Published: 2019-12-31

Taming a street. From the ethnographic field research at Wschodnia Street

Grażyna Ewa Karpińska
Journal of Urban Ethnology
Section: Articles
DOI https://doi.org/10.23858/JUE17.2019.003

Abstract

The article describes the practices aimed at developing a sense of settlement at a street and the methods by
which concrete persons and communities imbue the physical entity of a street with a value and a symbolic meaning. The analysis is based on materials collected among the owners of craftsman’s workshops located
along one of the streets in the city of Łódź, namely Wschodnia Street. The street was laid out in the early 19th century, concurrently with the development of Łódź as an industrial town; by the outbreak of the 1st World War it had been filled with low-standard tenements containing rented lodgings on the upper levels and retail space on the ground floor. At the turn of the 19th century it was already a street of merchants and craftsmen, and it retained this outlook until the end of the 20th century. Today, it lies within an old, dilapidated and decaying area of Łódź, its residents are impecunious and the shops are closing.

Keywords:

a sense of settlement at a street, spatial practices, a locus, Wschodnia Street, Łódź

Citation rules

Karpińska, G. (2019). Taming a street. From the ethnographic field research at Wschodnia Street. Journal of Urban Ethnology, 17, 47–61. https://doi.org/10.23858/JUE17.2019.003

Cited by / Share


This website uses cookies for proper operation, in order to use the portal fully you must accept cookies.