Torsello, Davide - Pappová, Melinda: Social Networks in Movement. Time, interaction and interethnic spaces in Central Eastern Europe - Nostra Tempora 8. (Somorja-Dunaszerdahely, 2003)
Time and social networks
46 Árendás Zsuzsanna individual integration as it happened in Hird, and so on. Nevertheless, answering such questions is beyond the scope of this study. My intention was merely to grasp one aspect of this rather complex ethnic and kinship setting, from an insider point of view of the resettled Hungarians in Hird. From this position I proceeded further, moving “outwards”, widening the scope of research along their ethnic and neighbourhoodbased ties. The analysis is based on their narratives and interpretations, taking their angle of perspective - thus it is far from being “objective”. During the writing process, when describing their multiple identity-formation processes I added my own thoughts, interpretations, and observations to the text. Approaches of group, identity, and memory The aim of the this theoretical part is to find answers to questions like what makes the topic of ethnic identity and belonging so actual in our present days, why it is the focus of both the public and scientific interest; in what sense it is reasonable to speak about cultural and/or ethnic identity; what these terms actually mean; how their semantics changed in the ethnological and anthropological discourses of the last decades. Most present-day social sciences agree upon a general definition of personal and social identity saying that it is a collection of personal experiences and social practices. The aim of this research is to find answers to how and under what circumstances these social practices are experienced; how people define themselves and others. Identity and social representations are inseparable; they are social creations thus collective constructions. The notion of “identity” in the social sciences does not represent a neutral equality as e.g. in the fields of natural sciences. It is a more positioned, relative phenomena. Since the 1960s “identity” has become a widespread term, based on E. Erikson’s "health model”. Erikson described a social-psychological construction where the origins, the "roots” play the
