CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2025
| Author | Kokhan, Oleksandra |
|---|---|
| Title | Preservation amidst Destruction: Architectural Preservation Activism in Kyiv |
| Summary | In this thesis, I engage with architectural preservation activism regarding the historical center of Kyiv during the third year of the full-scale Russian invasion, 2024. This thesis seeks to explore the strategies of architectural preservation activism in Kyiv historical centre amidst the ongoing destructive war, highlighting the link between private property and heritage. How does preservation happen amidst destruction? Based on three-month fieldwork from July to October 2024 in Kyiv, during which I have done participative ethnography and in-depth interviews with Kyiv architectural preservation activists, I argue that buildings in the historical Kyiv center are preserved not only from the war, but also from developers. Architectural preservation activism can be characterized as the process of negotiation for building ́s preservation through the claim that it should be treated as heritage without abolishing the idea that it is a private property. With this thesis, I aim to contribute to the value anthropology and post-socialist studies by developing the idea of value-making through the construction of private property-heritage axis during war. My findings suggest that architectural preservation activism can be understood as a contestation of the ultimate value that private property has had in post- socialist property regimes and neoliberal tendencies, as war induces a need for an alternative value expressed through heritage. |
| Supervisor | Zentai, Violetta; Bodnár, Judit |
| Department | Sociology MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2025/kokhan_sasha.pdf |
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