XXII Seminarium Migracyjne: "Tourism Longing and Sehnsuchtsorte of Central and Eastern European Societies"

Dr Hannah Wadle jest adiunktem w Instytucie Etnologii i Antropologii Kulturowej na Uniwersytecie im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu. Studiowała etnologię i historię na Uniwersytecie im. Alberta Ludwiga Freiburgu Bryzgowijskim, stopień doktora antropologii społecznej otrzymała na Uniwersytecie w Manchesterze za pracę o relacjach turystycznych na Mazurach. Jej publikacje dotyczą antropologii turystyki, dziedzictwa, architektury i emocji, i także metodologii etnograficznej. Jest także działaczką kultury, m.im. dyrektorką festiwalu Stn:ort na Mazurach.

OPIS wykładu:

In this presentation, I propose the concept of tourism sehnsuchtsorte, tourism places of longing. Since Svetlana Boym’s seminal work “The Future of Nostalgia” (2001) nostalgic longing has gained more and more attention also in Anthropology. The introduced concepts of longing and tourism sehnsuchtsorte include nostalgia, but are not limited to it, allowing for a variety and complexity of longings to be explored alongside one another. I suggest this as an angle that helps us frame and explore ambivalent, transforming mobilities between migration and tourism. It also draws our attention to multiple and competing longings in historically contested settings.

I will be referring to our recently published book project “Eden für jeden. Sehnsuchtsorte in Mittel-und Osteuropa von 1945 bis zur Gegenwart” (ed. B. Hoenig, H. Wadle, 2019). Through the lens of tourism sehnsuchtsorte the authors of this publication explore tourism movements that are shaped by ideological controversies, transnational political tensions and sociocultural change in Central and Eastern Europe since 1945. They discuss among others the longing of Soviet tourists for the USA, the changeable construction of the Tatra as a place of longing in socialist Poland, the contrasting local and tourism narratives of (be)longing to in Usti nad Labem after 1945, but the literatures of utopia and dystopia about the Crimea, and the touristic rediscovery of socialist modernist tourism architectures. Through the book, we suggest that the conceptual framework of tourism places of longing helps us to accommodate the grey zones between migration and tourism, to move beyond the East-West paradigm, and to include both subversive and affirmative currents in authoritarian and post-authoritarian societies.

In my presentation, I argue that telling discourses and practices of different forms of longing allows us to narrate alternative, emotionally complex, transnational processes of place-making. I suggest that they make visible undercurrents, counter-narratives, and subversive stories as much as they are able to unpack hegemonic politics of emotion and imperial sentiments. As our project developed from an interdisciplinary conversation, I will be glad to discuss how to sharpen the debate for an anthropological research trajectory.

Polecana literatura:

Agata Bachórz: Polish Tourists in Russia: Longing for the Past, for the Place, or for an Alternative Version of Identity? in: Eden für jeden? Sehnsuchtsorte in Mittel-und Osteuropa von 1945 bis zur Gegenwart, ed. by Bianca Hoenig and Hannah Wadle, Göttingen 2019, pp. 309-324.

Soliman Lawrence with introduction by Erica Lehrer: Fotoessay : A Single Point Perspective. Revival of Jewish Life in Today’s Poland. In: Eden für jeden? Sehnsuchtsorte in Mittel-und Osteuropa von 1945 bis zur Gegenwart, ed. by Bianca Hoenig and Hannah Wadle, Göttingen 2019, pp.113-124.

Sune Bechmann Pedersen: A Paradise behind the Curtain: Selling Eastern Escapes to Scandinavians, in: Eden für jeden? Sehnsuchtsorte in Mittel-und Osteuropa von 1945 bis zur Gegenwart, ed. by Bianca Hoenig and Hannah Wadle, Göttingen 2019, pp. 227-252.

Eden für jeden? Sehnsuchtsorte in Mittel-und Osteuropa von 1945 bis zur Gegenwart, ed. by Bianca Hoenig and Hannah Wadle, Göttingen 2019.