SESSION 3

3. November 3, 2011 – Negotiating Capitalism in East-Central Europe


Wild East: Global Capitalism in East-Central Europe (Lecture and Discussion, 14.30–16.00)

Privatization, Consumerism, and the Discourse on Normality (Discussion, 16.15–17.45)

Trajectories of Social and Cultural Change after 1989 (Lecture, 18.00–19.00)


* Konstantinov, Yulian, Gideon M. Kressel, and Trond Thuen (1998) Outclassed by Former Outcasts:
Petty Trading in Varna. American Ethnologist, Vol. 25, No. 4. (Nov. 1998), 729–745. (BG)

* Fehérváry, Krisztina (2002) American Kitchens, Luxury Bathrooms, and the Search for a ‘Normal’
Life in Post-Socialist Hungary. Ethnos, Vol. 67, No. 3, 369–400. (HU)

* Dunn, Elizabeth (1999) Slick Salesmen and Simple People: Negotiated Capitalism in a Privatized
Polish Firm. In Michael Burawoy and Katherine Verdery, eds., Uncertain Transition: Ethnographies of
Change in the Postsocialist World (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield), 125–150. (PL)

* Verdery, Katherine (1999) Fuzzy Property: Rights, Power and Identity in Transylvania’s
Decollectivization. In Michael Burawoy and Katherine Verdery, eds., Uncertain Transition:
Ethnographies of Change in the Postsocialist World (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield), 53–81. (RO)

* Berdahl, Daphne (2001) “Go, Trabi, Go!”: Reflections on a Car and Its Symbolization over Time.
Anthropology and Humanism, Vol. 25, No. 2, 131–141. (D)

* Galbraith, Marysia H. (2003) ‘We Just Want To Live Normally’: Intersecting Discourses of Public,
Private, Poland, and the West. Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Europe, Vol. 3, No.
1, 2–13. (PL)

* Harper, Krista (2005) “Wild Capitalism” and “Ecocolonialism”: A Tale of Two Rivers. American
Anthropologist, Vol. 107, No. 2. (Jun. 2005), 221–233. (HU)

* Friedman, Jack R. (2007) Shame and the Experience of Ambivalence on the Margins of the Global:
Pathologizing the Past and Present in Romania’s Industrial Wastelands. Ethos, Vol.35, No.2,
235–264. (RO)

* Kalb, Don (2009) Conversations with a Polish Populist: Tracing Hidden Histories of Globalization,
Class, and Dispossession in Postsocialism (and Beyond). American Ethnologist, Vol. 36, No. 2 (May
2009), 207–223. (PL)



Readings marked with a plus sign (+) are required readings for all students (9 readings).

Readings marked with an asterisk (*) may be chosen for class presentation (22 readings).