Contentious Spaces

Maja Babić is an architectural historian. She is Assistant Professor of History and Theory of Architecture and Urbanism at the University of Groningen.Tino Mager is Associate Professor of History and Theory of Architecture and Urbanism at the University of Groningen and President of ICOMOS Germany.

An exciting study which draws on broad theoretical frameworks of urban and architectural heritage following the end of state socialism in Europe. Suggested by its title, Contentious Spaces, this compelling volume captures the multifaceted discourses and rhetorics of urban identity in former socialist states. Through individual chapters that skillfully bring together different intellectual traditions, this book offers insights into the narratives of the complex formation of heritage in vibrant post-socialist cities, also tracing the contours of their acceptance. - Jasna Mariotti, Queen’s University Belfast

• The World Without: On Shards and Lost Languages Carmen PopescuChapter 1. The Material Heritage of Socialist Modernism: International Perspectives Maja Babić and Tino MagerPart I: State-Socialist Urban Heritage and IdeologyChapter 2. Artefact or Monument? Afterlives of Socialist Relief Sculpture between Conservation and Repoliticisation Emma Louise LeahyChapter 3. (In)tangible Socialist Heritage of Yugoslav Youth Labour Brigades : Can We Think the (Un)Imaginable? Nikolina BobicChapter 4. Romania’s Heritage of Socialist Sports Buildings: The Case of the Bacău Sports Hall Ruxandra BalcanuChapter 5. Remaking Nature : Environmental and Urban Industrial Development during and after State Socialism, the Case of Industrial Navoi and Aktau (formerly Shevchenko) in the 1960s–2020s Nadezda GobovaPart II: Appropriating State-Socialist Urban HeritageChapter 6. When Does a Space End? Yugoslav Socialist Memorials and the EU ‘Anti-Totalitarian’ Reckoning Tatjana AleksićChapter 7. Above Nostalgia, Beyond Stereotypes : Tourism, Feminism and Activism as Paradigms of Contemporary Revalorisation of Modernist Legacies in Post-Yugoslav Space Jovana JaninovićChapter 8. Beyond the Narrative of the “Wild 1990s” : Cultural and Architectural Legacy of Soviet Industry Polina Gundarina and Marina SapunovaChapter 9. Cafeneaua Guguţă: Heritage and Civic Activism in Chișinău Abigail KarasChapter 10. Breka: Its Potential as an Affordable and Liveable Neighbourhood Elsa Turkusic JuricAbout the Contributors