scholarly journals Memory Is Not About the Past

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (01) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Chahine
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Third Generation ◽  
Young Adolescents ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
The Past ◽  
Embodied Experiences ◽  
East German ◽  
Time Position ◽  
The City

The short documentary "Memory Is Not About the Past" aims to understand how members of the so-called Third Generation East, individuals who experienced the fall of the Berlin Wall as children or young adolescents, remember East Germany 26 years after reunification. The field of research is the city of Berlin and all its former East German districts. Walking, as a performative practice, is at the centre of this ethnographic journey. With every step, the individuals reclaim their childhood neighbourhood and, at the same time, position themselves in the present. The urban space functions as a sounding board of the individual's inner thoughts and embodied experiences and is closely intertwined with stories of former communal solidarity, social change and an underlying level of estrangement from these areas.

scholarly journals The city in Soviet Lithuanian cinema

Menotyra ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilona Vitkauskaitė
Keyword(s):  
Urban Space ◽  
Collective Consciousness ◽  
The Past ◽  
Living Space ◽  
Feature Films ◽  
Urban Representations ◽  
Artistic Interpretation ◽  
Mother Figures ◽  
The City

The article analyzes urban representations of Soviet-era Lithuanian cinema. Like any other object of reality, the city in cinema is a secondary reality, the fruit of artistic interpretation. At the same time, images of the city in film can reflect individual and collective consciousness of the period. The analysis of urban space of Lithuanian feature cinema reveals that cinematographic space can be treated as a composite construct, which creates and represents projections of identities and feelings, reflects demands, ideas, cinema fashions of its time and “hides” real sociocultural and sociopolitical discourses. Most of Soviet-style feature films much easier incorporate countryside spaces, images, landscapes and lifestyle. Meanwhile the city often not only creates an impression of a claustrophobic space, but even looks very decorative. It seems that most of filmmakers can’t identify cities with their own, Lithuanian, national living space. In search of identity or inspiration they turn to idealized village, agrarian culture and its images. Therefore, the city of Soviet Lithuanian cinema is more likely to become a space of collapsed hopes, prison, ideological repressive space, which is stuck between the present and the past. Filmmakers, like their characters, run to the shelter of nature, the mythologized, well-decorated farmstead, where archetypal father and mother figures or a calm, meditative landscape await. It seems that movie characters (and filmmakers), who have escaped from the socialist reality and its challenges to the landscapes of nature and village, have never returned.

scholarly journals Street Names through Sociological Lenses. Part II: Constructionism and Utilitarianism

2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mihai Stelian Rusu
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Real Estate ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Social Constructionism ◽  
Place Branding ◽  
Real Estate Market ◽  
Previous Issue ◽  
The Real Estate ◽  
The Real Estate Market ◽  
The City

AbstractAs toponymic means of inscribing urban space, street names have been addressed mainly by human geographers, who have articulated the field of critical place-name studies. In this paper, I continue the endeavor started in the previous issue published in Social Change Review of reading street names through sociological lenses. Whereas in the first part of this two-part contribution the analysis was made from functionalist and conflictualist perspectives, this second and final part employs social constructionism and the utilitarian theoretical tradition in making sociological sense of street nomenclatures. First, conceiving of street names as forming discursively constructed linguistic landscapes, the paper shows how urban namescapes – the “city-text” – are written, erased, and rewritten to reflect the shifting political powers. Second, the paper examines the neoliberal processes of place branding and toponymic commodification by which street names are turned into sought-after urban commodities with transactional value on the real estate market. The paper concludes by inviting sociologists to join the conversation on street names, which should become an important topic of sociological reflection.

scholarly journals Cultural Memory and Urban Space in Shaping Cultural Identity

2019 ◽  
pp. 160-183
Author(s):  
Valentyna Bohatyrets ◽  
Liubov Melnychuk
Keyword(s):  
Urban Space ◽  
Cultural Memory ◽  
Urban Landscape ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
The Past ◽  
Historical Archives ◽  
City Space ◽  
New Type ◽  
The City ◽  
Historic Cities

Nowadays, in the age of massive spatial transformations in the built environment, cities witness a new type of development, different in size, scale and momentum that has been thriving since late 20th century. Diverse transformation of historic cities under modernisation has led to concerns in terms of the space and time continuity disintegration and the preservation of historic cities. In a similar approach, we can state that city and city space do not only consist of present, they also consist of the past; they include the transformations, relations, values, struggles and tensions of the past. As it could be defined, space is the history itself. Currently, we would like to display how Chernivtsi cultural and architectural heritage is perceived and maintained in the course of its evolution. Noteworthy, Chernivtsi city is speculated a condensed human existence and vibes, with public urban space and its ascriptions are its historical archives and sacred memory. Throughout the history, CHERNIVTSI’s urban landscape has changed, while preserving its unique and distinctive spirit of diversity, multifacetedness and tolerance. The city squares of the Austrian, Romanian and Soviet epochs were crammed with statuary of royal elites and air of aristocracy, soviet leaders and a shade of patriotic obsession, symbolic animals and sacred piety – that eventually shaped its unique “Bukovynian supranational identity”. Keywords: Chernivtsi, cultural memory, memory studies, monuments, squares, identity.

Thematic Review of Trends in Inclusive Urban Development Studies (2000- 2020)

2021 ◽  
pp. 362-372
Author(s):  
Samuel Medayese ◽  
Hangwelani Hope Magidimisha-Chipungu ◽  
Ayobami Abayomi Popoola ◽  
Lovemore Chipungu ◽  
Bamiji Michael Adeleye
Keyword(s):  
Urban Development ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Relevant Literature ◽  
Physical Development ◽  
City Development ◽  
The Past ◽  
Thematic Review ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The City ◽  
Best Parameters

This study followed a chronological review of literature over the past 20 years. This was able to show relationship between inclusivity and physical development. A variety of discussions were looked into including dimension of inclusivity, definition of inclusivity, scales for measurement of inclusivity, methodology for appraising inclusivity, protagonists of inclusivity, and antagonists of inclusivity. The intricacy of the correlations between inclusive physical development and life expectations of residents are improved upon so as to show the similarities of these parameters. The analysis of the relevant literature indicated the process of enhancing the urban space and ensuring that all interest and strata of groups in the human composition are adequately cared for by employing the best parameters from the conceptualization of the city development, all the indicators of inclusiveness are well thought out.

scholarly journals Oral Tradition as a Source for Digging Up the History of Parakan as a Heritage City

2018 ◽  
Vol 65 ◽  
pp. 01001
Author(s):  
Purwantiasning Ari Widyati ◽  
Kurniawan Kemas Ridwan ◽  
Sunarti Pudentia Maria Purenti Sri
Keyword(s):  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Small City ◽  
Third Generation ◽  
Brand Name ◽  
The Past ◽  
Central Java ◽  
History Of ◽  
Strong Attachment ◽  
The City

This research was aimed to explore the history of Parakan City, a small city of Indonesia, located in Central Java. Parakan City has been regarded as a heritage city in Central Java and is well known as a Bambu Runcing City. Bambu Runcing is a sharpened bamboo that has been used as a traditional weapon in the past hundred years in Indonesia. This research was to conduct in oral tradition as a source for digging up the history of Parakan, particularly the reason why the community of Parakan using the words “Bambu Runcing” as a brand name for the city. This research was also to describe to what extent the community in having a strong attachment to the founder of Bambu Runcing known as KH Subuki. Some relevant and credible sources were interviewed using this oral tradition, and some of them are the second and third generation of KH Subuki.

Out of the Closet behind the Wall: Sexual Politics and Social Change in the GDR

Slavic Review ◽  
1990 ◽  
Vol 49 (4) ◽  
pp. 585-596 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raelynn J Hillhouse
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Gay And Lesbian ◽  
Evangelical Church ◽  
Protestant Church ◽  
The Past ◽  
Gay And Lesbian Movement ◽  
East German ◽  
The Republic

The search for avenues to express changing cultural values has shaped recent politics in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). During the past decade tens of thousands of GDR citizens became involved in new social movements that included issueoriented groups within both the Protestant church and such mass organizations as the Kulturbund (League of Culture) and the Freie Deutsche Jungend (Free German Youth, FDJ). The rise of these issue-oriented movements evoked reactions from the former government ranging from repression to accommodation. Perhaps the most striking example of the old regime's response to social change can be seen in the emergence of a very visible gay and lesbian movement. Beginning with a handful of activists within the Evangelical church, the East German gay and lesbian movement expanded into state and party institutions throughout the republic. In 1985, partially in response to the growing movement, the state began a campaign to end discrimination on the basis of sexual and emotional orientation.

Retrieving a Redemptive Past: Protecting Heritage and Heimat in East German Cities

2009 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-27
Author(s):  
Jason James
Keyword(s):  
Historic Preservation ◽  
Urban Renewal ◽  
The Past ◽  
Cultural Legacy ◽  
Moral Boundaries ◽  
East German ◽  
German Cities ◽  
The City

In the years following unification, East German cityscapes have been subject to fierce contention because historic preservation and urban renewal have served as a local allegory of national redemption. Using conflicts over preservation and renewal in the city of Eisenach as a case study, I argue that historic cityscapes have served as the focus of many East Germans' efforts to grapple with the problem of Germanness because they address the past as a material cultural legacy to be retrieved and protected, rather than as a past to be worked through. In Eisenach's conflicts, heritage and Heimat serve as talismans of redemption not just because they symbolize an unspoiled German past, but also because they represent structures of difference that evoke a victimized Germanness—they are above all precious, vulnerable possessions threatened with disruption, pollution, or destruction by agents placed outside the moral boundaries of the hometown by its bourgeois custodians.

scholarly journals Post-Pandemic City: Historical Context for New Urban Design

2020 ◽  
pp. 94-108
Author(s):  
Veaceslav MIR
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Urban Design ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Digital Technologies ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Past ◽  
The City

Cities have been almost completely unprepared for the COVID-19 pandemic. Urban history has known many epidemics and pandemics, and there are clear historical parallels between the 13th and 19th century plague pandemics and cholera epidemics and the 21th century COVID-19 pandemic, from an administrative point of view. However, the cities’ public administration did not take into account the experience of the cities of the past to be prepared for the future problems. This requires developing flexible pandemic strategies and focusing on the decentralization of urban space through an even distribution of population in the urban environment. The COVID-19 pandemic will change the city, as previous pandemics and epidemics did. Urbanism v.3.0. will emerge, combining a green vector of development and digital technologies to ensure the autonomy and sustainability of buildings, districts and cities. At the same time, the role of culture will increase, which will become an effective tool for consolidating the soft power of the city in order to attract new people as the opposition of nowadays trend for living in the countryside.

Ceasefire City

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dolly Kikon ◽  
Duncan McDuie-Ra
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Urban Space ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Urban Expansion ◽  
Military Occupation ◽  
Oral Histories ◽  
Military Presence ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Embodied Experiences ◽  
The City

For a city in India’s northeast that has been embroiled in the everyday militarization and violence of Asia’s longest-running armed conflict, Dimapur remains ‘off the map’. With no ‘glorious’ past or arenas where events of consequence to mainstream India have taken place, Dimapur’s essence is experienced in oral histories of events, visual archives of everyday life, lived realities of military occupation, and anxieties produced in making urban space out of tribal space. Ceasefire City captures the dynamics of Dimapur. It brings together the fragmented sensibilities granted and contested in particular spaces and illustrates the embodied experiences of the city. The first part explores military presence, capitalist growth, and urban expansion in Dimapur. The second part presents an ethnographic account of lived realities and the meanings that are forged in a frontier city.

scholarly journals THE IDEOLOGICAL MEANINGS OF HERITAGE: THE CONFLICTING SYMBOLS IN YOGYAKARTA, INDONESIA

2019 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 121
Author(s):  
Johannes Parlindungan Siregar
Keyword(s):  
Urban Space ◽  
Heritage Conservation ◽  
Urban Structure ◽  
Literature Study ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
Meaning Production ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The City

The heritage of Yogyakarta is always situated in a dynamic urban environment. Heritage conservation has been challenged by a lack of understanding on the ideological process in the creation of meanings. This paper investigates the creation process of urban space that is currently appreciated as heritage. The paper uses the city of Yogyakarta as the case study because its uniqueness as a mix of traditional and colonial cities. The study uses the concept of meaning production to understand the association between the construction of urban space and ideological meanings. This concept corresponds to the creation of urban objects and the recognition of meanings in the society. This study uses data sourced from a literature study. As the result, the process of meaning production has demonstrated social and political forces in the construction of traditional and colonial buildings. Situation in the past demonstrates urban space as a tool of political hegemony of traditional court and colonialist. A different social milieu in the present day changes the conflicting ideologies into history. Therefore, the urban structure expresses political strategies of relevant authorities in proclaiming hegemony and regulating society. This study provides a basis for investigating the influence of ideologies on the meaning of heritage that corresponds to cultural significant.

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