Torsello, Davide - Pappová, Melinda: Social Networks in Movement. Time, interaction and interethnic spaces in Central Eastern Europe - Nostra Tempora 8. (Somorja-Dunaszerdahely, 2003)
Introduction
28 Davide Torsello and Melinda Pappová tion so to allow liberty of expression in the researchers’ own tongues. The second aim was to provide an occasion for sharing research experiences from academic and non-academic research institutions. The result was extremely positive. Scholars from four Central Eastern European countries (Slovakia, Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovenia), three western European countries (UK, Switzerland and Germany) and the US participated in the event. The intense discussions managed to heat the cool atmosphere of the Galanta’s Renaissance Palace cellar, where the workshop was held. Galanta is a small agrarian town (about 18,000 inhabitants) situated in southwestern Slovakia, about 50 km from Bratislava, 90 km from Vienna and 120 from Budapest. The town is situated in the heart of one of the most fertile regions of the country, where agriculture and light industries were extensively developed during the 1960-1970s. It is also known internationally, thanks to the composer Zoltán Kodály, who spent his childhood in the small town and commemorated those years in his famous composition “Galanta Dance". The town functioned as the operative base of the Forum Institute for Social Research (now moved to Šamorín and renamed Forum Institute for Minority Research). After intense and fruitful colloquia with its director, Károly Tóth, the idea of the workshop took shape and was eventually realised thanks to the Institute’s generous support and collaboration. Social networks in movement The theme around which the workshop gathered its contributions was the analysis of social networks framed within the dynamics of their temporal and spatial mutations. Today social networks have re-acquired analytical importance in the anthropological investigation after the decline of the topic in the past two decades (Giordano, this volume). The main reason for this renewed scholarly interest in patterns of social interaction is that the events that followed the fall of the Berlin Wall have produced dramatic and profound changes
