Q&A with The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA), founded in 1837, is the largest state institution of higher learning in Greece, and among the largest universities in Europe. NKUA aims at excellence in both teaching and research in a varied range of disciplines and holds different collections divided in twenty museums, including the “Anthropology Museum” and “The Folklore Museum and Archive”. We have asked them four questions about their experience with the project so far.
What are your institution's goals for this project and how do you plan to achieve them?
Having as a starting point the nature and aim of the Greek institutions that participate in the consortium, i.e. the School of Physical Education and Sport Science (SPESS) of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) and the Hellenic Folklore Research Centre (HFRC)-Academy of Athens (AA) that focus on educational, ethnographic and academic research, and on archives of Greek traditional dance, the goal for this project is to bring up the significance of a particular Greek case study through the lens of the UNESCO’s Convention on Safeguarding ICH (2003) in the domain of dance and dancing as living cultural heritage. More specifically, the Greek case study focuses on ethnographic, educational and academic research with archival material, and on students specialised on Greek traditional dance of the NKUA-SPESS who interact with several dance heritage communities in Greece and abroad.
What are your thoughts on the project per now?
The project till now has enriched both our intellectual and practical knowledge. Through continuous communication and fruitful interaction among partners that come from various countries all over Europe, from diverse areas (universities, research centres, folklore archives, museums etc.) and with different backgrounds, the project has offered a space and place so as a forum of theoretical and practical experience to be established.
Have you learned something new?
Communication and interaction with partners as described above offer innumerous stimuli that can only lead to the enrichment of learning. Moreover, as we get to know people and cultures as well as dance and dancing better and deeper in the course of time, the stimuli for learning seems to be increased tremendously as time passes. The consortium has additionally materialized this enrichment of learning through the Belgium Boombal, the Hungarian tanchaz and the Hungarian Whitsun Festival at the Hungarian Open Air Museum. Moreover, it has materialized this enrichment of learning through high quality lectures from specialized people of excellence in their subject matter and area.
What is your institution's contribution to this project and its consortium?
The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA), established in 1837, is the oldest and largest state institution of higher learning not only of Greece but both the Balkan peninsula and the Eastern Mediterranean region, and among the largest universities in Europe, the only Greek University that participates in CIVIS (a European Civic University formed by the alliance of eight leading research higher education institutions across Europe). The School of Physical Education and Sport Science (SPESS) of the NKUA, the oldest and largest in Greece, specializes in the study, research and teaching of all expressions of movement of the human body through a holistic and in-depth interdisciplinary program that includes the natural sciences, the social sciences and the humanities. SPESS has a long history on Greek folk and traditional dance through a wide and in-depth undergraduate and postgraduate programme on ethnochoreology, dance anthropology, dance ethnography, dance notation and analysis, and others. Thus, SPESS of NKUA, as an academic institution, can contribute to this consortium by providing its long experience (in study, research and teaching) in dance and dancing as living ICH and to the new role of the dance researcher, the dance teacher, the dance artistic director and choreographer, the dancer and the dance archivist as facilitators for all kinds of dance heritage communities so as to put into practice an integrated and participatory