“Excursus on the Stranger” by Georg Simmel is a popular classical sociological text, whereas the stranger as a social type is one of the best known concepts of classical sociology. This paper claims that common sociological interpretations of this concept greatly ignore the context of Simmel’s text and his thoughts, thus missing the essence of his idea. This is due to the fact that Simmel wrote about the stranger in the context of his sociology of space, which is a relatively unknown feature of his thought. We discuss significant features of Simmel’s sociology of space, and present a reconceptualization of the stranger within this context.
The article discusses cemetery issues as the object of sociological analyses. The necropolis treated as a cultural text carrier may constitute a component that facilitates the interpretation of social vicissitude of surrounding places. The cemetery itself, which brings to mind the palimpsest figure, can be analyzed from many points of view. This article has used the example of three old Katowice necropoles in order to reconstruct on the basis of their functioning the vicissitude of the tricultural borderland community which built the city in the second half of 19th century.
The article examines the meanings that space and things acquire in the context of ageing and old age. The authoress draws on a study that was conducted with the objective of understanding the significance of autonomy in old age and the ways in which the elderly attempt to maintain it. The data from this study were subjected to a follow-up qualitative analysis based on the reformulated research question: 'What role do space and things play in the life of a senior as a person of a certain age at a certain period of life?' The results of the analysis are presented in the third part of the article, following sections devoted to the subject of space and things in sociological gerontology and to a description of the methodology used in the cited research. The analysis reveals that space and things are meaningful elements in the lives of seniors, who place them within three main frames: physical independence or personal autonomy and security, integration into informal social networks, and the home as a subjective centre of community. Space and things clearly become an important part of the strategies of 'coping with ageing'.
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