Nostalgia’s New Contexts

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 557 search. ît certainly serves to remind the reader that even the simplest object—such as the postage stamp—has a history. In addition, it pro­ vides insights into the transfer and adaptation of printing technologies and reveals that innovation, forced on by circumstance, can at times be found more on the periphery than in the metropolis. Thus it is in Sydney, Australia, that the first stamped envelopes are sold for prepaid postage, experiments are made with perforation, and stamps printed with “views,” in this instance of Sydney Harbour and immigrants. For the collector, Victorian Things tells of the reality behind the “pretty things”: that Staffordshire figures were produced by small children who for two shillings a week were expected to make up to 400 a day, and that manufacturers paid more attention to devising new matchbox covers than to preventing phosphorus necrosis among their workers. As Briggs concludes, there was no single universe of Victorian things: “what was not shared was at least as significant as what was” (p. 229). Kimberley Webber Ms. Webber is senior curator of social history at the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney. Recently she was a fellow at the National Museum of American History, undertaking research for her doctorate at the University of Sydney on the social construction of domestic technology. The Museum. Time-Machine: Putting Cultures OnDisplay. Edited by Robert Lumley. London/New York: Comedia/Routledge, Chapman & Hall, 1988. Pp. ix + 241; illustrations, notes, index. $47.50 (cloth); $15.95 (paper). The Museum Time-Machine seeks to examine changes that have occurred in the museum profession in recent years. Robert Lumley, a lecturer in the Department of Art History and Communication at Lanchester Polytechnic in Coventry, has assembled a diverse group of historians, writers, and social critics to focus their attention on English and French institutions and provide provocative points of view. Contributors to the volume address recent developments in the museum profession in the organization of collections and in the in­ terpretation of their meanings. These include audience evaluation, institutional policies, ethnographic materials, sound recording collec­ tions, and museum architecture. The essays are uneven in quality and depth, but several will be of specific interest to historians of technology. Bob West’s discussion of the Ironbridge Gorge Museum, an icon of the birth of the Industrial Revolution, describes the “political econ­ omy” of that site’s development. Ironbridge received its initial fund­ ing from the government and has grown to rely on major business contributors for its ongoing support and growth. West notes the shift in the local economy of the surrounding county largely to service 558 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE markets that cater to tourists. Sadly, West writes, “the non-essential sector flourishes” and Ironbridge has become “concrete proof of a lack of democracy in museum-making.” The representation of past gender relations is surveyed by Gaby Porter. She examines the domestic life exhibits at the Beamish Museum, a living history site in northern England. Categories tradi­ tionally used to describe collections, Porter writes, have given greater specificity—and consequently greater attention—to male-dominated pursuits. An increasing number of women have joined the profes­ sional ranks of museums. This has begun to influence the character of these institutions, and Porter is hopeful that the role of gender in the various period settings at Beamish will be addressed in the near future. Science museums are the subject of Alan Morton’s essay, “Tomor­ row’s Yesterdays.” Morton reviews the problem of mounting exhibi­ tions that focus on objects but often overlook important elements of a particular context. An increased reliance on private-sector funding has adversely shaped the interpretation of some controversial instal­ lations on scientific subjects, such as nuclear power. (In this sense, the experience of English museums can be said to parallel that of their counterparts in the United States, where the pressures of corporate sponsorship have been evident for some time.) Science museums, Morton states, need “to forge a new identity” that incorporates new technology while preserving their special qualities. In his introduction, Lumley claims that the museum has assumed new significance as “a potent social metaphor” for society’s...

This article explores the characteristics of cultural development in the provinces during the 1950-ies and 1960-ies of the XX century within the context of everyday life in the Soviet Union. The authors analyze the issue of access to cultural amenities for residents of both the capital and the provinces, highlighting the long-standing disparities in social development across the vast and diverse Russian landscape. An examination of periodicals and citizen appeals to the authorities revealed conflicting approaches to addressing this issue. The analysis showed a significant narrowing of the cultural development gap between the capital and the regions. A significant shift in the cultural dynamics of village life is demonstrated, with cultural activities transitioning from the church to the village club. The cultural demands of citizens have changed significantly. The deliberate promotion of cultural and recreational activities fostered a transformation in social awareness, leading to increased proactivity in citizens’ cultural pursuits. However, despite the Soviet authorities’ efforts to ensure equal access to cultural benefits, persistent domestic challenges prevented them from fully achieving this goal. Mosaic access to cultural assets, commonly associated with rural communities, was also observed in working-class neighborhoods within large cities. Based on citizens’ appeals to the authorities, the authors demonstrate that cultural demands became a crucial factor in resolving domestic problems. In the totalitarian state, cultural life autonomy vanished from the center, a trend that persisted even during the ‘thaw’ period. Executive documents reveal that local authorities were unable to independently resolve even organizational issues of cultural life, as substantive matters remained tightly controlled ideologically.

Maps of Englishness

It had been widely accepted for a long time that Great Britain was divided geographically between a poor, industrial, urban North and a more prosperous, rural South. It was generally assumed that this division resulted from the Industrial Revolution which had transformed the North and led to the emergence of extractive industries, factories and consequently large towns and cities. Although no clear definition of the North existed, it was usually thought that it included Northern England, Scotland and Wales. The mid to late 1980s saw a quantitative and a qualitative change regarding the use of the concept of the North-South divide. The division between Northern and Southern England, in particular, was frequently referred to in articles in the press, and politicians also mentioned it in speeches in parliament. Furthermore, it took on a symbolic value as it appeared to illustrate the separation between opponents and supporters of Margaret Thatcher and her policies. This article will take a closer look at the English North-South divide in the 1980s and how the North was represented. The divide became a metaphor for social and economic inequalities that had appeared in the Thatcher years. It allowed opponents of the Prime Minister to prove that she was more radical, and therefore more dangerous, than her predecessors. Nevertheless, the North-South divide was only used sporadically by the Labour Party as, although it was useful, it could be politically dangerous by leading the party to be too closely associated with a single part of the country and limiting its appeal.

In May I was shown around part of the German Land of MecklenburgVorpommern in north-east Germany. Like so many parts of the old DDR, it suffered significant loss of population and severe erosion of its economy after German re-unification. The response from the German government has been massive investment in housing and infrastructure in all the towns and villages of this and other of the eastern lander. I was told that more than one trillion Euros have been pumped into the old eastern Germany. Travelling around the area, the impact is everywhere to be seen. Even the smallest village has new or refurbished housing, excellent resurfaced roads and new public facilities. The result for the casual traveller is the delight of visiting places which seem to have stepped out of a history book and yet have modern amenities. Unfortunately, good-quality renovation cannot hide the number of properties still in need of attention, nor hide the decaying forlorn Tor sale' signs on old granaries and commercial premises which have lost their raison d'etre. Declining population continues to be a serious problem and private investment is patchy. Nevertheless, as I flew back home to a post-industrial conurbation in northern England, there seemed much that was admirable in the strategy of universality which Germany has undertaken since re-unification. By contrast, British governments over the years have only ever stirred to tackle regional imbalances when they need votes or in fear of large-scale riots. Nevertheless, it has to be admitted that spreading resources everywhere in a declining area even with the large and generous funding applied in eastern Germany may not be the most effective approach to re-creating a viable economy and achieving successful economic and social regeneration. Certainly, those who are interested in seeking to regenerate the 'under-performing' economies of the northern regions in England would appreciate a more wholehearted public investment in infrastructure such as roads and public transport and a more determined effort both to keep those companies which have settled here and to give more positive incentives to others to move away from the South East. But beyond that there is the important lesson underpinned by those scattered charming but struggling towns in MecklenburgVorpommern: eventually choices will have to be made in terms of concentrating on those with more potential for growth, whether it be larger towns, or places with tourist potential on the Baltic shore or that have assets such as a marina on one of the large lakes in the area.

An Interethnic Paradox: Chicago's Irish and Everyone Else

This chapter examines Konrad Zieliński's Żydzi Lubelszczyzny 1914-1918 (Jews of the Lublin Region 1914-1918). Zieliński focuses on the period of the First World War and its influence on the Jews living in the region of Lublin at the time, more specifically in the area under Austro-Hungarian occupation. In writing about various developments, such as the shaping of Jewish political and cultural life, he draws on earlier materials dating to the end of the nineteenth century, when, in large towns such as Lublin, Chełm, and Zamość, the seeds of the Jewish political parties were sown. The revolution of 1905 proved to be of great importance for the region of Lublin because, to the surprise of both Poles and Jews, it demonstrated that the latter were capable of engaging in mass socio-political movements and often displayed great national awareness. But the decisive period for the shaping of Jewish identity in the provincial towns of the region of Lublin was the First World War, when news of Zionism, socialism, and communism reached such places as Markuszów, Biłgoraj, Hrubieszów, and Tomaszów Lubelski.

A variety of sources is used when studying traditional culture and etiquette. In this study, the story of L.N. Tolstoy “Ilyas” was considered as an ethnographic source. In scientific texts, works of fiction are more often considered as indirect sources, characteristics of culture and everyday life, requiring careful verification and correlation with other sources and scientific literature.The famous Russian writer and thinker, the outstanding novelist L.N. Tolstoy (1828-1910) in his works truthfully described the customs and rites, the daily life of the Irgiz-Kamelik Bashkirs. His story “Ilyas”, despite the presence of numerous data on the traditional culture of the Bashkirs, has not yet been the subject of special ethnological studies. The purpose of the work is an ethno-literary analysis of the work of L.N. Tolstoy “Ilyas” to study the features of the traditional culture of the Bashkirs of the Samara province in the reform period.The story “Ilyas” by L.N. Tolstoy is of interest to us, firstly, by the fact that in this work the life of the Bashkirs is described by a representative of another ethnic group. Secondly, the story is invaluable, as L.N. Tolstoy conveyed the events and spirit of his era, captured during trips to the Bashkirs.The story of L.N. Tolstoy “Ilyas” shows the features of economic activity, spiritual and material culture, family life. The work describes the custom of hospitality of the Bashkirs, which occupied the main place in the hierarchy of values of the Bashkir people. The mentioned hospitality of the Bashkirs can be explained by the peculiarities of economic activity, ethnopsychology, the influence of ancient beliefs and religion.In the story, L.N. Tolstoy subtly conveys the peculiarities of the behavior of his heroes according to the traditional etiquette of the Bashkirs, for example: after greeting the Bashkirs, it is customary to read sura from the Qur'an and then spend their palms on the face, women sit separately from men. When seating the guests, they took into account their age, social status and family relations, and if they were in an equal position, they paid attention to the path they had traveled. In the story of L.N. Tolstoy, the established tradition of greeting a guest with the filing of kumys was transferred.In his work, L.N. Tolstoy managed to convey the general atmosphere of the era, traditions and mores of the Bashkirs, truthfully described the features of traditional everyday culture. Along with a colorful description of customs, he showed the negative consequences of violating generally accepted norms (drunkenness of a son, naughty, arrogant daughter-in-law, etc.). Ilyas was on the verge of someone else's home due to a violation of the custom of minorat, according to which the youngest son was supposed to care for his elderly parents. At the same time, the generosity of relatives who did not abandon a person in trouble was emphasized.Thus, the outstanding Russian writer in the story “Ilyas” managed to reliably present the national color, convey the spirit of the era, the subtleties of family life and the customs of the Bashkirs. The personal tragedy of Ilyas, associated with the loss of the property acquired by hard work, resonates with the difficult situation of the Bashkirs of the Samara province.An ethno-literary analysis of the story showed that the ethnographic material was used by the author to develop the plot, confirm the authenticity and reliability of the described phenomena, but still the main merit of L.N. Tolstoy, in my opinion, is that he managed to fix the ethnocultural features of the Irgiz-Kamelik Bashkirs.

The Evenki are a small ethnic group living in Russia and China, which has preserved its traditional culture and rituals. The “Evenk theme” has become a significant phenomenon in modern Chinese literature and has contributed to ethnographic studies of Evenk culture. The relevance of the study is due to the interest of modern literary criticism in various artistic projections of imagological methodology through the prism of ethnic cultures, as well as the attention of modern Chinese writers to the life of small nationalities. The aim of the study was the imagological analysis of the image of the self-perception of the Evenki in the artistic ethnography of the Evenk writer Uzhertu. The research is based on the methodological developments in the field of artistic ethnography, as well as imagological studies of cultural images and artistic images of perception in literature. The principle of attracting and using ethnographic material is based on the works by Russian ethnographers. During the research, the stories of Uzhertu were analyzed. The image of the Evenk in his works is given from the point of view of self-perception. At the same time, it is emphasized that despite the positive qualities, the Evenk nation is weak and small in number, dissolving in the Han culture under the influence of globalization, modernization, and developing economy. As a representative of an ancient ethnos, faced with the impact of modern civilization, with each new stage of creativity, Uzhertu became more and more aware of his responsibility to his people, trying to fix and preserve its unique culture in an artistic form. In the “Evenk” works by Uzhertu, the main typological techniques of artistic ethnography were captured: the creation of images of perception of a foreign culture (Han) and images of perception, the imprinting of traditional religious ideas and a mythological picture of the world, a description of household and trade customs and rituals. Uzhertu sadly records the processes of enveloping the Evenks, their dissolution in the Han culture and everyday life.

The basis of the article is the authors’ field materials recorded in 2017 from the words of the residents of the village Stovpiahy (Pereiaslav region). The main topics of the study are Ukrainian women's folk clothing and Ukrainian women's folk jewelry.This material presents facts that were not reflected in the official documents, but they are important as materials of personal origin. They reflect factual material saturated with observations and thoughts of the respondents about described events, details of people's lives and their moods. In addition, these field ethnographic records contain invaluable information about peasant life, customs, rites, calendar rituals, information about the native village from the point of view of children's and youth's observations. All recorded information is divided into separate sections.The study of the cultural phenomena specifics of both past and present generations of Ukrainians is based on the live connection between the recorder and the interviewer. During this reconnaissance methods of search, survey, generalization, and observation were used. The survey method is one of the main methods of collecting certain information about individual structural components of the traditional domestic culture of Ukrainians, their functioning as a certain system, application to persons having direct experience or knowledge of a subject or events.These ethnographic materials can be used for a thorough study of our own land, our own historical region, one's state, and further research of various areas of the material and spiritual culture of Ukrainians.

There has recently been much more recognition of the African role in the making of the colonial cities of southern Africa. Nevertheless, many kinds of action have still seemed to be impossible for Africans living in tightly controlled municipal townships. Among these is the political and symbolic management of death. While literature on West African towns celebrates 'mausoleum politics' and the struggle over the burial of dead men under the floors of their houses, in colonial Southern African cities it has been assumed that Africans had no choice but to accept the constraining rules of drab municipal cemeteries. Similarly, the initiative and agency, which we know rural Africans in Southern Africa to have exercised in their encounters with mission Christianity, have been much less documented in the towns. In short, it has been assumed that the Southern African town—and particularly the black townships—represented colonial control at its most intense and oppressive, allowing little room for symbolic or practical autonomy whether in social life, politics or religion. This article tests such presuppositions in relation to Southern Rhodesia's second largest town, and major industrial centre, Bulawayo. It argues that from the late 1890s there has always been a black Bulawayo, expressed first in the absence of municipal or state control of the Location and expressed later by the emergence of varying influential men and women there with the capacity to take cultural and symbolic initiatives, perhaps especially in the sphere of death, burial and commemoration. It discusses the successful performance of rites to 'bring back the spirit' a year after death despite missionary and municipal prohibitions; it discusses the role of the innumerable Burial Societies in colonial Bulawayo; it discusses the efforts of educated young men to erect memorials for African kings and chiefs; it discusses the varying focus of three types of African urban Christianity—missionfounded churches, 'Ethiopianist' independent churches and Apostolic prophetic churches—on rituals of death. By so doing it opens up many questions about the social, political, cultural and religious life of an African Location in colonial southern Africa.

The study is devoted to the study of the socio-cultural needs of young people living in small and large cities of the Kemerovo region - Kuzbass. The socio-psychological survey was conducted online, 6 198 people aged 16 to 23 years took part in it. Subjective assessments of the significance and degree of satisfaction of 28 social and cultural needs were examined. The responses of residents of Kemerovo and Novokuznetsk, the largest cities of the region, as well as residents of small towns and villages of the Kemerovo region, were analyzed separately. The leader in importance among socio-cultural needs has become the need for mutual care for loved ones, for a financially secure life, professional growth, entertainment, and education. These needs can be considered or as basic psychological, or as “age constants”. The most satisfied needs are: mutual care for loved ones, communication, education, acquisition of new information, entertainment. The largest gap in importance and degree of satisfaction was found for the needs of a financially secure life, travel, professional growth, interesting work, and entertainment. It was found that the most significant needs are assessed as more satisfied and are the leading ones for all three groups of respondents. Less significant needs may have varying degrees of importance for young residents of Kemerovo, Novokuznetsk and small settlements of the Kemerovo region in accordance with the specifics of the socio-cultural space in which the respondents live. Kemerovo residents are more focused on cultural life, Novokuznetsk residents - on professional self-realization, residents of small settlements of the Kemerovo region - on traditional values and love of the Motherland.

Over time, the role of cities as centers of economic, political and cultural life has increased significantly; they are major participants in the globalization process, affect economic growth and state policy. Cities are the main elements in many spheres of public life: they determine the education level and trends; the largest production facilities are placed in them or near them; city dwellers work as managers of different levels and shape state policy. Thus, the issues of urbanization, life and development of large cities, towns and areas around them are central to the consideration of self-government. Today, effective local governance and, consequently, effective development and promotion of the people’s well-being are viewed through the prism of achieving a balance between economic development, environmental protection and social development. Due to high population density, cities possess significant potential for creativity and innovation, energy conservation, environmental friendliness, socio-cultural diversity, etc., so it is the dynamic interaction of these features that drives European development. Setting sustainable development of cities and territories as a goal makes it important to take into account European experience not only in solving the existing problems of their functioning, but also in choosing priorities for the development of modern cities based on innovative approaches and the introduction of "smart" components. The significance of forming the required legal framework for an individual administrative and territorial unit (region, territory, city, community, etc.) to function, and of assessing its state for further use in public management of territorial development, determines the importance of developing and implementing an effective system of legal documents to address socio-economic problems and encourage sustainable regional (territorial) development in Ukraine.

Employing Naples (Italy) as their case study, Berruti and Palestino challenge the neoliberal framework of climate urbanism by adopting a “Southern” perspective. Their research shows the potential of social practices as the base for experimental governance approaches. Berruti and Palestino delves into a working-class neighborhood through in-depth interviews and a participatory laboratory, exploring the perceptions of climate change and the concrete practices of adaptation and mitigation. A systematic review of local newspapers for a three-year period (2018–2020) provides clues on the mainstream perception of climate change. Finally, the authors analyze the policies and official documents of the local institutions tackling climate change.

The histories of former industrial urban areas offer a contested and ambiguous framework for urban redevelopment. Whilst the newly emerged creative industries are framed in continuity with an industrial past, cultural heritage is being mobilized by different actors to authenticate or to contest the redevelopment of working-class neighbourhoods. This article explores the ongoing transformation of post-industrial Amsterdam North, an area that has become subject to active urban redevelopment since the 2000s. Based on ethnographic material, this study examines how 'heritage as development' – based on cosmopolitan ideals of social inclusion – reinforces a process of heritagization grounded on cultural rights that involves working-class memories of solidarity and dissent. I argue that the Amsterdam case complicates dualist interpretations of gentrification and heritagization as processes of categorizing individuals as 'winners' and 'losers'. Heritage practices tend to reinforce cultural differences that produce feelings of exclusion rather than inclusion, but also offer pathways for emancipation and a re-appropriation of local heritage for long-term working-class residents.