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The Social Death of Things? Minimalism as an alternative lifestyle
Brunerová, Aneta ; Zandlová, Markéta (advisor) ; Abu Ghosh, Yasar (referee)
The popularity of the minimalist lifestyle has been growing rapidly since 2008, especially in the American context. In recent years, this phenomenon has also been noticeable in the Czech Republic, manifesting itself in a critical revision of consumer society, to which it responds and defines itself in new forms of (anti)consumption. This thesis aims to examine minimalist consumption practices and to analyse minimalism mainly through the lens of material culture studies. With the help of ethnographic practices, I focus on selected aspects of the minimalist lifestyle, including its connection to environmental and anti-consumerist attitudes, attitudes towards material objects as such, or the position of minimalist actors in the social field. Keywords: ethnography, minimalism, material culture, consumer practices, consumer society
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Czech Ethnography in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. At the Crossroads of Slavic Studies, Regionalism and Heimatschutzbewegung - an Attempt at an Insight into a Seldom Researched Topic
Ducháček, Milan
The aim of this contribution is to map the dilemmas that Czech ethnographers were facing in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. With the end of the Czech-Slovak consensus on co-existence in a common, unitary state, the étatist, and later defensive ethos of Czechoslovak ethnography of the 1930s lost its foundation and argumentation basis. Similarly, too, after the Munich Agreement 1938 and quite definitively after the Nazi occupation, the notions of unity, purity and distinctive character of the ‘Slavic’ culture of ‘Czechoslovak state nation’ faced its ideological and methodological limitations. The present study emphasizes the continuity of problems that plagued the interwar Czechoslovak ethnography, including understaffing of Czechoslovak ethnography due to limitations of university policy at Czechoslovak universities in Prague, Brno and Bratislava. The article presents an analysis of institutional and academic foundation of ethnography after the closing of Czech universities on 17 November 1939. It describes both the conceptual and personnel continuity of care for regional cultural heritage in the 1930s. It also touches upon the ambivalent nature of documentary activities of the Ethnographic Commission of the Czech Academy of Sciences and Arts. Alongside with the orientation on general anthropology, including its racial aspects, the activities of Czech ethnographers during the occupation tended to focus on documentation of vernacular architecture. In this regard they also joined forces with architects and urban planners on projects that linked the idea of modernization of the countryside with efforts aimed at preserving its ‘traditional’ character in the spirit of the German Heimatschutzbewegung. This direction, as well as other impulses and motifs from the Protectorate era, were then further developed in the ethnographic ‘revival’ of the second half of the 1940s, which - paradoxically enough - resonated both with ‘new Slavic policy’ after 1945 and, to some extent, even with the subsequent Sovietization of the field.
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A comparison of selected anthropological theories in view of their pragmatic value
Hájek, Daniel ; Vrhel, František (advisor) ; Jakoubek, Marek (referee)
The study deals with the problem of applicability of two anthropological theories, structural functionalism and interpretive anthropology of Clifford Geertz. By applicability is meant what concrete difference using of one or the other theory brings about in ethnography. Each of the theories is at first thoroughly examined with emphasis on its possible aims, assumptions, and consequences for an ethnographer. Then each theory is put to test in examination of one particular ethnography associated with the theory. Evans-Pritchard's The Nuer serves as an instance of structural functionalism. Clifford Geertz's Negara as an example of interpretative analysis. Structural functionalism is shown to provide an ethnographer with a much more definite guidance which contributes to better possibilities of verification and comparability of the results than interpretive anthropology. Apart from the main subject, the study is concerned with more general questions, especially related to non-existence of a paradigm in anthropology and some of its causes.
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Musical aspects of the Living History phenomenon in the Czech historical fencing through the perspective of ethnomusicology
Novák, Josef ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Seidlová, Veronika (referee)
The aim of this musical anthropology thesis focuses on "medieval music" as practiced by fans of historical fencing in the form of living history on the example of two Czech bands - Subulcus and Medieval Open Band as part of project Prácheňská manství. In my thesis I focus not only on sound and musical instruments, but also on the behavior of actors and their conceptualization of the Middle Ages, according to the concepts of music as culture of Allan Merriam, resp. of music as social life of Thomas Turino. I combine here the basic ideas of ethnomusicology with the ideas of musical memory in connection with the contemporary concepts of social memory and, last but not least, with the concepts of "golden age", nostalgia, staged authenticity and invented traditions. The point of this work is to bring about the origin and form of music that the actors understand as medieval, although not always comes the repertoire from the Middle Ages.
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Some aspects of magical thought in children of younger school age
Tanzerová, Adéla ; Doubek, David (advisor) ; Klusák, Miroslav (referee)
Annotation: The subject of this bachelor thesis is magical thinking in children of younger school age. The concept of magical thinking is defined in the theoretical part from the perspective of developmental psychology and culture anthropology, further the concept of magical thinking by Jean Piaget is introduced. His perspective is crucial for this thesis. The main objective of this research, which is based on my own empirical material, is to discover whether magical thinking is still present in the concepts of children of younger school age. Magical thinking (concepts of children) is used in contrast to realistic thinking (concepts of adults). Attention is given to analogical thinking, too. The data were collected by using methods of participant observation and semi-structured interviews. Findings of this research are compared with Piaget's conclusions. The result of this thesis is a characterization of thinking in first-grade pupils, categorization and definition of used principles of thoughts, description of aspects of magical, realistic and analogical thinking. Key words: magical thinking, younger school age, ethnography, children's conceptions of the world
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Symbolization of Adulthood by Girls from Sixth Grade of Elementary School
Kálalová, Jiřina ; Doubek, David (advisor) ; Levínská, Markéta (referee)
The subject of the bachelor's thesis is pubescence of girls at the sixth, later seventh grade of an elementary school. It describes girls' methods, that represent their pubescence by interaction with other people (mainly with teachers and classmates), and symbols, that the girls use to be perceived as adults by other people. This thesis points, that girl's new identity is formed by symbolization of adulthood. This thesis is ethnographic research, author picked data at an elementary school in Prague, between children at the sixth, later seventh grade, for nearly a year. She used qualitative methods: concernedly observation of class and interviews with girls. The text of the thesis is divided into two main parts, theoretical and practical. It contains introduction, resume and summary of used literature. The theoretical part includes findings of developmental and social psychology and ideas of Erving Goffman. The practical part contains a description of ground and observed methods, the girls use to construct their adulthood by interaction with other people. The resume deals with fundamental sense of social construction of dulthood for gradational integrate of girls to the world of adults.
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