First Working Papers published

In the last year the team members presented the project and first results in several workshops. We decided to publish these first accounts in order to inform about our ongoing research project (cf. “Working Paper” in the header).

AnthroLab, 04.02.2010, 18:00

Elke and I, we will present our project and our first findings in the “Marburger AthroLab” in the main seminar room of the Section of Anthropology of our University. Our paper will present mostly our individual research projects, i.e. about the relevance of conceptions of honour in gender relations (Elke) and traditional law in Kvemo Kartli and the reaction of the state (Stéphane). The presentation will start at 18:00 on February, 4th.

Call for Papers: Law in the Caucasus (EASA 2010)

Lavrenti and I organise a workshop at the occasion of the 11th Biennial Conference, Maynooth (Ireland) of the European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA).

Workshop: Law in the Caucasus: anthropological perspectives on legal practice
EASA conference 2010: Crisis and imagination
Maynooth, 24/08/2010 – 27/08/2010

Short Abstract: We invite researchers on law in the Caucasus into our workshop. The focus will be on empirical investigations on contemporary or historic legal practice, i.e. on state law, traditional law, transnational influences on local law, religious law or Soviet legal residues.

Long Abstract: One of the ideas discussed by Bruce Grant and Lale Yalçın-Heckman in Caucasus Paradigms (2007) is the cultural, linguistic, religious, political and economic pluralisms in the region. In these pluralisms one important aspect is missing, namely the multitude of legal conceptions that exist in the Caucasus.
In numerous mountainous regions, traditional law is practiced and sometimes even staged as an intrinsic part of local identity concepts. State law reacts differently to it and is itself often changing and at times used quite arbitrary. State law may also be confronted by legal residues of Soviet times. In some places, where the state is not present or weak, new informal legal structures may emerge and play an important role in daily life. Transnational actors or nongovernmental organisations may enforce with their financial of political power their own procedures (project law) and change local laws. In some regions of the Caucasus, religious groups impose their own conceptions of legal order or try to do so.

In the workshop a decidedly anthropological perspective on law will be presented. The focus will be on empirical research on contemporary or historic legal practice. Studying legal texts is only one side of the medal; the other is examining law in practice, e.g. the enumerated rules and processes provided in interviews have to be confronted with how law is used. The workshop is about law in practice in the Caucasus as it is affected by power relations, cliental networks, ethnicity, religion or transnational influences.

To propose a paper follow this link. Please note, that a contributers must be members of EASA or apply for membership. See here for the list of all workshops.

Conference of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Völkerkunde in Frankfurt (Main)

From September 30 to October 4 took place the biannual conference of German Anthropological Association. The topic of the conference was “Cultural Appropriation: Assimilation – Adaptation – Camouflage” and I like a lot the plenary sessions. Numerous speeches were apparently especially designed to encourage in-depth studies of the conference program while listening …

In the beginning I was suppose to present two papers but, unfortunately, both workshops took place at the same time. I spoke on Aufführungen traditioneller Ordnungen in Albanien und Georgien in the workshop “Kontakt- und Bruchzonen in Landschaften des Mittelmeerraums” (convenors: M. Schäuble and M. Zillinger). After this workshop its participants launched a new workgroup “Regionalgruppe Mittelmeerraum” (members are here e.g. Thomas Hauschild, Dieter Haller, Gisela Welz, Lale Yalçın-Heckmann, Christian Giordano etc.).

The workgroup “Sozialanthropologie Europas” also came together. Some people here thought that with the above mentioned new workgroup (Mittelmeerraum) the continuation of the workgroup would be difficult. We decided, that we will try to “relaunch” the workgroup. We first changed our workgroup name to “Regionalgruppe Europa” (what was later in the evening accepted by the general assembly of the DGV). Then Tatjana Thelen (Zürich/Halle) and I were elected as new speakers. We will try to organise a little conference next year on a topic that still has to be discussed.

Back in Marburg and preparations for the winter term lectures

On September 26 we were back in Marburg after three extraordinary months in Georgia. We have to thank our Georgian colleagues Natia and Lavrenti for making our journey so pleasant. In the next six months we will work on our material. But we also have lectures (in German “Seminare”) to prepare for he winter term.

My French colleague Bernard Poulelaouen (he would say that he is Breton, not French …) and I, we give a seminar on “Musical anthropology in the Republic of Georgia”. Bernard is the director of the Centre du Patrimoine de la Facture Instrumentale (CPFI) in Le Mans (France). Since a couple of years he is living in Marburg and gives lectures on musical anthropology and identity, mainly on the Baltic regions and in Hungary. Because of my ongoing project in Georgia we planned to work together on traditional music in Georgia. In a two semester seminar we will give an introduction into Georgian traditional music and its contemporary relevance (first and second year students). A highlight of the seminar will be a ten days excursion of the participants to Tbilisi next April. There we will work together with the International Research Center for Traditional Polyphony of Tbilisi State Conservatory.

Urban Spaces: Caucasian Places

In the last week of my stay in Georgia I could attend the workshop „Urban Spaces: Caucasian Places: Transformations in Capital Cities“. The workshop was organised by Madlen Pilz, Tsypylma Darieva (Humboldt University Berlin) and Ketevan Khutsishvili (Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University). Researchers from Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Russia, USA or Germany presented their research and discussed if a there is a post-socialist city. The papers (program) provided very interesting insights in ongoing ethnographic works. One of the papers was also touching legal anthropology: Eugenia Zakharova (St. Petersburg) talked „Street Corner Life. Ubani and Urban Neighborhoods in Tbilisi” which are regulated by informal legal norms of the street. (The German anthropologist Jan Koehler studied also this topic several years ago.). Unfortunately some presentations stayed at the level of pure ethnography, leaving theoretical discussions aside.

The workshop was also a very pleasant getting together of researchers working in the Caucasus. I want to thank Madlen, Tsypylma and Keti for organizing this conference and for inviting me.

Project Workshop

Elke is presenting her paper to the Georgian anthropologists

Today took place our first workshop with Georgian anthropologists in Tbilisi. We, i.e. all four team members, presented their first findings (I hope, that we publish parts of the presented paper at this place soon). For us, the German team members, it was very interesting to experience the very animated Georgian form of discussing our topic. The Georgian colleagues criticized and praised our research project, mostly all in one sentence. Numerous mentioned points were very interesting and will be taken into consideration. Most interesting was that we managed to bring together anthropologists from different institutions which, unfortunately, communicate one rarely each other. After the end of the four hour workshop we all went together to a restaurant near to the lake Kustba for large supra.

Koshki and Kulla

A part of the village Mulachi in Svaneti, near Mestia

Since three months I am in Georgia, but I never saw so many tourists in one place like in Svaneti (except perhaps during my short trip to the Black Sea). The road to Mestia is really long and not so easy. There are no planes flying. But still so many people come here. I have to admit that Svaneti is (and we only saw some very little part of it) a fantastic place. The towers (koshki) remind me of the towers (kulla) I saw in Albania. The towers there are larger and not that many are remaining. The Albanian towers are also more dispersed in the mountains. But the towers in Albania and in Svaneti were both constructed to protect the families from blood feud. From the Svan towers they also they, that they were build to protect oneself from the difficult climatic conditions. The koshki would resist avalanches.

Interviews in Svaneti

Lavrenti in an interview in Mulakhi

Of course, we made some tourist excursions but we also, with the help of our Svan colleague Khatuna Iossiliani, talked to people on local traditional law and made interesting interviews. Svaneti is not our target region, but as we study among Svans in Kvemo Karli, small researchers in the highlands are necessary. For next year, Lavrenti and I plan to stay some days more in the region.

We stayed in the village of Mulakhi, around 12 km from Mestia. Our host explained Lavrenti the village structure and the families names living there. We got interesting insights in recent blood feuds or “traditional” investigations of a case, in which some men did steal money from tourists. The police persecuted innocent people and only the local population did finally find the real thieves (… this is at least that what the Svan say).

Difficult trip to Svaneti

Reparing the v-belt in Svaneti

As some of our team members do research among Svans migrated from the highlands we thought that it would be useful to pay a short visit to Svaneti. From September 11-14 we were with the Svans. The road was difficult because the minibus we hired lost its cooling water. Our driver had to refill it every 30 minutes. Then, around 30 km before the Svan capital Mestia, the v-belt burst and we had to wait some time in the middle of the mountains for help. The family of our Svan driver provided help and after around 15 hours we finally did arrive our destination. Two days later we were trying to get to Ushguli. Again, we had a problem with the minibus. This time one shock absorber broke.