Tomáš Samek | Charles University, Prague (original) (raw)
Papers by Tomáš Samek
“Cultures in Times of Transition” explores how the transformations of the 1980s and 1990s affecte... more “Cultures in Times of Transition” explores how the transformations of the 1980s and 1990s affected everyday life for citizens on both sides of the Iron Curtain; how ideas of “the other” circulated before and after the fall of the wall; and what a future utopia looked like for citizens of the East. These contributions range from the history of agricultural change, urban studies, linguistics, and legal history. They mirror the broadness of questions concerning the transition, but also hint at the heterochronous nature of those transformations.
The title of the conference refers, first, to the collection of essays What Was Socialism and Wha... more The title of the conference refers, first, to the collection of essays What Was Socialism and What Comes Next (1996) by Katherine Verdery, a seminal book in the anthropology of postsocialism, and second, to the nature and prospects of contemporary capitalism in the context of the present economic and environmental crises. We are calling for a discussion on how the anthropological studies of postsocialism can contribute to the understanding of these crises. We believe capitalism in its various models should not be conceived of and studied only as an economic but also as a political and moral configuration whose specific activities are interlinked with wider social, technological and cultural processes and their particular historical developments. Economic practices are embedded in social spheres such as community, religion, kinship, and science. As many anthropologists have demonstrated, forms of production, distribution, exchange and consumption are not only based on abstract cost-benefit logic but are involved in social ontologies and relations, socio-technical and religious practices, and power configurations. An anthropological analysis of capitalism should therefore focus on the conditions, moral expectations, ideas and actions that depend upon and result in the re/production, distribution, exchange or collapse of various forms of capital. It is not the stability of capitalist systems but their ongoing change in time and space that is at issue. Bearing in mind the empirical grounding of anthropological knowledge, we believe that the debates on post/socialism and post/capitalism in Central and Eastern Europe should contribute to a) discussions about the current global economic and environmental crises as they are understood and manifested in local settings, and b) identification and description of modes of production alternative to those dominating contemporary capitalisms. We believe it is time to put capitalism, particularly as it is manifested in Central and Eastern Europe, under analytic scrutiny, as anthropologists (Verdery, Hann, Humphrey, Yurchak, and others) have done with post/socialism. A key insight from those scholarly discussions was the identification of incoherence and internal tensions within systems and of the role of different forms of resistance at the edges of state socialism. The space opened up by the ongoing economic and environmental crises allows for an examination of the dynamics of contemporary capitalisms at the centre and the margins. The first biennial conference is organized jointly by the Slovak Association of Social Anthropologists (SASA) and the Czech Association for Social Anthropology (CASA). We believe that conferences that bring together these professional anthropological associations offer an excellent opportunity to introduce the discipline to a wider academic public.
Paideia, 2021
The world of emotions is ambivalent. This article distinguishes several levels of that ambivalenc... more The world of emotions is ambivalent. This article distinguishes several levels of that ambivalence, posing a fundamental question about the extent to which contemporary families, schools and society are able to cultivate all aspects of a human being, including his or her emotions and feelings. Do we need to educate our hearts? And how can anthropology be helpful in that endeavour? Also, a new notion of semantic "flavor" is introduced in the article.
In this chapter I propose a new methodological tool for analyzing social and communicative phenom... more In this chapter I propose a new methodological tool for analyzing social and communicative phenomena that I call “a deictic perspective”. Deploying this perspective, the chapter explores various ways in which the notions of “us” has been formed by, and transformed in, the most salient parts of discourse – slogans used in public rallies in two Central European countries in two different times. In late 1989 the West was the much desired Other for many citizens of Czechoslovakia and the German Democratic Republic; at the turn of 2014 and 2015, the West frequently became a rhetoric means by which to protect “us” against the undesired Other, i.e. the (often Muslim) migrants coming from non-European territories – the East and the South. The once cheerful we-want-to-be-part-of-the-West attitude has been, by some people at least, transformed into a much less cheerful we-don’t-want-others-to-be-part-of-the-West. Based on samples of public discourse from Germany and Czech Republic, I argue that the deictic perspective suits to comparing the fine interplay among time, space and social identity. The chapter concludes by emphasizing both similarities and differences in public “we” across time and space within Central Europe, thus documenting the changing – and yet to a certain degree stable – sense(s) of belonging to the West.
Cargo –Journal of Socio-cultural Anhtropology, 2009
Focusing on semantic maps of various world-views, the article examines the ways in which the rela... more Focusing on semantic maps of various world-views, the article examines the ways in which the relationship between ideologies and conceptual hiearchies is reflected in three English-language thesauri: one from the U. S., one British and one from the European Union. Library thesauri present many different terms, organized into conceptual hierarchies clearly showing each term’s relation to other terms as well as the form of semantic relation between them – e.g., synonymy, antonymy and hyponymy. If you look at the ideologically loaded words "man" and "gay" and analyze the semantic image of those words as presented by each of the three thesauri, you find that each thesaurus (re)presents a rather different picture of the world or different ideology. Despite the generally accepted notion that thesauri should be an objective conceptual classification tool used for organizing and ordering knowledge included in libraries and databases, a closer analysis shows the extent to which this notion is an illusion. As with other language products, the thesaurus, too, reflects – and simultaneously contributes to the establishment of – its authors’ biases, thus subliminally influencing every-day users of classification systems. Retrieving information from databases and libraries is everything but an ideologically neutral endeavor. Sexual, gender and other minorities may be affected by those seemingly neutral practices of using linguistic tools for finding information. The question is which of the thesauri is using most inclusive language.
R. Vorlíček: Jak se daří inkluzi u nás a na Slovensku?, 2019
České postoje k inkluzivnímu školství jsou analyzovány jako indikátor vztahu společnosti k liberá... more České postoje k inkluzivnímu školství jsou analyzovány jako indikátor vztahu společnosti k liberální demokracii a právnímu státu. Po představení základní typologie sporů o inkluzi jsou popsány tři paradoxy, jimiž se vyznačuje rozprava o inkluzi probíhající v českém veřejném prostoru. Předmluva ke knize Radka Vorlíčka, která je rozsáhlou etnografií sociální dynamiky inkluze a exkluze v českých a slovenských školách během výuky i mimo ni.
Books by Tomáš Samek
![Research paper thumbnail of Samek, T. Tahle země je naše: Český a německý veřejný prostor v deiktické perspektivě [This Land is Our Land: Czech and German Public Space – a Deictic Perspective.] Úvod [Introduction] & Polarismus [Polarism] – kap. 1 [Chapter 1]. Pardubice: Univerzita Pardubice 2016, pp. 1-36.](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/61020207/thumbnails/1.jpg)
](Tahle země je naše: Český a německý veřejný prostor v deiktické perspektivě [This Land is Our Land: Czech and German Public Space – a Deictic Perspective.], 2016
This is the Introduction and the first Chapter of the monograph "This Land is Our Land: Czech and... more This is the Introduction and the first Chapter of the monograph "This Land is Our Land: Czech and German Public Space – a Deictic Perspective". The Introduction focuses on the contents, topics, structure and methodologies used in the book. The first chapter analyzes the gradient and non-binary nature of grammatical categories such as number and discusses the "polaristic" approach to both linguistic and sociocultural phenomena.
“Cultures in Times of Transition” explores how the transformations of the 1980s and 1990s affecte... more “Cultures in Times of Transition” explores how the transformations of the 1980s and 1990s affected everyday life for citizens on both sides of the Iron Curtain; how ideas of “the other” circulated before and after the fall of the wall; and what a future utopia looked like for citizens of the East. These contributions range from the history of agricultural change, urban studies, linguistics, and legal history. They mirror the broadness of questions concerning the transition, but also hint at the heterochronous nature of those transformations.
The title of the conference refers, first, to the collection of essays What Was Socialism and Wha... more The title of the conference refers, first, to the collection of essays What Was Socialism and What Comes Next (1996) by Katherine Verdery, a seminal book in the anthropology of postsocialism, and second, to the nature and prospects of contemporary capitalism in the context of the present economic and environmental crises. We are calling for a discussion on how the anthropological studies of postsocialism can contribute to the understanding of these crises. We believe capitalism in its various models should not be conceived of and studied only as an economic but also as a political and moral configuration whose specific activities are interlinked with wider social, technological and cultural processes and their particular historical developments. Economic practices are embedded in social spheres such as community, religion, kinship, and science. As many anthropologists have demonstrated, forms of production, distribution, exchange and consumption are not only based on abstract cost-benefit logic but are involved in social ontologies and relations, socio-technical and religious practices, and power configurations. An anthropological analysis of capitalism should therefore focus on the conditions, moral expectations, ideas and actions that depend upon and result in the re/production, distribution, exchange or collapse of various forms of capital. It is not the stability of capitalist systems but their ongoing change in time and space that is at issue. Bearing in mind the empirical grounding of anthropological knowledge, we believe that the debates on post/socialism and post/capitalism in Central and Eastern Europe should contribute to a) discussions about the current global economic and environmental crises as they are understood and manifested in local settings, and b) identification and description of modes of production alternative to those dominating contemporary capitalisms. We believe it is time to put capitalism, particularly as it is manifested in Central and Eastern Europe, under analytic scrutiny, as anthropologists (Verdery, Hann, Humphrey, Yurchak, and others) have done with post/socialism. A key insight from those scholarly discussions was the identification of incoherence and internal tensions within systems and of the role of different forms of resistance at the edges of state socialism. The space opened up by the ongoing economic and environmental crises allows for an examination of the dynamics of contemporary capitalisms at the centre and the margins. The first biennial conference is organized jointly by the Slovak Association of Social Anthropologists (SASA) and the Czech Association for Social Anthropology (CASA). We believe that conferences that bring together these professional anthropological associations offer an excellent opportunity to introduce the discipline to a wider academic public.
Paideia, 2021
The world of emotions is ambivalent. This article distinguishes several levels of that ambivalenc... more The world of emotions is ambivalent. This article distinguishes several levels of that ambivalence, posing a fundamental question about the extent to which contemporary families, schools and society are able to cultivate all aspects of a human being, including his or her emotions and feelings. Do we need to educate our hearts? And how can anthropology be helpful in that endeavour? Also, a new notion of semantic "flavor" is introduced in the article.
In this chapter I propose a new methodological tool for analyzing social and communicative phenom... more In this chapter I propose a new methodological tool for analyzing social and communicative phenomena that I call “a deictic perspective”. Deploying this perspective, the chapter explores various ways in which the notions of “us” has been formed by, and transformed in, the most salient parts of discourse – slogans used in public rallies in two Central European countries in two different times. In late 1989 the West was the much desired Other for many citizens of Czechoslovakia and the German Democratic Republic; at the turn of 2014 and 2015, the West frequently became a rhetoric means by which to protect “us” against the undesired Other, i.e. the (often Muslim) migrants coming from non-European territories – the East and the South. The once cheerful we-want-to-be-part-of-the-West attitude has been, by some people at least, transformed into a much less cheerful we-don’t-want-others-to-be-part-of-the-West. Based on samples of public discourse from Germany and Czech Republic, I argue that the deictic perspective suits to comparing the fine interplay among time, space and social identity. The chapter concludes by emphasizing both similarities and differences in public “we” across time and space within Central Europe, thus documenting the changing – and yet to a certain degree stable – sense(s) of belonging to the West.
Cargo –Journal of Socio-cultural Anhtropology, 2009
Focusing on semantic maps of various world-views, the article examines the ways in which the rela... more Focusing on semantic maps of various world-views, the article examines the ways in which the relationship between ideologies and conceptual hiearchies is reflected in three English-language thesauri: one from the U. S., one British and one from the European Union. Library thesauri present many different terms, organized into conceptual hierarchies clearly showing each term’s relation to other terms as well as the form of semantic relation between them – e.g., synonymy, antonymy and hyponymy. If you look at the ideologically loaded words "man" and "gay" and analyze the semantic image of those words as presented by each of the three thesauri, you find that each thesaurus (re)presents a rather different picture of the world or different ideology. Despite the generally accepted notion that thesauri should be an objective conceptual classification tool used for organizing and ordering knowledge included in libraries and databases, a closer analysis shows the extent to which this notion is an illusion. As with other language products, the thesaurus, too, reflects – and simultaneously contributes to the establishment of – its authors’ biases, thus subliminally influencing every-day users of classification systems. Retrieving information from databases and libraries is everything but an ideologically neutral endeavor. Sexual, gender and other minorities may be affected by those seemingly neutral practices of using linguistic tools for finding information. The question is which of the thesauri is using most inclusive language.
R. Vorlíček: Jak se daří inkluzi u nás a na Slovensku?, 2019
České postoje k inkluzivnímu školství jsou analyzovány jako indikátor vztahu společnosti k liberá... more České postoje k inkluzivnímu školství jsou analyzovány jako indikátor vztahu společnosti k liberální demokracii a právnímu státu. Po představení základní typologie sporů o inkluzi jsou popsány tři paradoxy, jimiž se vyznačuje rozprava o inkluzi probíhající v českém veřejném prostoru. Předmluva ke knize Radka Vorlíčka, která je rozsáhlou etnografií sociální dynamiky inkluze a exkluze v českých a slovenských školách během výuky i mimo ni.
Tahle země je naše: Český a německý veřejný prostor v deiktické perspektivě [This Land is Our Land: Czech and German Public Space – a Deictic Perspective.], 2016
This is the Introduction and the first Chapter of the monograph "This Land is Our Land: Czech and... more This is the Introduction and the first Chapter of the monograph "This Land is Our Land: Czech and German Public Space – a Deictic Perspective". The Introduction focuses on the contents, topics, structure and methodologies used in the book. The first chapter analyzes the gradient and non-binary nature of grammatical categories such as number and discusses the "polaristic" approach to both linguistic and sociocultural phenomena.