berghahn New York · Oxford

Contents

List of Figures

Introduction: For an Ethnographic Microhistory through Ruins
Chiara Calzana and Valentina Gamberi

Part I: Ethnographic Lenses for Ruination

Chapter 1. A Landscape of Failures: The Historical Ecology of Ruins in the Po River Delta
Francesco Danesi Della Sala

Chapter 2. From Desire to Avoidance: Contrasting Interactions with the Rubble of Familiar Spaces Affected by an Earthquake and a Planned Flood (China)
Katiana Le Mentec

Part II: Hauntings

Chapter 3. A Scattered Self: Composing Subjectivities through Ruined Houses (Taiwan)
Valentina Gamberi

Chapter 4. Contested Memoryscapes: Post-Disaster Ruins and Memorial Practices in the Vajont Valley (Italy)
Chiara Calzana

Chapter 5. Ruins of Remains: Unpacking Narratives about a Cemetery of ‘Political Victims’
Fang-I Chu

Part III: Curating Ruins

Chapter 6. Ruins in the Forest: Conserving, Abandoning and Feeling Heritage in the Marquesas Islands (French Polynesia)
Giacomo Nerici

Chapter 7. Soba Past versus Soba Present: Ethnography of Soba Archeological Site (Sudan)
Marciej Kurcz

Afterword: The Only Real Nation Is Ruination
Francisco Martinez

Index

Haunting Ruins

Ethnographies of Ruination and Decay

Edited by Valentina Gamberi and Chiara Calzana

Afterword by Francisco Martinez

216 pages, 17 ills., bibliog., index

ISBN 978-1-80539-885-1 Hb Published (March 2025)

eISBN 978-1-80539-886-8 eBook

Details

“From a conceptual, argumentative and methodological point of view, the book is effective and rigorous. It is a well-developed volume which will be of interest to a wide audience.” • Giacomo Pozzi, IULM University

Ruins, rubble and decaying material can foster a more layered theory of time, change and memory. The seven ethnographic case studies in Haunting Ruins trace human engagements with the temporal forces of ruins, which can trace the past and transform the present. Conjuring environmental humanities, the anthropology of history, memory and archaeology, this book delves into the complex influence of the past on the present and the future and urges scholars to consider ruins as things to think with.

Valentina Gamberi is a MSCA-CZ fellow at Palacký University Olomouc (UPOL). Previously, she held positions as an adjunct lecturer (University of Bologna, 2022–2023) and a research fellow (Research Centre for Material Culture in Leiden, 2021–2022 and the Institute of Ethnology of Academia Sinica, 2019–2020). Her most recent publication in English is Experiencing Materiality: Museum Perspectives (Berghahn, 2021).

Chiara Calzana is a research fellow at the University of Turin and an adjunct lecturer at the University of Milano-Bicocca. She is currently a member of the research team of the ERC Project ‘The World Behind a Word: An Anthropological Exploration of Fascist Practices and Meanings among European Youth (F-WORD)’.

Series: Volume 16, Material Mediations: People and Things in a World of Movement

Subject: Anthropology (General) Archaeology

Area:

LC: CC75 .H38 2025

BISAC: SOC002010 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Anthropology/Cultural & Social; SOC003000 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Archaeology; HIS039000 HISTORY/Civilization