George Thomson and the Dialectics of Hellenism

Abstract

When I think of G. Thomson one question which immediately springs to mind is: why was he, and why is he still, so popular in Greece, a country he visited only four or five times? Was it his scholarly work, his Marxist beliefs or his emphasis on the continuity of Greek culture that bestowed on him respect and acclaim among Greeks? It seems to me that it was a combination of all these three factors which resulted in the fact that Thomson is one of the few classical scholars whose major studies have been translated into Greek and enjoyed wide publicity. He is now considered in Greece not only an exception among classicists but an exception among those who have studied the historical development of Greek culture and vehemently stressed its continuity. Despite the fact that his views were largely ignored during the debate of the 1960s and early 70s concerning the question of continuity, and which centred around Byzantium, Thomson's views on the subject must seriously be taken into account.     

Topographies/topologies of the camp: Auschwitz as a spatial threshold

This paper, largely inspired by Giorgio Agamben’s conceptualization of the camp, reflects on the relationship between the ‘topographical’ and the ‘topological’ in reference to Auschwitz-Birkenau and its spatialities. After having discussed the concept of soglia (threshold), we briefly introduce the ways in which the historiographical literature on the Holocaust treats the relationship between modernity, rationality, and Nazism. The second part of the paper is dedicated to an attempt to read ‘geographically’ the entanglements between the camp, Nazi spatial planning, bureaucratic rationalities, and the Holocaust. The notion of the camp-as-a-spazio-soglia is central to this interpretation. Auschwitz, conceived as a metaphorical and real space of exception, is contextualized within the broader regional geography planned by the Nazis for that part of Poland; while ‘Mexico’, a specific compound within the camp, is described as a key threshold in the reproduction of those very geographies. The aim is to show how the topological spatialities of the camp were a constitutive element of the overall biopolitical Nazi project of ‘protective custody’ and extermination and that, for this reason, they deserve further investigation and need to be discussed in the relation to the crude calculative and topographical aspirations of that same project.     

Homeland In the Snowland

Modern Tibetans cherish a natural love for the great nature and this love turns out to be even deeper than their predecessors who lived and multiplied in this region for so many centuries.Lhalu Wetland: Oxygen BarThe residents of Lhasa take great pride in the Lhalu Wetland within the city. Skirted by Damn Road West, the wetland covers a total area of 6.2 square km, or 11.7 percent of the total area of     

故土与边疆:满洲民族与国家认同里的东北

本文从满族的角度探讨边疆研究的一个中心问题:族群领域性(territoriality)的再定义与其身份(identity)的重塑如何互动关联。满族的历史与文化在近几十年来的清史研究中地位卓著。然而,在清史之外的其他领域,尤其在北美有关二十世纪中国或东亚史的学术领域,满族常常被忽视。本研究立足边疆研究,中外关系,及满汉关系领域的交叉路口,分析清末民初满族的故土认知变化与其对族/国的多元再定义的过程。     

Detached from Their Homeland: The Latter-day

Over the past few decades, the homeland concept has received an ever-increasing amount of attention by cultural geographers. While the debate surrounding the necessity and applicability of the concept continues, it is more than apparent that no other geographic term (including culture areas or culture regions) captures the essence of peoples' attachment to place better than homeland. The literature, however, provides few examples of the deep-seated loyalty people have for a homeland despite being physically detached from that space. Employing land use mapping and informal interviews, this paper seeks to help fill that gap by exemplifying how the daily lives of Mormons living in Chihuahua, Mexico reflect their connection to the United States and the Mormon homeland. Our research revealed that, among other things, the Anglo residents perpetuate their cultural identity through their unique self-reference, exhibit territoriality links reflected in their built environment, and demonstrate unconditional bonding to their homeland through certain holiday celebrations. It is clear to us, as the Anglo-Mormon experience illustrates, that the homeland concept deserves a place within the geographic lexicon.     

Homeland Heroes: Migrants and Soldiers in the Neoliberal Era

This paper examines the dynamic relationship between neoliberalism and nationalism through the counterintuitive comparison of journeys travelled by US citizens as they enlist in the military and by unauthorized Central Americans as they migrate to the United States. We argue that, however different the context and content of their decisions and their lives, Central American migrants and US soldiers are both connected within a larger political economy. We complicate the idea of migrants and soldiers as purely rational economic actors, but we also reject the idea, imputed onto migrants and soldiers by neoliberal states, that they are naturally nationalistic actors. Migrants and soldiers embody a neoliberal subjectivity produced through processes of violence, capital accumulation and militarization. Yet, as we examine throughout this paper, their construction as homeland heroes within the national imaginary masks the ways their labor and their mobility serve the institutionalization of neoliberal statecraft.     

乡情凝聚人心

飘色、花灯、剪纸、乡曲、乡祭……大庙会凝聚乡情凝聚人心。岭南人拯救还原民俗的同时也善用民俗——呼唤情感回归建设美好家园。 考察非物质化遗产,不能不考察大庙会。在普查中,大庙会被分类为化空间。这个空间是古庙、老店、戏曲、手工技艺、宗教信仰、饮食、民间舞蹈、年画、武术、杂技……的集合体,根本就是一幅幅生动的《清明上河图》。 大庙会仅仅是乡间民俗的集合体吗？我们在调查中似乎还找到了另一种回答——大庙会是乡情的最好的载体。在人的所有社会情感当中,乡情是最为温暖柔软的部分,当心中涌起这种美好情感的时候,眼前流动的,往住就是大庙会的某个画面了,一张剪纸、一盏花灯、一缕乡曲、一次乡祭……[编按]     

文化移植与重建家园--评《越洋再建家园--新加坡华人社会文化研究》

近代以来,在中国和东南亚社会历史变迁的大背景下,中国的华南移民越过海洋抵达新加坡后重建社会与文化家园.在精英文化和上层制度缺失的状态下,华人移民利用祖籍地的文化传统,并以血缘、族群和信仰为纽带,重新建立了他们自己的华人文化,并进一步完成了社群的整合与文化的重植.作者在<越洋再建家园>一书中选取了华人社会的本土视角与民间视角,以历史人类学和文化人类学的方法考察了新加坡华人社会从移民到定居转变过程中文化移植与重建家园的历程.     

Constructing Homeland Security: An Anemic Policy Regime

This research addresses the strength of the homeland security policy regime that was constructed after the terrorist attacks of September 2001. We argue that homeland security provides a preeminent example of the challenges of developing policy regimes that focus policymaking on a common goal across diverse subsystems. All the ingredients for fashioning a powerful regime were in place after the terrorist attacks of September 2001—a common purpose, engaged stakeholders, and institutional redesign. But for a variety of reasons that we discuss, the results are far from cohesive. The lessons we draw are more general ones regarding factors that influence the strength of boundary‐spanning policy regimes.     

Materiality and Autonomy in the Pocumtuck Homeland

The Indigenous people of New England’s middle Connecticut River Valley are often imagined as having been subservient to powerful tribal nations elsewhere. Yet, archaeological and ethnohistorical evidence suggests Pocumtuck independence and autonomy in relations with neighboring Native groups and with Dutch, English, and French colonizers during the seventeenth century. We employ a decolonizing framework, drawing on H.M. Wobst’s critique of the preoccupation with dominance and geopolitical “centers” to analyze this evidence. By framing artifacts, colonial texts, and cultural interactions as both past and present “material interventions,” we can generate better understandings of Pocumtuck political autonomy, agency and identity.