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The current issue of the Journal of Ethnography deals with two topics: the environmental urban research, and the birth of three ethnographic regions of Moravia.
Alexandra Bitušíková offers in her study a comprehensive view on the questions of the urban anthropology (The Urban Anthropology: yes or no? Theoretical questions concerning the development of the urban anthropology). Zdeněk Uherek presents specific studies of the urban history using an example of a newly built Postdam Square in Berlin (The Symbolic Meanings in an Urban Environment: Berlin). Karel Altman deals with interhuman and intergroup relations within a big city (Exploring How the Brno Inhabitants Gather). Pavla Stöhrová is interested in the urban environment as well (The Seven Roaches House: A Preliminary Report on the Research of Urban Housing). Peter Michalovič focuses on folk music traditions in a small town (The Town Environment: the Place of the Decline and/or Revitalization of Folk Music).
Richard Jeřábek presents in his study an outline of the historical formation of three ethnographic regions of Moravia (Zálesí - Kopanice - Horňácko of the 18th and 19th Centuries; Focusing on Terminology). Dagmar Pintířová focuses in her specific ethnographic study on folk magic (The Godesses of Žitková).
The photo supplement brings the work of a Brno photographer Jan Beran (born 1913). The Tradition Transformation column deals with a rediscovery of a traditional hand technique: tinkerware. The next entry is a contribution on the cultural and historical activities of the contemporary village. The Social Chronicle remembers the birthdays of the Slovak folklorist Marta Šrámková (b. 1935), the dance folklorist Barbora Čumpelíková (b. 1930), the ethnographer Zdeněk Mišurec (b. 1925), the folk singer Luboš Holý (b. 1930), and the ethnomusicologist Olga Hrabalová (b. 1930). Other regular columns deal with conference and exhibition news, festivals, concerts, and CD and book reviews.
The double issue of Národopisná revue (Journal of Ethnography) 1-2/ 2000 deals with folk spiritual culture and the questions of methodology used in ethnological research. The first topic is introduced by a theoretical paper by Richard Jeřábek (The Material, Spiritual and Social Culture - an antiquated trichotomy) which explains the contents of individual issues and sets the position of oral culture in the ethnographic terminology of various European countries. The next study in interpretation is by the Slovak religionist Milan Kováč. It deals with the evaluation of folk beliefs in the area of the White Carpathians. In her article, Alexandra Navrátilová explains, using Czech material, the ritual meaning of attending a burial ceremony. A study by the Polish ethnologist Piotr Kowalski is called Polish Yeoman Literature as a Source of Learning 17th Century Folk Culture. It brings a wide picture of the thinking and mentality of the period. The next two articles deal with questions of methodology. Jana Nosková analyses narrative methods in contemporary ethnology, and Jiří Pátek approaches the method of the e-mail interview, using as an example his research on Czech migration to the USA.
The Tradition Transformation column deals with contemporary pilgrimage tradition in the little town of Doubravník in western Moravia. The Looking Back column recalls the outstanding Moravian cymbalom player Antoš Frolka. The Social Chronicle column includes the obituary of Vladimír Pokora (1928-1999), an important organizer of the folkloric movement in Moravia. It also deals with the anniversaries of the birth of Jozef Melicher (1929), a representative of Slovak literary folklorism, and Kliment Ondrejka (1929), an ethnographer and foremost Slovak ethnochoreologist (included is a selective bibliography), Zdenka Jelínková (1920), a founder of modern Moravian ethnochoreology, and Jan Čumpelík (1925), a dance pedagogue and folk dance choreographer. Regular columns follow, bringing information about folklore festivals and concerts, ethnographic conferences, exhibitions and publishing efforts. The irregular column Lost and Found features an article by Richard Jeřábek. The author points out the manipulation of photo documents which occurred in the body of work of ethnographer Antonín Václavík. The final pages of the journal bring a list of books and magazines which the library of the Institute of Folk Culture in Strážnice gained in 1999.
