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The NGOs or the Independent Citizen’s Organizations are the third – after the state and neo-liberal market structure – oficial sector distinguished by a formal organization. On the positive side of NGOs we could mention the numerous civil initiatives which advance public education and public debate on global affairs. Most NGOs undertook also projects to fight for more equitable distribution of planetary resources. In a postcolonial era some Western observers were of opinion that the sustainable development and the process of democratisation in Developing Countries, could be achieved mainly with the help of NGOs. But in the same time the models of NGOs activities, growing and shaped by the western patterns of economy and culture, were not properly understood and realized in the differentiated cultures of Developing Countries. The end of cold war and growing disappointment with globalization expanded the space for religious renewal. Alongside with the erosion of traditional identities and sources of authority, religion was able to furnish the empty space of people’s sence of security. In comparison with NGOs the religious social organizations, FBOs, have something qualitatively different to offer, particularly in terms of empowering people, e.g. giving them personal dignity and selfworthiness.
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Despite the introduction in 1981 of a meat and processed meat ration card, the supply situation in Poland was deteriorating, with stores dreading empty shelves. It became impossible to buy even basic products. This, in turn, affected public sentiment and increased the frustration of Poles, especially women. It also led – in July of that year – to a new form of protest, the so-called hunger marches. They were a way of demonstrating discontent without stopping work, organizing strikes, which would not only not improve the situation, but could even make it worse, and would also allow the PRL authorities to hold Solidarity responsible for the dire supply situation. The loudest and largest hunger marches were organized in Lodz. In the following weeks, they were also held in many other cities. An end was put to these unusual street protests (involving mainly women, often with children) by the union›s authorities – the National Coordinating Commission, which in August 1981 appealed to refrain from organizing further marches and other protests (including strikes) and declared that it would do everything it could “to lead the country out of the crisis”.
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What is the strength of the museum? The answer can be summarized briefly by listing two strong and distinctive points that define this institution in its essence. The museum is a device that generates time and, on the other hand, operates with the authentic object, giving the possibility of a direct interaction with the reality of visitors. Even in case of considerable intervention by contextualization of the museum object, the visitor has the possibility to establish a direct, present and sufficiently intimate connection with at least a fraction belonging to the object itself, which intervenes in the knowledge of the truth. In contrast stand replicas or copies of objects with which we are continuously bombarded in a time of constant processing and manipulation of reality through computers and their software. In this paper I argue for the two fundamental features of the museum and I try to prove that they have an indispensable role from a cultural point of view, which cannot be replaced by other media, considered by some, competitors.
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National Revival architectural and ethnographic complexes and sites are an essential part of Bulgarian national culture. The aim of this study was to analyze the spatial concentration of the main reserves and complexes of this type in the mountainous and hilly areas of the country. To achieve this aim are used cartographic and comparative geographic method (Arc GIS 92) and historical approach. As a result, a map of these sites is geographically identified cultural and historical localizations and major axes of the monuments of this age. An architectural and historical assessment of their importance for cultural tourism is done.
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The present study deals with a specific type of megalithic monuments – with menhirs in Bulgaria and on the Balkan Peninsula. At the beginning, some important methodological issues are discussed: definitions of megalithic sites in general and menhirs in particular – individual as well as grouped in various sets. Then information about menhirs on Bulgarian territory from the end of XIX till the beginning of XXI century is collected and presented in detail. Individual menhirs, menhir rows and cromlechs from North-East and South-East Bulgaria are described. They are compared with similar sites on Crimea Peninsula and in South Ireland. In this sense, Bulgarian megalithic area represents a significant transition region from West European and Mediterranean megalithic world in east direction towards the big Black sea megalithic arc: Balkan Peninsula – Crimea – Caucasus – Armenian Mountains Zangezur. The main methodological problem discussed here is the formal resemblance between prehistoric menhirs and medieval Islamic tombstones. Turkish researchers assert that nearly 2,000 orthostats registered in the area between Edirne and Lalapasha are menhirs and significantly differ from Islamic tombstones. Within the limits of Europe, this problem occurs only on the Balkan Peninsula and – if neglected – it can distort the overall picture of megalitism in the whole region. After a critical review of a number of similar sites in northeastern Bulgaria and Rhodope Mountains, this report comes to the opposite conclusion: The Edirne orthostats are most probably abandoned medieval Muslim gravestones and not prehistoric megaliths – menhirs.
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The devtashlari are numerous objects of megalithic character. The official opinion interprets them as proto-Bulgarian monuments which are created in VII–VIII cent. AD. The author examines the devtashlari in two contexts. Compared with the early Christian architectural monuments of Byzantine 122 origin in Bulgarian lands (IV–VI cent. AD) as well as with the temples in the old Bulgarian capitals Pliska and Preslav (built in IX–X cent. AD) the devtashlari appear as extremely primitive objects. The official interpretation is shown to be impossible from the point of view of a normal architectural evolution. On the contrary, the devtashlari find their adequate place among the numerous monuments of rock-cut and megalithic character in Bulgaria originating from III–II millenium BC. So the present analysis gives a more convincing dating and interpretation of the devtashlari. The devtashlari are in fact classic menhirs. Some of them are grouped in rectangular grids exactly like the famous menhirs in Menec, Brittany, France. Such specific grouping happens very rarely in the megalithic world. The mechanical treatment of the devtashlari and the state of their surface are also identical with the Menec menhirs.
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This study aims to clarify numerous interdisciplinary problems that arise at the interface between arhаeo-astronomy and ancient Roman Urbanism. The general scheme of a Roman city as well as its concrete implementation in the new cities built during the territorial expansion of Ancient Rome is described. The author discusses in detail various situations where it is possible to make mistakes in interpreting the street system orientation of the Roman cities. Referred to are those weaknesses in the description and publication of archaeological sites that do not allow adequate and reliable archaeoastronomical analysis. All the published data about the street orientation in Roman cities in Bulgaria are collected and presented here for the first time. Several classical Roman cities in Bulgaria are commented that have inherited earlier Thracian or Roman settlements (Ulpia Escus, Serdica, Philipopol, Seuthopolis).
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The locality Stalpishte / Dikili-tash (Russe) presents a combination of natural and historical objects which have a noticeable cultural and touristic potential. The present study collects all the data concerning the historical monuments from the Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages including photographs and original descriptions. An interpretative analysis is proposed of two monuments in the locality Stalpishte / Dikili-tash: (1) a rock reflief of a horseman and (2) a cave sanctuary crowned with a rock-graved pediment. The figure of the horseman has a Thracian origin, but its rock-cut representations have been spread over the whole Thracian-Phrygian region in Roman times. The Thracian horseman is depicted on the reliefs in various compositions (the hunter-god Heros, the war-god Ares, the local king possessing a god-dignity etc.) but always in the frames of the thracian mythology infiltrated into Phrygia. The cave sanctuary with a rock-cut pediment is a more complicated object. Rock temples and graves are created in Thracia as well as in Phrygia. Pediments are also widely used in both regions. Pediments graved over rock (or cave) temples or over rock facades are a typically Phrygian phenomenon. In this sense the rock sanctuary in Stalpishte / Dikili-tash is unique on the Balkan peninsula, i.e. for the Thracian area, and it has been built possibly in Roman times under the influence of the Phrygian architecture. However, the pediment over the cave sanctuary in Stalpishte / Dikili-tash contains a typical Thracian element – four graved trapezoidal niches which are known in the East Rhodope Mountain (i.e. in Thrace) only. We can conclude that the monuments in Stalpishte / Dikili-tash (Russe) demonstrate in an very impressing and convincing way the cultural interactions between Thracia and Phrygia in Roman times.
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Results from an online research and observations of Bulgarian migrant communities’ organizations within and outside Europe due to Covid-19 pandemic. Main pillars are the 123 connections with the homeland, the hosting country, and with the local community, mechanisms for support, as well as forms of activities, festivity, and communal consolidation.
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The text presents the Bulgarian church community “Nativity of the Vir-gin Mary” in Geneva, which is part of the Western and Central European Diocese of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church. It contains thoughts shared by Bulgarians participating actively in the development of the newly-created church community. The article focuses on different aspects of parish life: church services, social initiatives, educational activities, etc. It also exam-ines the question of how restrictive measures during a pandemic affect a young church community.
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The Ottoman Empire administered Nis and its surroundings for a very long period, more precisely from 1389 to 1878. Based on Ottoman archival sources, published works, and field studies, many cultural and social monuments of that period come to light. The number of waqf monuments that were built and registered in Serbia, Montenegro, and Sandzak (Novi Pazar) (New Yugoslavia) during the Ottoman period is 1,140. While the number of monuments that have managed to survive until today it is only 30. In Nis alone, it is mentioned that a total of 23 mosques, 2 madrasas, 4 schools, 7 tekkes, 2 public canteens (imaret), an inn, 2 hamams, 3 fountains, a castle, and a bridge have been destroyed. Therefore, the figures given in the paper do not necessarily mean to extract all the monuments of that period, because there are still many documents in different archives that researchers are expected to use in the future in order to complement the historiography, however, we hope that this study will help to fill a part of that gap.
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This article is the third part of the series “60 years of the Medical University of Varna”. The period under review begins in 1977 with the inauguration of the new leadership of the Medical Faculty of Varna, with Dean Prof. Dr Garabed Husebikyan Kaprelyan. From 10.01.1979, the Medical Faculty of Varna was reorganized into a Higher Medical Institute, within the Medical Academy (MA) of Sofia, and prof. Dr Garabed Kaprelian was elected Rector (1979 - 1983). During his terms of ofice, the construction of a series of new units was completed: the first modern hospital complex in Bulgaria, built specifically for the treatment of mentally ill patients, with five wards and 350 beds, new diagnostic-treatment and hygiene-epidemiological structures, with their own buildings. New laboratories and sectors were opened as well. The joint work between the Varna Мedical Institute and the Varna Primary District Hospital was expanded. An afiliated faculty of the Varna Medical Institute was opened in the town of Tolbukhin (today Dobrich), for the training of medical students from the third to the sixth year, thus increasing the contribution of Varna Medical Institute (VMI) to raising the level of health care in North-Eastern Bulgaria. From 20.VI.1983 to 27.IV.1987 the Rector of VMI was Prof. Dr. Vanko Nachev Vankov. During his term of ofice the construction of the surgical corpus in Dobrich town was completed which were the structures of the surgical departments of the afiliated faculty, thus increasing the level of surgical care in the Dobrudja region and improving the conditions for students education. On 29.X.1986, the most modern of its time hospital structure of the Varna Medical Institute was oficially opened with 733 beds and a training campus, adjacent to the previously built hospital complex for the treatment of mentally ill. This created a powerful treatment and diagnostic complex with 1290 beds and 103 places for short hospital stay. VMI Varna established itself as an authoritative center of medical education, with a decisive impact on the improvement of healthcare in North-Eastern Bulgaria, receiving public recognition for its 25 years contribution to medical science, practice and education.
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The webinar cycle Materializing-Modernity: Landscape, Architecture and Anthropology Intersections in 20th Century Rurality1 was organized and implemented from April 12, 2021, to May 6, 2021. It has been realized and implemented within the framework of the EU-funded project Materializing Modernity – Socialist and Post-socialist Rural Legacy in Contemporary Albania (MaMo), by Federica Pompejano (MSCA-IF Researcher, Academy of Albanian Studies), the Institute of Cultural Anthropology and Art Studies (IAKSA), the Department of Cultural Heritage and Environment and the Laboratory of Ethnomusicology and Visual Anthropology (LEAV) of the University of Milan (UNIMI), Milan, Italy. The MaMo Webinar Cycle was part of a project that received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 896925. The following pages contain the programme of the MaMo Webinar Cycle and the abstracts (in English and Albanian languages) of each oral presentation in order to give a more complete and a better understanding of the topics covered during the implementation of the webinar.
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This essay explores the interactions between customary law and state governance, revealing the complex relationships among power, identity, and law in contemporary India. It highlights the evolving nature of customs and the challenges faced by both dominant and marginalized communities. The analysis focuses on the Jat community's demand for the inclusion of sagotra marriage prohibitions in state law, illustrating how this demand exemplifies formal legal pluralism that reinforces their dominance in local politics. In contrast to marginalized groups seeking recognition of their norms, Khap Panchayats work to uphold traditional authority amid changing social dynamics.
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The analysis of folk proverbs from Bolesław Bawolak’s book Lemko proverbs and sayings from Swiatkowa Wielka and the surrounding area provides the basis for the reconstruction of opinions on the role of teaching, learning and education in the life of Lemkos in the past, as reflected in culture and language. The linguistic representation of education in Lemko paremiology is presented based on the analysis of proverbs containing lexemes вчыти (ся) (learn), чытати (read), наука (learning), учытель (teacher), and книжка (book). Proverbs are an important part of folk culture of every nation. Recording and analysing folk sayings, cultural heritage samples, everyday customs, knowledge of the world, and sensibilities of past generations also provides the basis for studying changes these communities underwent over the years.
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The paper analyses the Kemalist dailies’ presentation of veiled female students who protested the discrimination they faced when the hijab was banned at Turkish universities. Although such discrimination has since been quashed, the ideology that produced and legitimised it is still alive. The media, an important means of reproducing the Kemalist hegemony, relativised or legitimised discrimination against these students by discursively constructing them as a destructive force that threatened the secular or der. This construct is based on the Kemalist conception of modernisation, equated with secularisation, where “the limit of the expression of religion in Turkey is the skin of a citizen”. The analysed examples reinforce the construct by integrating multimodal elements, including the text itself, typographical elements, page layouts, and accompanying images and caricatures. The paper confirms the importance of analysing linguistic and other semiotic elements of discourse in the research of complex social phenomena like discrimination, hegemony, and ideology.
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This text explores the life and work of Dr. Haralambi Sarmadzhiev, a Bulgarian diplomat from the late 19th century. His career began as a legal adviser and confidant to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Denominations, and later he served as a diplomatic agent in Belgrade and Vienna. The article highlights his role in the 1898 International Anti-Anarchist Conference. It also delves into his personal life, including his marriage to Elena Pulieva, an heir of Evlogy Georgiev, and examines the fate of his family after his untimely death and the political changes in Bulgaria post-1944.
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In previous academic publications, I have already turned my attention to the expedition carried out by the famous Bulgarian folklorist Rayna Katsarova in Dobrudzha in the summer of 1944. This endeavor of hers was also the subject of deeper interest in my text from the last issue of the journal “Bulgarian Ethnology“, the continuation of which is the present article. The specific reason for the research is the fact that some time after finding the file with the reportfrom R. Katsarova’s fieldwork trip in the archive of IEFSEM-BAS, I was able to familiarize myself with her recordings, made in several settlements in North-Eastern Bulgaria. These transcripts are stored in today’s Musical the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. The specific reason for the research is the fact that sometime after finding the file with the report from R. Katsarova’s fieldwork trip in the archive of IEFSEM-BAS, I was able to familiarize myself endeavour of hers was also the subject of a deeper interest in my text from the last issue of One of the highlights of R. Katsarova’s expedition to Dobrudzha were the Bulgarians who moved from the Tavria region in 1943 (then in the Ukrainian SSR), bringing with them a specific language, traditions and folklore. Our great folklorist did not know that after a few months these people would not remain in their ancestral homeland and that, unlike the Jews in Bulgaria, the state would not be able to save them. About 2,000 Tavrian Bulgarians were deported back to the USSR, a part of them were killed along the way, others were repressed and thrown into the prisons of Central Asia. There is no way that the Tavrians themselves knew that their meetings with an academic like R. Katsarova were a unique chance to pass on to the next generations, through her, pieces of their cultural memory, of their customs and musical folklore, which will remain as a document for the development of their ethno-cultural traditions and identity and in the conditions of the Second World War. In the present second part of the study, the archival materials of R. Katsarova from1944 will be presented in a more detailed manner, both in terms of their content and type, and in relation to earlier and later records of other researchers among the Bulgarians from the historical and cultural regions of Tavria and Bessarabia.
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