, such as anemia.
It is also analyzed the evolution of the health system, during 1990-2013, with its effects on equality of access to health care today – for mother and child.
The conclusion reached by the authors, suggests that if urgent action is not taken – in the sense of shrinkage of artificial differences created by human behaviors – concerning the environment – by coherently interconnected health policies with other sectors such as education; in time, these phenomena will increase the burden of social spiral.
Equalization chances to health and education through disappearance and / or shrinking of the disparities between the urban and rural environement, beginning from the young ages, is one of the most important preconditions for the welfare and prosperity of populations.
Podoabele în tablouri votive din București - Drd. Ioana Gabriela Duicu
Bucureştiul domnesc se constituie în această lucrare într-un subiect unic al unei atente observaţii a podoabelor din câteva tablouri votive ecleziastice, cu rolul de a ilustra spiritul medieval şi premodern, fără de care „modernitatea noastră între Europa şi Orient … ar fi probabil mai greu de imaginat”[1].
Prezenţa podoabelor în portretele acestor tablouri este una frecventă, ea constituind modalitatea prin care comanditarului îi erau etalate atributele rangului pe care-l deţinea sau îi marca identitatea etnică.
Dacă veşmântul din tablourile votive ale secolului al XVIII-lea este unul oarecum clasic, secolul al XIX-lea aduce un suflu nou, o diversificare atât a croiului, al elementelor componente, cât mai ales în repertoriul podoabelor. Intervenţia pictorilor face de fapt această deosebire majoră deoarece, chiar dacă respectă canoanele şi se ajută de izvoade, la fel ca şi zugravii ce păstrau tradiţia şcolii bizantine, tablourile votive capătă „libertatea” de exprimare a spiritului artistic şi astfel au putut să-şi etaleze întreaga pricepere, subliniată şi prin redările miniaturale ale detaliilor podoabelor.
Identificarea diversităţii, rolului şi calităţilor podoabelor, aşa cum vom încerca să le creionăm, reprezintă paşii care trebuie urmaţi în identificarea lor, predilecte vremurilor şi modelor dintr-un anumit moment al istoriei.
[1] Răzvan Theodorescu, Genezele unei spiritualităţi, în Grădina valahă, Bucureşti, 1999, format digital.
Această lucrare a fost realizată în cadrul proiectului “Cultura română şi modele culturale europene: cercetare, sincronizare, durabilitate”, cofinanţat de Uniunea Europeană şi Guvernul României din Fondul Social European prin Programul Operaţional Sectorial Dezvoltarea Resurselor Umane 2007-2013, contractul de finanţare nr. POSDRU/159/1.5/S/136077
Drd. Ioana Gabriela Duicu
Muzeul Naţional al Satului „Dimitrie Gusti”
Mono-industrial zones in Sud-Muntenia region - Amalia Balescu
This study begins by using the term mono-industrial town or monotown. Localities of this type are defined as those dominated by a single industry, associated with the communist planned economy period, when many of them depended on a single economic agent.
After 1989, following contraction of industrial activity or even closures, these villages were affected in socially and economically in particular, some of them being declared disadvantaged areas.
This paper refers to both local and regional development, and more specifically to small monotowns or rural localities with a specialized mono-economy based on industry. In addition it explores the avenues for local development within a regional context. The study aims to analyze the evolution of socio-economic development of these mono-industrial localities, the current degree of development, and the present economic role they have, in order to characterize types of mono-industrial areas and to propose a scenario to help revitalize disadvantaged areas.
Amalia Balescu
Scoala doctorala, Universitatea de Arhitectura si Urbanism „Ion Mincu”- Bucuresti
Transformări ale peisajului urban în perioada campaniilor electorale. Afișul – instrument de conștientizare socială sau agent de poluare estetică - Gabriel Stoiciu
Afișele, creații grafice multiplicate și difuzate în spațiul public cu scopul de a promova informații de larg interes sau având caracter comercial reprezintă o bogată sursă de cunoaștere atât a culturii cât și a epocii din care provin. Apariția mass-media și a multimedia pare să determine o diminuare a impactului pe care îl au afișele clasice realizate pe suport grafic. Cu toate acestea, atât datorită prețului, dar și unor importanți factori culturali, nu este încă de imaginat o campanie publicitară (electorală îndeosebi) fără difuzarea de afișe. Principalele componente ale afișului, imaginea statică și textul cu impact au, datorită simplității stimulului, o persistență sporită în reprezentările culturale individuale și colective.
A aduce în discuție afișul ca produs reprezentativ, înzestrat cu suficiente elemente pentru ne putea oferi un cadru interpretativ referitor la cultura de proveniența, nu reprezintă un demers nou, dar este cu siguranța unul puțin explorat, în special din perspectivă comparată. Campaniile electorale sunt marcate de adevărate întreceri în plan cantitativ în ceea ce privește afișajul. Dar aduc oare acestea și o îmbunătățire în plan calitativ în ceea ce privește peisajul urban?
Gabriel Stoiciu
Institutul de Antropologie “Francisc Rainer” – Academia Romana
Între emblematic şi expresiv: grădina peisageră engleză ca instituţie culturală a secolului al XVIII-lea - Lect. dr. Dragoş Ivana,
Comunicarea de faţă propune o reinterpretare a grădinii peisagere engleze ca instituţie culturală sau, cu alte cuvinte, ca topos urban neoclasic. Analiza se concentrează pe o componentă estetică – teoria umanismului civic adoptată de Joshua Reynolds, care încadrează grădina peisageră în domeniul artei liberale – şi pe dimensiunea socio-politică – plasarea cetăţeanului în sfera republicii (res publica), pentru a evidenţia contribuţia pe care grădina engleză o aduce la fondarea Republicii Gustului înţeles ca reprezentare emblematicăşi expresivă a spiritului britanic în secolul al XVIII-lea.
Lect. dr. Dragoş Ivana,
Facultatea de Limbi şi Literaturi Străine, Universitatea Bucureşti
Cultura nationala, individul colectiv si orasul - Razvan Paraianu
Ideea de îmbunătățire a corpului națiunii implică existența unei individualități colective și nu o asociere a unor indivizi liberi. Această individualitate colectivă, sugerată de Emil Durkheim, devine tot mai prezentă în scrierile oamenilor de știință la începutul secolului al XX-lea. Dacă este să luăm în considerare însă numai lucrările științifice de medicină și igienă socială sau cele de antropologie și sociologie vom scăpa din vedere modul cum a luat viața acest individ colectiv care în cursul câtorva decenii dobândește treptat individualitate, profil, destin, voință, personalitate, caracter, originalitate, energie, înțelepciune, &c. Or, toate aceste atribute ale persoanei umane au fost împrumutate individului colectiv prin mijloace literare. Literații au fost aceia care prin limbajul lor figurativ au reușit să insufle viața precum Frankenstein creaturii sale monstruoase.
În intervenția mea voi vorbi despre acest proces de creație a individului colectiv în literatura și publicistica începutului de secol XX dar și despre destinul ei în perioada comunistă, perioada în care națiunea și cultura socialistă au preluat și modificat acest individ colectiv în folosul noii orânduiri. Astăzi, după un sfert de secol de la prăbușirea regimului comunist, constatăm cu tristețe că nu a apărut încă o veritabilă alternativă la această cultură, drept pentru care multe din fenomenele culturale rămân încă obscure. Cultura națională rămâne mai departe o imagine simbolică a unei societăți monolitice în care elemente anonime anistorice și cu precădere rurale formează un amalgam refractar valorilor umaniste.
Razvan Paraianu
Universitatea Tg.Mures
Organizatori: Muzeul Municipiului Bucureşti, Centre for Medical Humanities – Oxford Brookes University, Institutul de Antropologie „Francisc I. Rainer” al Academiei Române, Asociația pentru Antropologie Urbană, Societatea Academică de Antropologie, Facultatea de Urbanism a Universităţii de Arhitectură şi Urbanism „Ion Mincu”
Sponsori: Grand Hotel Continental, Hanul Manuc
