Greek Island Cosmos : Kinship and Community in Meganisi

by Just, Roger

• ISBN13: 9780852552681
• ISBN10: 0852552688
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-09-21
• Publisher: James Currey Ltd

Summary

Meganisi is one of the smallest and most remote of the Greek Ionian islands. From another point of view, it is the centre of the world, and its sailors travel literally from China to Peru while its migrants maintain familial connections from Johannesburgto Montreal. This volume reveals the historical dynamism of what appears at first sight to be a forgotten backwater. The villages of Meganisi are also, however, tightly-knit communities, and this detailed ethnographic study explores the basis on which the islanders' solidarity and sense of identity are constructed and reconstructed despite population mobility and economic change; the values, sentiments and structures of kinship and family.

Author Biography

Roger Just is Senior Lecturer in Anthropology at the University of Melbourne

Table of Contents

Illustrations	p. viii
Preface & Acknowledgements	p. x
Introduction	p. 1
Orientations	p. 11
Delineations of History	p. 39
The Advent of Wealth	p. 63
Terms of Kinship	p. 93
Godparenthood	p. 129
The Back-to-Back Community	p. 155
Household & Inheritance	p. 186
Romance & Dowry	p. 217
A Kalos Kosmos	p. 246
Epilogue	p. 255
References Cited	p. 260
Index	p. 272
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