The proposed volume is an eclectic collection of papers on a country which remains, despite the occasional - and almost exclusively negatively inclined - reportage in the media, without any contours. The aim of the collection is twofold - firstly to bring together Albanian and foreign scholars working on various aspects of the history and anthropology of Albania; and secondly to make available to the interested public an overview of the multifaceted nature of albanological research beyond the shallow limits of what is presented in the media.

Considering this introductory statement, the question may be asked, why the focus is explicitly historical-anthropological and ethnological, beyond the obvious institutional stipulations. The answer is twofold: A great deal of research done on Albania is de facto historical-anthropological in nature as the interests of the authors asked to contribute to this volume testify, and even for those specialists who are neither explicitly historian or anthropologists, it is not possible to get around these methodological approaches if one is seriously interested in finding answers to what is going on in Albania today, irrespective of the appellation one chooses for one's own form of science.

The proposed volume intends to analyse several main features of Albanian society throughout the 20th century. An attempt will be made to provide a picture of the Albanian society under several political regimes that existed in Albania, focusing especially on the interwar period, the communist regime and the first decade after the fall of the communist regime.

Papers dealing with the following aspects are especially welcome:

1. Family and Household, Marriage, Gender issues
2. Migration, effects of migration on family, Integration of emigrants
3. Tradition and Modernisation
4. Urban-Rural contrasts and everyday life

Deadline for paper proposals (ca. 500 words) and a short CV: February 1st, 2005

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