Common European Heritage
Proposed Workshop:
Common European Heritage: Museums, Borders, Intercultural Understanding and
Increasing Communication Between Border Communities
Village of Tsamantas, Thesprotia, Epirus
Greece (15-16 September 2005)
The European Regional Studies and Ethnology units of the Centre for European Studies
(CES) at the University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol wishes to establish
a forum for exchanging ideas and to create a cooperation network for exploring the
use of museums in border areas for the promotion of cultural understanding. The
aim is to organise a roundtable workshop, building on the CES on-going activities
on the socio-economic evolution of regional agglomerations at the micro level (Dimitrios
Konstadakopulos), European ethnology and cultural policy (Sarah Blowen and Ullrich
Kockel), European culture project management (Alan Kilday), and cross-border co-operation
(Ann Kennard).).
The workshop will be designed to facilitate dialogue and understanding around specific
cultural aspects of economic regeneration policies for border areas within a broader
social, economic, political and cultural context. The main aims of the workshop
are to:
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This dialogue will therefore include experts on local/regional development and museum
development. The small, distinguished group will comprise museum staff, policymakers,
cultural development specialists, European and American scholars, journalists and
local administrators including officials from neighbouring south Albania. Among
these will be Hugues de Varine, an internationally-respected curator, writer and
cultural administrator who now runs ASDIC conseils et services en developpement
local, France; representatives from museums which work in cross border settings
including the Mus?e sans Fronti?res network on the Franco- German border; the Frauenau
Glass museum on the borders of Germany and the Czech republic; and Soterios Zoulas,
associate professor in communications and chair of the Communication Arts Department
of the Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy, Massachusetts.
The workshop (15-20 participants) will be organised jointly by the CES with the
support of the Municipality of Filiates, the Community of Tsamantas, the St. George’s
Hellenic Benefit Society of Tsamantas Inc. (Worcester, MA) and the Folklore Museum
of Tsamantas (and with collaboration with the Universities of Ioannina and/or Aegean).
The main two day sessions will take place in the grounds of the Folklore Museum
of Tsamantas in September 2005.
Background
At a time of opening of borders throughout Europe, and given the future extension
of Europe’s external boundaries, many political, economic and cultural changes are
set to affect the societies and communities living in border areas. Often this has
led to conflict when, for example, cheap labour is “imported” from one side of a
former closed border to the other. These current tensions and preoccupations often
occur despite the fact that communities on both side of the border share a common
heritage of tradition and pattern of everyday life, or indeed come from the same
people group. Age-old communalities have disappeared under the weight of divided
histories, political propaganda or collective forgetting.
Cultural institutions have become central to economic development in many regions
where tourism is increasingly replacing industrial or agricultural activity. Often
the economic benefits of exploiting the local or regional cultural heritage have
been brought to the fore in such development, which, in some cases, has only served
to exacerbate pre-existing cross-border tensions or rivalries.
Museums are cultural institutions which increasingly have a remit to explain and
communicate not only the past, but also the present and the future. They are therefore
ideally placed to promote cultural understanding: not only through their displays,
but also through their management style, theoretical underpinning and finance and
administration.
It is against such a backdrop that this workshop hopes to work with the Greek village
community of Tsamantas to explore the role for their museum in the future development
of the region. The village of Tsamantas is situated on the Greek-Albanian border
in the mountainous region of Epirus, in the prefecture of Thesprotia, Greece, and
in many ways its history is that of the Balkans, but also of Europe as well. Inaccessibility
has been a factor in the creation of the village’s micro-economy, which is based
around its ethnic grouping. Its remoteness has also helped it preserve its strong
cultural identity to the present day.
Epirus has the unenviable task of being at the bottom of European Union regions’
ranking, delaying the region’s integration into the European economy. Nevertheless,
the fall of communism, and the transition to democracy and free market capitalism
of neighbouring Albanian in the 1990s, has created waves of inward migration to
the region as in the rest of Greece which is creating a new set of problems. The
increased migration of labour from neighbouring Albania to Epirus in general and
in the prefecture of Thesprotia in particular, is creating new and changing labour
hierarchies that undermine the integration of the region into the nation-state configuration.
The Albanian workers that fill the unskilled positions in the agricultural and service
sectors in Epirus and in the rest of Greece, send their remittances back to Albania
that has helped that country’s balance of payment and has averted economic collapse.
In turn, the regional economy of Epirus is improving by drawing from the neighbouring
local population of cheap labour. It is also integrating with the rest of the Balkans
and this is reinforced by the process of modernisation that takes place in the wider
regions as well as by capitalist expansion in the form of cross-border investment.
It can be seen that, in the early years of the 21st century, the old historical
circumstances and transnational processes are shaping the political economy of South-eastern
Europe in general, and that of Epirus in particular, in a dramatic way. After decades
of separation these mountain communities on both sides of the border are having
to deal with new realities which bring the possibility of closer contact but also
conflict and rivalry. There is therefore a need for a more detailed study on the
regional and micro level perspective that could reveal the emerging social, cultural
and economic relations necessary for building a bigger picture on the economic trajectory
of Southeast Europe.
The Folklore Museum of Tsamantas
http://www.uwe.ac.uk/hlss/languages/research/staff/dk/intro.html
http://www.tsamantas.com
The museum was established in 1983 by the folklorist, writer and poet Kostas Zoulas
(winner of an Athens Academy award). It contains a collection of traditional tools,
instruments, costumes, documents and other items used by the villagers. The museum
is housed within a traditional building that was once the village’s primary school.
The museum plays an important role in relation to maintaining, preserving and promoting
folkloric traditions and culture. It has also developed an educational role, providing
students, researchers and scholars with a valuable insight into the evolution of
the region’s cultural heritage. It has contributed to many national and international
exhibitions, seminars and other cultural events, thereby promoting its rich legacy.
Constitutionally, the museum is a non-profit-making organisation (recognised as
a museum by the Greek Ministry of Culture). However, the Ministry’s funding meets
only a very small part of its needs. This lack of resources as well as expertise
has also constrained promotion of the museum and precluded its further development.
Nevertheless, the Cultural Association of Tsamantas has created a website and is
establishing, through the Internet, links with village’s diasporic community in
Greece, rest of Europe, United States (Worcester Mass) and Australia (Melbourne).
Any financial support for realising this round table workshop would be valuable
and timely.
This proposal was prepared by Dimitrios Konstadakopulos and Sarah Blowen of CES,
University of the West of England, Bristol.
