forum urban_land_scapes
Anthropological research on different spatial formations (urbanity, rurality) is an important focus at the department of European Ethnology. The "Forum urban_land_scapes", founded in 2019, aims to bring together diverse initiatives and projects that focus on rural areas and urban space.
The forum serves the regular exchange of ongoing research and activities, the development of future initiatives and the joint deepening of the content of spatial theory issues and concepts. The existing exchange with actors from other disciplines and non-university fields will also be continued on selected topics.
In addition to research on and about the countryside, large cities and metropolitan areas such as Vienna, the Institute also pursued research questions on cities of different "sizes" and positions as well as their negotiation and reflected on methodological and analytical questions and concepts. For example, the everyday life of residents in "medium-sized cities" was examined in terms of how their own place of residence is given meaning in everyday negotiations and position assignments of different institutions and actors. Since 2011, for example, there have been yearly workshops organized by the “Network for Urban Cultural Studies” at the department.
Apart from research projects, presentations and publications in the field of urban_land_scapes, this focus of research is also reflected in the courses offered at the department.
In recent years, this focus has once again expanded to include cultural analyses of different urban and rural spaces: praxeologically oriented relational spatial analyses examine not only reciprocal references but also the imaginations of "country" and "city" and their transformation. Current projects deal, among other things, with the production of the public sphere and processes of infrastructuralization in the city, with questions about contemporary rural economies and working environments, as well as with everyday and life-historical themes in rural areas.
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