‘Staged Nostalgia’: Negotiating Identity through Encounters with the Landscapes of Conflict in Cyprus
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Georgiou, Pauline. 2019. ‘Staged Nostalgia’: Negotiating Identity through Encounters with the Landscapes of Conflict in Cyprus. Doctoral thesis, Goldsmiths, University of London [Thesis]
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Text (‘Staged Nostalgia’: Negotiating Identity through Encounters with the Landscapes of Conflict in Cyprus)
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Abstract or Description
The thesis is an ethnography of modern day Greek Cypriot society and the struggle to establish identity and belonging through encounters with the landscape. It contributes to the anthropological literature on Cyprus and on wider literature on heritage, tourism and borders. The historical conflict that has left Cyprus divided for 44 years becomes the basis for an identity crisis which is then fuelled by internal conflicts based on perceptual dichotomies and divisions. Collectiveness is achieved through socializing mechanisms and recitals such as the proposed ‘staged nostalgia’ which involves the public and collective performance of patriotism, mourning, victimization and nostalgia. This public and private distinction and the performance of ‘staged nostalgia’ resonates throughout the thesis as encounters with the landscape shape perceptions of identity. Chapter Two introduces Greek Cypriot identities as ‘products of conflict’, covering the historical, social and politico-economic context of the suggested identity crisis. Then, four chapters approach the questions through a focus on the physical landscape and interactions with it during fieldwork. First, the contested border becomes the edge upon which identity negotiations take place. The division of the physical landscape reflects the social divisions and as the border becomes penetrable new perceptions and challenges are formed. Then, interactions with the physical landscape of loss and decay challenge notions of temporality and monumentalization. The heritage landscape becomes a space of further contestation as multiple narratives compete for legitimization. Internationalist and nationalist heritage regimes attempt to establish narratives of heritage as top-down impositions onto the landscape. At the same time, local voices and memories are lost in time and selective histories are passed on. Parallel to this, tourism spaces become opportunities for public display and consumption of the contested ‘self’ where contradicting notions such as ‘modernity’ and ‘tradition’ compete. While individuals express their struggle to conceptualize their personal relationship with identity, ‘staged nostalgia’ takes over in the public sphere to display a very particular socio-political existence.
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Item Type: |
Thesis (Doctoral) |
| Identification Number (DOI): |
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| Keywords: |
Anthropology, Landscape, Tourism, Heritage, Borders, Urban, Conflict, Identity |
| Departments, Centres and Research Units: |
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| Date: |
31 August 2019 |
| Item ID: |
26977 |
| Date Deposited: |
19 Sep 2019 12:05 |
| Last Modified: |
07 Sep 2022 17:15 |
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URI: |
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