Problemi etnološkega preučevanja v mestu na primeru ljubljanskega delavskega predmestja
Some Problems of Urban Ethnological Research: The Example of Ljubljana's Worker's Suburb

Summary/Abstract: The paper introduces some methodological cognition resulting from an investigation into the way of life in a workers' suburb of Ljubljana. The hypothesis of a group being the bearer of culture proved unusable; our interest focused on the individual and his communication with environment. The cultural systematic which has been in use is loosing its basis now; certain of its categories already lost their ethnological content. For example, instead of „building“, „feeding habits“ and „costume“, the strategies of choosing and using things became m ore significant, transcending „pure material“ world and revealing the interaction of economic necessity, social relations, thought and values. The research paid special attention to kinship, neighbors and neighborhood. The customary categories of „social culture“ proved unfounded in reference to this cultural aspect too; even the use of the term „family“ as a single denotation for various forms of cohabitation thus becomes questionable. It was also discovered that the notion of a city as an urbanized environment with rapid flow of information, a rich repertoire of cultural events and the possibilities of communication, does not hold for the everyday life of the residents of this Ljubljana suburb. In the past, nature and the social life of the town fulfilled a number of residents’ material, social and spiritual needs. At present, the suburb does not offer these possibilities any more. The city, on the other hand, has not spread its facilities to the town yet. If creativity and independent control over environment is taken as a decisive element, the suburb was less marginal before World War II, when it was located on the outer border of the city both spatially and socially.

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