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The following article, starting from critique of the concept “the successful roma”, presents an alternative point of view on how the construction of identity and the dimensions of its distinctiveness take place among the residents of “Stolipinovo”. The aim of the analysis provided is not to show that “all of the roma are consumers”, but to place emphasis on the fact that, in order to “understand” the neighbourhood (following Bourdieu) and its construction as a specific social space cannot solely be achieved via the means of discourses on deprivation, inequality, exclusion and marginalization, but also requires to take into account the practices of consumption which can be observed in the neighbourhood, practices that are the result of wider social changes, directly connected to the transition towards consumer societies and the consumer culture that is characteristic of them.
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According to youth experts, a significant number of contemporaryyoung people in Western societies reach adulthood at a later age than previousgenerations. This phenomenon is generally perceived as a temporary misstep on thepath todefaultpatterns of transition establishedin the 1950s and 1960s. Giventhecurrent societalcontext, should the transition to adulthood today really conform tothat model? This paper provides an historical analysis of transitionsto adulthood toenqui re whether the post-war model canstill be considered a meaningful referencetoday. Were routes of transition similar or different in earlier times, or hasthemodel always existed? To answer this question, the paper looks at demographicsin two case countries, Finland and France, in three periods: the nineteenth andearly twentieth centuries, the 1950s–1970s, and the early twenty-first century.The paper argues that the post-war generation’s rapid patterns of transitionw ere unique, resulting from a sustained period of economic growth in developedsocieties. Thishas generatednew pathways of transition and a model of adulthoodstill used as a standardpoint today, even though the current socio-economic contexthaschanged. Transitions to adulthood are not static. They have always evolved,mirroring the wider historicalcontext within which individuals operate.
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This paper focuses on the life orientations of youth living in postcommunist countries. Although a large part of them function today withinthe same global organism, their political past still differs them from the othercountries, defining in a special way all the socialization space the youth grow upin. The analyses undertaken in this paper try to argue that this is not only theproblem of the political heritage, but much more complicated interaction betweentransformation and globalization processes, that can be described in terms of glocalspace, where nothing is the same, starting with socialization process, through lifeopportunities, and ending with political significance of youth. Empirical basis arehere existing data collected in an international project covered Poland, EasternGermany, Latvia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Russia, China and Vietnam. Theanalyses show life orientations of youth – representatives of the first generation,who have grown up intellectually within the new system – as an important drivingforce of changes, on the one hand, and equally serious source of social and politicaltensions, on the other, possible especially where the “aspiration gap” (the distancebetween what young people aspire to and what they can achieve) is large andconcerns considerable part of youth.
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Migration abroad has become a significant part of the life experiencesof a growing number of Bulgarian youths, since the regime change in 1989. In thispaper we explore the effect of migration on the life transitions of two generationsof young Bulgarians – the ‘Transition’ generation o f those who had their formativeyears in the 1990s during the country’s transition from state socialism to amarket economy and the ‘Accession’ generation of those who grew up after thecountry joined the EU in 2007 in a somewhat better economic situation. Takinginto consideration the impact of the social context in the sending country in twodifferent historical periods (before and after 2007) a nd in the receiving countrieswe focus on the differences of the transition paths of lower and higher skilled femalemigrants within the two migrant generations. The paper draws on a data baseof 42 qualitative interviews with Bulgarian migrants living in EU countries thatwere conducted in 2017 and an in -depth analysis of the life trajectories of fourwomenbelonging to the two migrant generations. Our findings suggest that facingdifferent structural constraints in their countries of departure and reception, youngpeople employ diverse st rategies of settling down, achieving success and attaininghappiness. In the process they transform their social ties and national identities.
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The aim of this paper is to explorethe characteristics and relativeimportance of civic engagement for young members of civil society organisationsin Serbia. This article is exploratory in character and is based on qualitativemethodology.Youth engagement is observed through the theoretical lens of thelifecourse approach. The questions addressedbythe paper are as follows: How doyoung people perceive their civic engagement? What motivates their participation?How does this engagement relate to other aspects of their lifecourse?The method used here is narrative analysis of 20 semi-structured interviewsconducted with young volunteers and members of civil society organisationsin Serbia selected through theoretical sampling.The key finding is that there isarange of motivations and accompanying strategies – from the purely idealisticto the highly instrumental. The majority of our respondents displayed a mixedtype of motivation, successfully combiningactivities aimed at protectingthe “socialgood” with thosethat contribute to the achievement of personal goals. Motivation,however,tends to vary between the different types of organisations, professionaland grassroots. Engagement in professional organisations is more frequentlyinstrumental and, in contrast, grassroots organisations typically attract “genuine”,value-driven activists.
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This study introduces a novel methodology for measuring,exploring and describing the pro cesses of party nationalization and localization.The key component of this approach is using electoral volatility as a baselinemeasure for computing party localization indices. For the purposes of this study,conventional definition of localization as non-uniform territorial politicalresponse (Caramani, 2004) is redefined as non-uniform, but spatially contingentresponses of territorial units to national political forces. Using network analysis,the authors introduce quantitative approach for studying spatial and dynamicalaspects of party systems and demonstrate its usefulness and applicability in casesof two post-communist systems: Serbia and Croatia. The results demonstrate thatdifferent components of party systems (new versus stable parties) exhibit differentlevels of nationalization and localization, which has been overlooked in previousstudies. In line with previous research (Bochsler, 2010c; Golosov, 2016; Schakel,2017), this study confirms that the Croatian party system is less nationalized thanSerbian, but there are some similarities between the two countries in terms of thedistribution of electoral volatility. In the discussion part of the study, limitationsof new methodology are explained and directions for its further development areoutlined.
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The article builds upon the current political context in Bulgaria, where the politicians and mass media openly disseminate hate speech against Roma people and Roma quarters blaming them for many social issues. However, the article argue that this is not a “Romany culture” but “a culture of poverty” and in the first part draws parallels both in the spatial features and in the social deviations with many other slums, shanty towns and “ghettoes” in Brazil, France, Germany, Spain, UK and USA. The second part discusses the history and origins of the segregated ethnic neighbourhoods in Bulgaria, starting with the Ottoman urban planning principles, through the socialist ethnic policies to the recent days secondary segregation and the paradox of exodus: what you try to escape the ghetto, soon you realize the ghetto moves with you. The conclusions are rather lessons learned and relate to two positive examples of tackling urban segregation, coming from the town of Kavarna and Stara Zagora city, where the proper urban planning breaks both the prejudices and the circle of marginalization.
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The purpose of the article is to reveal the dynamics of the functioning of cultural and ethnic identification on the Ukrainian border in the modern period. The methodology of the study is to use theoretical, historical, cultural, artistic, and scientific approaches, which allowed us to reveal the interaction of trends represented by the phenomena of multiculturalism, as well as the relationship between ethnicities, regions, and countries in our time. Scientific novelty. For the first time, the article focuses on the dynamics of the development of cultural and ethnic identification in the Ukrainian border territories. Conclusions. It is noted that social changes are taking place in the Ukrainian border territories, namely, opening new opportunities for their residents, developing cooperation in the social, economic, and cultural spheres, etc. It is proved that the theoretical substantiation of the issue of cultural and ethnic identification contributes to the development of national interest, awareness of which is a necessary component of the development of Ukrainian society. Identity and identification processes in similar areas occur on a symbolic level. According to K. Shestakova, in our time, transboundary regions are formed with their own identity, in which local or regional identification dominates over others. At the same time, in ethnically mixed territories (the factor of interethnic contacts is extremely strong here, almost the main one), the set of several identities in which the ethnic aspect is most pronounced is traced. Thus, the relationship between global and national factors of the contemporary historical process in Ukraine is diverse, complex, and contradictory. They can contribute to the development of integration of a country into the world community or slow down this process. The interaction between the specificity of ethnic and cultural identity on the Ukrainian border is a pressing issue today.
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This study makes use of hybridity identity theory and the dynamic perspective of identity negotiation as a framework for exploring how pan-Chinese immigrant descendants in Belgium culturally and ethno-nationally identify themselves, how they negotiate with various ethno-national identity labels, and how they perceive differences between their immigrant parents’ heritage culture and the culture of Belgian host society. Ethnographic and qualitative research methods were employed to collect data from 2017 to 2019 at Sun Yat-sen heritage school in Brussels. Based on 200 hours of participant observation and 30 interviews conducted with immigrant descendants, the results indicate that cultural differences could be observed in participants’ familial and social life, including education, parenting, and lifestyle. Moreover, three vital dimensions whereby pan-Chinese immigrant descendants negotiate, perform, and situate their cultural and ethnic identity are food practices, popular cultural consumptions, and friendships. Notably, few participants identify themselves as either Chinese or Belgian; the majority espouses a dual identity and tends to place their identity “in-between” the pan-Chinese and Belgian ethnic affiliations. This study further finds that the descendants of Taiwanese immigrants find it difficult to settle their cultural and ethnic identity as they frequently struggle to establish a sense of belonging, and are caught between three ethno-national labels: Taiwanese, ethnic Chinese (Huaren), and Belgian. The findings highlight the fluid, dynamic, context-specific, and multi-layered nature of the development and negotiation of cultural and ethnic identities in the immigrant context.
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The fundamental idea behind this paper is the interpretation of genocide in Srebrenica using the term and meaning of “cultural trauma“. The research is based on the analysis and challenging of the visual and semantic dimensions of the work entitled Bosnian Girl by Šejla Kamerić, an artist from Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as the 1945-1995-2005 billboards by photographer Tarik Samarah. These works, originated in the post-war period, are acknowledged as the key cultural mechanisms of interpretation and understanding of the Srebrenica traumatic events. The expressions of a changed and fragmented collectivity are reflected in the framework of the past semantically shaped by different visual means and their interrelationships. The author observes the powerful symbolic potential of these works as a space for archiving knowledge and cultural dimension of remembering the genocide in Srebrenica and integrating the historical content in the framework of the contemporary and future Bosnian and Herzegovinian social context. The narratives of cultural memory, the works of artist Kamerić and photographer Samarah examine the effects of the past on the processes of re/construction of the collective identity.
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The topic of the paper is the modern method of identity–building that emerges in Bosnia and Herzegovina with the advent of the Dual Monarchy and is expressed through the emperor and dynasty, ceremonies, monuments, lands coats of arms and flags while promoting land identity; as well as the fate of these building elements in the regimes that followed. It starts with the idea, philosophy, theory and mystical–religious aspect of the Empire; ideology of imperial legitimacy; dynastic ideology and Habsburg mission, and comes to the functioning imaginary community united in an emperor with politically limited power embodied in a multiplicity of homelands; the Emperor with his lands and his peoples. The transformation of the Empire are followed, the development, the appropriation of the idea, the dissolution, rebirth, confrontation of national problems and the practices of their solving to the destruction of the Empire and its consequences which were tried to be justified with the creation of the myth of the dungeon of nations and eventually the revitalization of the imperial heritage as the idea of Central Europe. Bosnia (and Herzegovina)has been followed in the orbit of empires since the earliest ceremonial testimonies, through the establishment of a new of ceremonial paradigm through the artistic, sculptural and heraldic affirmation of imperial ideology with the advent of the Dual Monarchy and the revival of old Bosnian symbols. Within this, it is indicated to the apparent conflict between political and ceremonial, and to the relationship of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Bosniaks (of that time) to the Empire until the very end. After the Empire, in the three–tribe kingdom and the socialist federation, the oldvessels contain new contents, and the usage of imperial, formally negated, paradigm was continued by the Karadjordjevic dynasty and Tito, by taking over the imperial ceremonies in altered forms through new art, sculpture and heraldry enriched with completely new inventions, the until then unknown term peoples coat of arms and un heraldic socialist heraldry. Yugoslavia, by its multinationality, was very similar to the Dual Monarchy, and because of its successful management, Tito deserved the epithet of the last Habsburg. The notion of the emperor and his peoples is on the ideological plane replaced with the relationship without intermediary between the leader and the people, for which King Alexander, introduced the dictatorship as a formal justification, but the Tito officially did not. The loyalty to the leaders is shown by the people by the mass manifestations of bearing a torch or a baton. During this period, the artistic, sculptural and heraldic legacies of every previous regime were thoroughly destroyed, so the land coat of arms survived only in traces in the Land capital till today, and not so much of sculptures and paintings. In 1946.Bosnia and Herzegovina got a new flag, coat of arms and constitution. While the flag does not even have any of Bosnian herzegovinian symbols and indicates that it is subjected to and under the protection of Yugoslavia, one of the coat of arms proposals tried to give the breath of new life into the old land coat of arms, and the constitution itself insisted on the pattern of peoples as land subjects from the imperial era. Bosnia and Herzegovina was the remnant of the empire. The Constitutions that followed the one from 1946. adopted the ZAVNOBIH matrix and abandoned the one of land people. With the death of the people and the triumph of the nations and return to the millet system of an previous empire; the territorialization of nations came in exactly the same way as it did in the countries of Central and Southeastern Europe after the collapse of the Dual Monarchy. It was the final farewell of our country to its imperial heritage. The relationship to the order of remembrance, heraldic and sculptural heritage, as well as their treatment through the changing regimes that followed the imperial, continued in a new society without ideology; it had not much left to destroy; only one coat of arms of the Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
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Cultural globalization is the fierce and unavoidable tendency that has powerfully influenced the culture of each nation or ethnicity, especially the cultures of developing countries. They are worried about the uniformity of the world culture, which will fade away cultural identity diversity. This paper analyzes some threat and chances of the globalization process and point out several solutions that Vietnam has applied and practiced to preserve cultural identity in the context of cultural globalization
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Identity is often treated as a possession of a person or a human collective. It is a time-honored and time-consuming preoccupation of the human species to discuss what it is they have that others lack, what constitutes that specific identity that makes chem into what they are. Since the goal is ostensibly to penetrate to the core of a person's or a collective's existence-to the heart, soul, roots, raison d'etre-these debates are always versatile, colorful, and also highly serious affairs. [...]
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The area of today’s Vojvodina in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was the scene of the development of quite dynamic social and political ideas for the purpose of ensuring a better-quality approach to the constitutional and national questions. After the Decision on the accession of Vojvodina to the Kingdom of Serbia and subsequently the Decision on the unification of Yugoslavia, issued by the Great National Assembly on 25th November 1918, the national zeal was gradually replaced by realistic political ideas with the intention of finding the social identity of Vojvodina in the newly-created Yugoslav circumstances. In the 1918-1929 period of parliamentarism, these ideas had an exceptionally dynamic course and were directed towards democratic tolerance, but after the introduction of the 6th January Dictatorship in 1929, the political and party life was forbidden. Due to the new constitutional circumstances and political consolidation, Alexander Karađorđević, certain of the success of his state politics, tacitly allowed the restoration of the party life. The Sombor Resolution as well as the Novi Sad Resolution, both enacted in 1932, played the role of the moderator of the party and political life of the opposition parties with an extremely active attitude towards social circumstances dominated by the state party.
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Arab-American women’s literature has emerged noticeably in the early years of the 21st century. The social and political atmosphere in post-9/11 America encouraged the growth of such literature and brought it to international attention. This diasporic literature functions as a means of discussing the Orientalist discourse that circumscribes Arab American identity and its effects in determining their position in the wider American society. As such, this article investigates the extent to which Edward Said’s discourse of Orientalism is employed by Mohja Kahf in her novel The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf (2006) to project the stereotypes and misrepresentations that confine the identity of Arab and Muslim characters in the US society. This article suggests that post-9/11 Arab American fiction serves as a literary reference to such stereotype-based discourse in the contemporary era. The arguments in this article, while employing an analytical and critical approach to the novel, are outlined within postcolonial and Orientalist theoretical frameworks based on arguments of prominent critics and scholars such as Peter Morey, Edward Said, and Jack Shaheen, to name just a few.
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Review of: Keith Davies - Mawby, R.C., Worrall, A. (2013): Doing Probation Work: Identity in a Criminal Justice Occupation. Abingdon. Routledge.
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This research explores the political advertising campaign of Niyazi Kızılyürek, who was a candidate for the 2019 European Parliament election with the left-wing Progressive Party of Working People (AKEL) in Cyprus. It aims to uncover the content of political ads by focusing on the emotive character of the campaign language. Adopting a multi-method approach involving visual and qualitative content analysis of fifty-five ads, I examined the characteristics of communication materials distributed prior to the election. I looked at the type of tone, theme, language, music, visuals, and emotions these ads displayed. The main findings of the study are the following: (1) Kızılyürek’s political stance, which favors a solution to the problem of Cyprus based on creating a federation with Greek Cypriots, is literally reflected in each ad; (2) issue-based ads that underline political issues in the country were preferred to image-based ads that highlighted the personal qualities of the candidate; (3) both emotional appeals (associated with feelings such as hope and enthusiasm) and logical appeals (which tended to promote rational information processed by the conscious mind) were employed in the ads; and, (4) the overall tone of the ads was positive in nature, while negative emotions were completely avoided in this campaign.
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The 2019 European Parliament (EP) election in Lithuania was a second-order event significantly affected by domestic political developments and agendas. As with all previous EP elections, it attracted a minimal level of public attention in Lithuania, creating challenges and opportunities for Lithuanian political groups to effectively reach their electorates. This article focuses on the emotional display patterns of the campaign messages of political parties during the 2019 European Parliamentary campaign in Lithuania. To this end, it applies Lasswell’s model of commu-nication to assess printed media- and social-network-based campaign materials. Findings confirm that emotional messages dominated the communication of the political groups to their voters, and show the extremely broad spectrum of political messages that were used to arouse emotions. The study indicates that the concept of Europe remains distant and abstract to voters in Lithuania. Politicians’ messages to voters overwhelmingly appealed to the European context when addressing domestic agendas, thereby exploiting the emotional aspects of domestic political discourses in Lithuania and the perception of the EU in the country. Finally, the study demonstrates that the personification of political strategies involving politicians’ charisma, public image, and expressivity were key elements in terms of the election outcome.
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