Adriana Teodorescu, Roxana Varian, Cimitirul ca un câmp de luptă. Studiu de caz asupra cimitirului Hajongard din Cluj-Napoca
The Cemetery as a Battlefield. A Case Study upon the Hajongard Cemetery from Cluj-Napoca
Within the majority of Romanian communities the cemetery is considered a space of undisputable sacredness, being socially represented in almost exclusive idyllic colors as a place governed by the rule of social equality. There is a strong tendency to imagine that after death all people share the same terrestrial space and the same symbolic space – eternal life – regardless of the social status during their lifetime. The intention of our study is to dismantle this stereotypical idea. The paper discusses the data obtained from a research upon the Hajongard cemetery from Cluj-Napoca, where we have undertaken repeated observations and informal interviews. We are to present the cemetery as a socio-cultural non-homogenous space in which the social struggle from the daily life is duplicated in various forms.
Keywords: cemetery, Hajongard, social inequality, battlefield
- Baumeister, Robert F., Sensuri ale vieţii (Meanings of Life), ASCR, Cluj-Napoca, 2011
- Bennet, Diane O., Burry Me in Second Class: Contested Symbols in a Greek Cemetery, in Anthropological Quarterly, The George Washington University Institute for Ethnographic Research, 1994, pp.122-134 Bodea, I. Gheorghe, Clujul vechi si nou (Old and New Cluj), PROF
- Image, Cluj-Napoca, 2002
- Douglas, Mary, Purity and Danger. An Analysis of Concept of Pollution and Taboo, Routledge, London and New York, 2002 [1966]
- Goffman, Erving, Viaţa cotidiană ca spectacol (The Presentation of Self), Comunicare.ro, Bucureşti, 2003 [1959]
- Pascu, Ştefan, Istoria Clujului (The History of Cluj), Consiliul Popular al Municipiului Cluj, Cluj-Napoca, 1974
- Rotar, Marius, Eternitate prin cenuşă: O istorie a crematoriilor şi incinerărilor umane în România secolelor XIX-XXI (Eternity through Ashes. A History of Crematoria and Human Cremation in XIX-XX Century Romania), Institutul European, Iaşi, 2011
- Rugg, Julie, Defining the place of burial: what makes a cemetery a cemetery, Routledge, London, 2000
- Sahlins, Marshall, Islands of History, University of Chicago Press, Illinois, 1985
- Sloane, David Charles, The Last Great Necessity: Cemeteries in American History, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991
- Simmel, Georg, La tragédie de la culture et culture et autres essais, Rivages-Poche, Paris, 1988
- Warner, W. Lloyd, The living and the dead: a study of the symbolic life of Americans, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1959
- Ziegler, Jean, Les vivants et la mort, Seuil, Paris, 1975 http://ziuadecj.realitatea.net/eveniment/scandal-in-hajongard-68559.html, last consulted on 29.01.2014
