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The object of the article is a late legend – The Story of the Irani Star – which might have originated among the Eastern Orthodox Slavs in the 15th c. The plot revolves around the Star of Bethlehem, the birth of Jesus, and the pilgrimage of the Magi (cf. Matthew 2: 1–12). The article discusses the narrative, its structure and the history of the text, with a focus on the edition and reconstruction of the text. The Story is published according to the copy found in Miscellany No 143 (504), 258v–265r, dated to the 16th c., which is part of the manuscript collection of the Joseph-Volokolamsk Monastery. Today, the manuscript is kept in the Russian State Library (Moscow, Russia). The edition is prepared in comparison with four copies of the legend dated to 15th and 16th c.
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This article analyses the process of choosing different strategies of identification by Bulgarians in Ukraine. The present state of ‘identification processes’ against the background of ‘war of memory’ and ‘invented traditions’ places them among the priority problems of science and politics. The subject of analysis is the specifics of the formation of collective memory, which is at the root of the choice of identification strategy: commemorative practices, mechanisms for the memorialization of the past, the correlation between the local history of the group and the national strategies of Bulgaria and Ukraine. The conclusion is that the choice of identification behaviour is influenced by the efficiency of social adaptation under specific historical circumstances. The social resources at the disposal of the group in any particular moment influence the choice of vectors of collective memory and predetermine the formation of defensive practices aimed at preserving the group.
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The objective of this article is to outline in the light of the relations between the nation-state and the various religious organizations and individuals the main tensions in the contemporary Bulgarian society concerning the intertwining of religion and secularism. The general goal is to combine the presentation of national historical context, existing legislation and the current social debate based on fieldwork.
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This text is based on an ethnographic study on the protests and civic initiatives that initially took place in 2013 but then continued with varying intensity throughout the following years. While applying the method of participant observation during the Gazi events’ and conducting interviews with individuals who had taken part in the protests, a main goal of this study is to grasp the transformation in the identification, articulation and presentation of important and secondary topics and problems that had been brought forward throughout the public discussions. The initial motivation of this study is the idea that after the first demonstrations and clashes, the interpretation of the political projects’ turbulence, of the reinvention of urban spaces, of the success or failure of diverse protest and resistance practices, gradually modifies the way the aforementioned events and ongoing processes are being thought and talked about. The research questions the respondents’ participation in protests, the constitution and disintegration of communities, the ‘diagnosis’, ‘prognosis’ and ‘rationale’ elements in respondents’ and informants’ micro-discourses and their acts in relation to diverse initiatives. The text attempts to systematize the observation data and the collected ‘narrative fragments’ within four ‘modes of articulation’: transformative, subjective, argumentative, and topological.
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From the beginning of the 21st century and especially in its second decade, a lot of folklore festivals, sabors, singing and music making competitions, fairs, exhibitions and feasts have been created and organized. In almost every town or village (predominantly these are towns) the events take place once a year – a fact which suggests that they are in a way substitutes of the local fairs from the past. In all these cases there is folk music – either processed or unprocessed. Its role and significance determine to a great extent the type, the format and the level of the particular event.The article reveals different phenomena, certifying for the influence of the music performed on the festival where it is performed – played by professionals or by amateurs, having a main or an accompanying role, used or not with different functions and with different cultural aims.
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The article presents Voditsi rite in the village of Dobarsko (Razlog Municipality, Blagoevgrad Region) and the ritual song repertoire, characterized by its antique musical thinking, melody and rhythmic specifics. The scholarly focus is centered on the processes of development of the traditional rites in the local culture. The diachronic point of view to the rite reveals the dynamics in the course of time as far as from the second half of the 1950s to the middle of the 1980s Voditsi rite performed in Dobarsko by young virgins has stopped to exist. After that the rite is reconstructed, but mainly as a performance on the scene. Today the rite is an important element of the cultural heritage of the village and functions as a sign of local identity.
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During the second half of the early Neolithic (after 5800 B.C.), the construction of two-storey houses in the Eastern and Central Balkans began. It seems that in the early Neolithic both floors of these houses were used as residential, but in the late Neolithic (after 5500/5400 B.C.) only the upper floor had residential function – the bottom was used for commercial or industrial purposes (storage of products or salt production). Some of the Neolithic houses were deliberately burned. The intentionally burned houses were buried in pits according to the principle pars pro toto (“a part for the whole”). It seems that in the early Neolithic, the pit sanctuaries were located in the periphery of the village, and in the late Neolithic, in ritual complexes situated outside the village. The researchers have no reason to separate the dead Neolithic people from their houses. It follows that the “cremated” houses might lead us to their probably cremated inhabitants - one of the possible explanations of the vast amount of “missing” graves in the Balkan Neolithic.
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The intensification of world processes has acutely raised the problem of preserving traditional ethnic culture. Preservation of cultural heritage in a mass society is the most important problem of our time. In this regard, the question of influence of mass culture on the culture of an ethnos and its overcoming is actualized. In the article, on the basis of the literature review, the concepts of “mass culture” and “ethnic culture” are analyzed. It is revealed that ethnic culture is multi-component and includes both traditional components and elements of mass culture. The consequences of the impact of mass culture on the culture of the Yakut ethnos- acculturation and marginalization – are revealed. Conditions for overcoming the influence of mass culture on the culture of an ethnos – the dialogue between western and eastern cultures, the cessation of mindless copying of the Western way of life – are developed.
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The text presents the incorporation in public activities and research paradigms of Russe museum related to the European cultural route “The Roman Emperors and Danube Wine Route”, which turns to be a catalyst of the change in the way of presentation and sharing of heritage in the region. The observations are focused on the historical reconstruction “Roman market” establishing itself as a festival with a focus on pre-modern food. The author follows the images of the Roman fortress, the variants of museum pedagogics, the digitalization and the 3D printing of artefacts, which certify the narration about the past throughout their testimony.The local feasts strengthen local memory and unite communities. They also build social and cultural ties to the place where they regularly happen.The cultural route is important for the processes, which the Rousse museum tries to guide while searching to form of knowledge and compassion on the themes connected to local heritage.
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The article analyzes the gender and existential dimensions of man in the age of globalization and their reflection in philosophical education. Philosophical education aims to actualize criticality, creativity, humanism – a philosophical worldview that becomes a counteraction to any consciousness manipulation. It is proved that philosophical education in a democratic society is always a science – teaching and mastering philosophical knowledge is necessarily supplemented by philosophical creativity. The answer to the challenges of gender innovation and transhumanism is, above all, teaching and research in the field of philosophical anthropology, which becomes a meta-anthropology and promotes the concepts of gender partnership and androgynism.
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The marital partners in mixed families engage in a form of cultural transition as a result of negotiating the differences between them. This leads to the development of a new cultural model which is influenced by or even combines both partners’heritages. An important aspect of this intercultural interaction is the festivities, more particularly the manner of their functioning, especially within bi-religious families. Hence, the festive events appear to form an essential and very visible part of each partner's own cultural heritage, which the couple more or less incorporate into their mixed family’s life. This article focuses on several ethnocultural (including religious), as well as social aspects of the festivities of couples composed by Bulgarians and foreigners of the Middle East and North African countries. The text considers the place of the festivities in the lifestyle of the partners and their children, as well as the agents’attitudes, personal motivations and involvement in certain activities.
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This paper draws on the author’s ethnographic research with 11 – 15 years old adolescents conducted in a “prioriy” middle school in Normandy, France (2014 – 2017) and aims to explore these immigrant students’ experiences of acculturation, sociocultural adaptation and identity formation. In particular, I present the case study of a Moroccan boy in an attempt to uncover more profound aspects of these phenomena. I use the theoretical framework of Berry et al. (2006) regarding strategies for acculturation and identity processes in adolescence in order to analyse data gathered through ethnographic methods. Then, I illustrate how methodological pluralism can produce a nuanced picture and allow for alternative interpretations. In addition, followingPollock and Van Reken’s example of a third-culture kid, I use the concept of a third culture adolescent (Pollock and Van Reken 1999) to demonstrate how a migrant student with a diffuse profile, that defines him as marginal and confused, viewed through an ethnographic lens, can be thought of as someone creating “third culture”.
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In historical ethnology, women’s servants is a social phenomenon related to the so-called “West European” family model characterized by late matrimony. In Bulgaria, under the influence of socio-economic factors in the country and the modernization of the Bulgarian society in the first half of 20th century, the servantship developed and became very popular in the decades after World War I. In the next decades, it underwent numerous changes which led to slow but steady turn in the understanding of it. The study of its development and the outlining of the different stages with their age and gender characteristics allow us to trace the changes in the Bulgarian society in the previous century. It is also important to outline the regional characteristics which show important specifics of the existence and development of women’s servantship. Because of its strong influence over the life of different social groups in the society and its transformation into a vehicle of cultural exchange between them, the servantship could be defined also as a social mediator. It creates a peculiar bridge between the village and the city and facilitates the penetration of the new West European culture and urban patterns in the small local village community. The changes in the attitudes towards servantship as well as its popularity give us important information about the society as a whole and allow tracing the changes in the matrimonial models. The article is dedicated to the labour mobility of the young girls from the Tuzlukregion (Municipality of Antonovo, District of Targovishte) which expands in the course of time and to their hiring as housemaids mainly in the capital of Sofia. The study is based on the narratives of local people gathered during two short fieldworkresearches in the Municipality of Antonovo.
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The article draws attention to the linguistic aspects of the problem of speaking in the field of gender and sexual relations. My observations show numerous examples of euphemistic names for marital status, sexual relations and intimate body parts. The presence of euphemisms in the tabloid media and their active use there refute the perception in linguistics (and in particular in stylistics) that euphemisms are a feature of a single type of socially restricted speech (i.e. that they are part of official / high registers). My observations clearly show that in the media environment in Bulgaria there is a clear tendency for the active use of euphemisms within the informal speech register. This tendency is defined as brand new, formed at the end of the 20th century and actively manifested at the beginning the 21st century in journalistic style. Dysphemistic nominations are mostly jargon words and contradictory evaluations include nominations belonging to the group of international terms – impotent, vagina, penis. The transformation of medical terminology into dysphemisms and taboo names is due to the fact that the denoted concepts are strongly prohibited. This is further transmitted to the very terms denoting them.
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