Papers by Riki Van Boeschoten
In the Greek context of economic crisis and of emerging xenophobic ideas and discourse, this arti... more In the Greek context of economic crisis and of emerging xenophobic ideas and discourse, this article presents some findings from a research project which had the ambition to give voice to immigrants in Greece about their own language and communication needs. The target group of the project were immigrant parents, whose children attend public schools in the area of Volos. Communication between schools and immigrant families is fragmentary or non-existent, causing frustration for parents and teachers. The ELMEGO project used focus groups in order to construct social meaning related to migrant discourse, and shed light on it from an interdisciplinary perspective, combining insights from social anthropology, applied linguistics and the sociology of education. After the first stage of needs analysis, the practical outcomes of the project were the design of teaching material and educational activities, the implementation of pilot courses and their evaluation, and the creation of a resource pack. The results of the project question the validity of specific-purposes-approaches to language needs, stress the importance of conditions for learning the migrants' second language, and associate social, cultural and institutional settings with identity and emotional choices.
Journal of Modern Greek Studies, 2015
Paper presented ar the "Museums in Motion" Conference, Volos 3-4 July 2015, closing the Research ... more Paper presented ar the "Museums in Motion" Conference, Volos 3-4 July 2015, closing the Research Program "DeMuCiV: Designing the Museum of the City of Volos: Historical Research and Development of innovative interactive content for the dissemination of knowledge” (University of Thessaly, 2012-2015)
Abstract
Museums all over the world are increasingly interested in making their collections more accessible to the broader public. In the wake of this trend, invoking the need for a “participatory museum” has become a kind of mantra for museum professionals. Approaches have varied from the assessment of visitors’ needs to handing over the entire responsibility of specific exhibitions to local communities. However, the possible pitfalls of such community involvement have less often become an object of analysis. In this paper I will discuss the rather low-profile approach to community engagement we adopted in the first stage of designing the Volos City Museum. I will focus in particular on a series of “memory nights” we organized with a group of local residents in order to get feedback for our on-going research, to evoke local memories and to spot new topics important for the local community
This volume collects ten essays that look at intra-regional migration in the Southern Balkans fro... more This volume collects ten essays that look at intra-regional migration in the Southern Balkans from the late Ottoman period to the present. It examines forced as well as
voluntary migrations and places these movements within their historical context, including ethnic cleansing, population exchanges, and demographic engineering in
the service of nation-building as well as more recent labor migration due to globalization. Inside, readers will find the work of international experts that cuts across national
and disciplinary lines. This cross-cultural, comparative approach fully captures the complexity of this highly fractured, yet interconnected, region. Coverage explores
the role of population exchanges in the process of nation-building and irredentist policies in interwar Bulgaria, the story of Thracian refugees and their organizations
in Bulgaria, the changing waves of migration from the Balkans to Turkey, Albanian immigrants in Greece, and the diminished importance of ethnic migration after the 1990s. In addition, the collection looks at such under-researched aspects of migration as memory, gender, and religion.
The field of migration studies in the Southern Balkans is still fragmented along national and disciplinary lines. Moreover, the study of forced and voluntary migrations is often separate with few interconnections. The essays collected in this book bring these different traditions together. This complete portrait will help readers gain deep insight and better understanding into the diverse migration flows and
intercultural exchanges that have occurred in the Southern Balkans in the last two centuries.
Έμφυλοι λόγοι μετανάστευσης στη ΝΑ Ευρώπη - Νεφέλη forthcoming
Ντρέπενε άνδρες θα βοηθάνε γυναίκες πριν στην Αλβανία. ΠΑΡΑ ΠΟΛΥ ντρέπενε! Τώρα είναι αλλιώς. Τώρ... more Ντρέπενε άνδρες θα βοηθάνε γυναίκες πριν στην Αλβανία. ΠΑΡΑ ΠΟΛΥ ντρέπενε! Τώρα είναι αλλιώς. Τώρα βοηθάν! Ο Στράτος με βοηθάει εμένα. Ναι, μια μέρα που εγώ πήγα δουλειά και αυτός δεν πήγε, ήταν στη, στο βρύση πολλά πιάτα, έπλυνε και να σφουγγαρίζει. Εντάξει. Τώρα, βοηθάνε τώρα, τώρα δεν είναι ΝΤΡΟΠΗ! 1 Και εγώ αυτό του λέω [του γιου μου] Να προσέχεις. (…) Να πιάσεις μια κορίτσι που μη το έχει πιάσει κανένας. Έτσι του λέω. Γιατί εδώ είμαστε μεγάλη σόι, 90 και άτομα. Αν ακούσει κάποιος για μένα που όλοι με ξέρουν, ήμαν σωστός στη ζωή μου, ότι το αγόρι του Ιλλίρ πήρε ας πούμε αυτό το κορίτσι, δεν είναι σωστό. Είναι ντροπή για μας. Δηλαδή, να πάρει αυτό που αξίζει, περίπου να είναι αλφαδιά. Λέμε τα κορίτσια που έχει εδώ δεν είναι για οικογένεια, δεν ξέρουν να μαγειρεύουν. Γιατί αν έχει τα νύχια τόσα δεν ξέρει να μαγειρεύει. Έχει μαγειρεύει μόνο μάνα στο σπίτι. Αυτό θέλει να το κάνει παραγγελία εκεί στον Παπαγάλο να το φέρει στο σπίτι. Πρώτα. Το δεύτερο: είναι μαθημένος [το κορίτσι] κάθε ώρα να βγει στην παραλία να πιει καφέ. Εμείς πού να το βρούμε τα φράγκα; Είμαστε πλούσιες; Το δεύτερο [τρίτο]: τα θέλει το δικαίωμα όπως έχει άντρα θα έχει η γυναίκα. Ακόμα εμείς δεν τα έχουμε αυτά, δε μιλάω για τα παιδιά, μιλάμε εγώ. Αν είναι τέτοιο μάρκα θα χαλάσει την οικογένεια! 2
Paris 13-15 Décembre 2012 Dans la littérature autour de la mémoire orale les termes «témoignage» ... more Paris 13-15 Décembre 2012 Dans la littérature autour de la mémoire orale les termes «témoignage» et «récit de vie» sont souvent traités comme interchangeables. Cet usage pose un problème d'ordre méthodologique. Si, en lignes générales, on peut entendre le «récit de vie» comme une forme narrative dans laquelle un sujet historique raconte une partie de son expérience vécue à une autre personne au cours d'un entretien (Bertaux 1997: 32), ce qu'on entend aujourd'hui par «témoignage» semble être d'une nature beaucoup plus spécifique. En plus, le «témoin» a lui-aussi obtenu un statut spécifique dans nos sociétés contemporaines, tandis que le sujet d'un récit de vie n'en a pas. Au contraire, ce dernier est sensé de représenter en même temps soi-même et «monsieur ou madame-tout-le-monde». Depuis les années quatre-vingts, tant le «témoin» que le «raconteur de vie» ont pénétré l'espace public à un degré inconnu jusqu'alors, un phénomène qui a explosé davantage depuis les deux dernières décennies. L'explication de cette tendance reste à faire, mais on peut facilement constater que le témoin et le raconteur de vie occupent des sphères distinctes de cet espace public. D'un coté on pourrait placer les multiples documentaires de témoignages sur des expériences traumatiques comme le Shoah et de l'autre des sites Internet comme Storycorps où «toutes les vies se valent et sont bonnes à raconter», comme Frederic Gaussen l'avait entrevu dès 1982 (Wievorka 1998: 127). En bref, tandis que chaque témoignage peut être considéré comme une forme spécifique de récit de vie, chaque récit de vie n'est pas nécessairement un «témoignage». Je me propose donc de réfléchir sur la spécificité du «témoignage» oral dans «l'ère du témoin» (Wievorka 1998) en le comparant avec les récits de vie. Quels sont les éléments qui transforment un récit de vie en témoignage? Est-ce que ce sont surtout des éléments externes à l'expérience vécue du sujet (par exemple le contexte de l'entretien, les expectations de l'enquêteur, le discours publique sur le rôle du témoin etc)? Ou bien est-ce que c'est plutôt la nature de l'expérience vécue (par exemple la 1 notion de souffrance)? Ou encore la position du sujet envers l'histoire (sa conscience historique) ou par rapport à une collectivité d'appartenance? Enfin, si on peut admettre que ces deux genres pourraient s'entremêler pendant un même entretien, dans quels moments et dans quelles circonstances cette transition s'effectue-t-elle? Témoignages et récits de vie: points communs Pour comprendre les différences entre les deux genres, il faut d'aborder voir ce que ils ont en commun. Dans les deux cas il s'agit d'une narration basée sur les mémoires personnelles d'un individu qui se rapportent à des expériences vécues par lui-même dans le cours de sa vie. Dans les deux cas cette narration se construit dans le cadre d'une relation intersubjective entre le narrateur et l'enquêteur. Cette construction narrative, mutuellement définie, contient tant des éléments événementiels que des éléments non-événementiels (Thanassekos 2003, 2008), mais ne saurait pas reproduire telles-quelles les expériences initiales: elle contient toujours un élément d'interprétation des expériences vécues. Cette interprétation subjective dépend en partie de la nature des expériences vécues, mais aussi et surtout par le présent de la narration (Halbwachs 1994). Et ce présent-là est formé en même temps par les relations qui se construisent à l'intérieur de l'entretien et par des facteurs externes à ce dernier. En fait, il serait erroné de voir l'intersubjectivité d'un entretien d'histoire orale uniquement comme une relation entre les deux personnes qui entrent en communication pendant celui-ci. Il y a un troisième acteur, invisible mais omniprésent: la culture mémorielle d'une époque et le discours public par rapport aux événements évoqués. Certains chercheurs ont appelé ce troisième facteur le «circuit culturel». (Abrams 2010: 59). Vue de cette manière, l'intersubjectivité de l'entretien implique une conversation en triangle: une conversation intérieure du sujet interviewé avec soi-même, une conversation du sujet avec l'enquêteur et une conversation de tous les deux avec le contexte public -culturel, social et politique (Abrams 2010: 54).
‘I made 100 interviews: what am I going to do with them?”
In spite of the increased use of oral h... more ‘I made 100 interviews: what am I going to do with them?”
In spite of the increased use of oral history interviews by Greek scholars over the last two decades, very little of this rich empirical material is integrated into the final draft of their publications. Thus a unique opportunity to gain deeper insights into the role of individual and collective actors in social and historical processes is lost. I argue instead that oral sources can play a crucial role both in the reconstruction of the past and in the analysis of social memory as an important factor of the present. This article explores the reasons for this reluctance on the part of Greek scholars to integrate oral material into their interpretations and suggests two different methods for the analysis of oral interviews: the narrative interview method introduced by Gabriele Rosenthal and Fritz Schütze, among others, and the “ethno-sociological method proposed by Daniel Bertaux.
Keywords: oral history, life stories, narrative method, ethno-sociological method
After the War was Over: Reconstructing the Family, …, Jan 1, 1943
Jahrbücher für Geschichte und Kultur Südosteuropas, Jan 1, 2003
History and Anthropology, Jan 1, 2003
Memory and the Second World War: An Ethnographic …, Jan 1, 2005
Journal of Peasant Studies, Jan 1, 1993
Oral History, Jan 1, 2007
Journal of Modern Greek Studies, Jan 1, 2006
Based on anthropological field-work among Slav-speakers in the Florina area, this article focuses... more Based on anthropological field-work among Slav-speakers in the Florina area, this article focuses on informal cultural language-based practices, such as code-switching and the telling of jokes. The analysis tries to decode the implicit social and cultural meanings of these practices and explores to what extent these data can improve our understanding of the relationship between language, ethnicity and power.
Strates. Matériaux pour la recherche en …, Jan 1, 2001
Ce document présente les principaux résultats d'une enquête de terrain effectuée en sept... more Ce document présente les principaux résultats d'une enquête de terrain effectuée en septembre 1993 et financée par la Commission européenne. L'objectif de cette enquête était d'analyser l'usage des langues minoritaires dans une région de la Grèce du Nord qui se présente ...
MEMORIA E RICERCA, Jan 1, 2006
BOOKS by Riki Van Boeschoten
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Papers by Riki Van Boeschoten
Abstract
Museums all over the world are increasingly interested in making their collections more accessible to the broader public. In the wake of this trend, invoking the need for a “participatory museum” has become a kind of mantra for museum professionals. Approaches have varied from the assessment of visitors’ needs to handing over the entire responsibility of specific exhibitions to local communities. However, the possible pitfalls of such community involvement have less often become an object of analysis. In this paper I will discuss the rather low-profile approach to community engagement we adopted in the first stage of designing the Volos City Museum. I will focus in particular on a series of “memory nights” we organized with a group of local residents in order to get feedback for our on-going research, to evoke local memories and to spot new topics important for the local community
voluntary migrations and places these movements within their historical context, including ethnic cleansing, population exchanges, and demographic engineering in
the service of nation-building as well as more recent labor migration due to globalization. Inside, readers will find the work of international experts that cuts across national
and disciplinary lines. This cross-cultural, comparative approach fully captures the complexity of this highly fractured, yet interconnected, region. Coverage explores
the role of population exchanges in the process of nation-building and irredentist policies in interwar Bulgaria, the story of Thracian refugees and their organizations
in Bulgaria, the changing waves of migration from the Balkans to Turkey, Albanian immigrants in Greece, and the diminished importance of ethnic migration after the 1990s. In addition, the collection looks at such under-researched aspects of migration as memory, gender, and religion.
The field of migration studies in the Southern Balkans is still fragmented along national and disciplinary lines. Moreover, the study of forced and voluntary migrations is often separate with few interconnections. The essays collected in this book bring these different traditions together. This complete portrait will help readers gain deep insight and better understanding into the diverse migration flows and
intercultural exchanges that have occurred in the Southern Balkans in the last two centuries.
In spite of the increased use of oral history interviews by Greek scholars over the last two decades, very little of this rich empirical material is integrated into the final draft of their publications. Thus a unique opportunity to gain deeper insights into the role of individual and collective actors in social and historical processes is lost. I argue instead that oral sources can play a crucial role both in the reconstruction of the past and in the analysis of social memory as an important factor of the present. This article explores the reasons for this reluctance on the part of Greek scholars to integrate oral material into their interpretations and suggests two different methods for the analysis of oral interviews: the narrative interview method introduced by Gabriele Rosenthal and Fritz Schütze, among others, and the “ethno-sociological method proposed by Daniel Bertaux.
Keywords: oral history, life stories, narrative method, ethno-sociological method
BOOKS by Riki Van Boeschoten
Abstract
Museums all over the world are increasingly interested in making their collections more accessible to the broader public. In the wake of this trend, invoking the need for a “participatory museum” has become a kind of mantra for museum professionals. Approaches have varied from the assessment of visitors’ needs to handing over the entire responsibility of specific exhibitions to local communities. However, the possible pitfalls of such community involvement have less often become an object of analysis. In this paper I will discuss the rather low-profile approach to community engagement we adopted in the first stage of designing the Volos City Museum. I will focus in particular on a series of “memory nights” we organized with a group of local residents in order to get feedback for our on-going research, to evoke local memories and to spot new topics important for the local community
voluntary migrations and places these movements within their historical context, including ethnic cleansing, population exchanges, and demographic engineering in
the service of nation-building as well as more recent labor migration due to globalization. Inside, readers will find the work of international experts that cuts across national
and disciplinary lines. This cross-cultural, comparative approach fully captures the complexity of this highly fractured, yet interconnected, region. Coverage explores
the role of population exchanges in the process of nation-building and irredentist policies in interwar Bulgaria, the story of Thracian refugees and their organizations
in Bulgaria, the changing waves of migration from the Balkans to Turkey, Albanian immigrants in Greece, and the diminished importance of ethnic migration after the 1990s. In addition, the collection looks at such under-researched aspects of migration as memory, gender, and religion.
The field of migration studies in the Southern Balkans is still fragmented along national and disciplinary lines. Moreover, the study of forced and voluntary migrations is often separate with few interconnections. The essays collected in this book bring these different traditions together. This complete portrait will help readers gain deep insight and better understanding into the diverse migration flows and
intercultural exchanges that have occurred in the Southern Balkans in the last two centuries.
In spite of the increased use of oral history interviews by Greek scholars over the last two decades, very little of this rich empirical material is integrated into the final draft of their publications. Thus a unique opportunity to gain deeper insights into the role of individual and collective actors in social and historical processes is lost. I argue instead that oral sources can play a crucial role both in the reconstruction of the past and in the analysis of social memory as an important factor of the present. This article explores the reasons for this reluctance on the part of Greek scholars to integrate oral material into their interpretations and suggests two different methods for the analysis of oral interviews: the narrative interview method introduced by Gabriele Rosenthal and Fritz Schütze, among others, and the “ethno-sociological method proposed by Daniel Bertaux.
Keywords: oral history, life stories, narrative method, ethno-sociological method