Lecture format: on site
Room: 2Q-EG-27 (Seminar Room of the Institute for Eastern European History).
Street address: Spitalgasse 2, Campus of the University of Vienna, Hof 3.2
In this seminar, the phenomenon of coastal kiosks in Albania is taken as a starting point to explore broader questions of architectural transformation, social change, and everyday life in the postsocialist period. Nowhere are the ruptures and continuities of Albania’s transition more visible than in its built environment. Following the collapse of the communist regime, a previously highly regulated system of planning gave way to a proliferation of informal construction, in which new forms of spatial practice emerged under conditions often described as “anything goes.”
Focusing on the kiosks that rapidly appeared along the Albanian coast in the 1990s and early 2000s, the seminar examines these structures not merely as marginal or temporary architectural objects, but as socially embedded environments, showing how kiosks functioned as sites of economic experimentation, social interaction, and negotiation of new forms of ownership and public space. In this sense, they can be understood as microcosms of a broader transformation from a state-controlled to a market-oriented society.
The talk further situates these developments within wider processes of urbanisation, tourism, and environmental change. Particular attention will be given to the ways in which informal building practices intersect with coastal ecologies and shifting patterns of seasonal habitation. By bringing together architectural analysis with anthropological perspectives, the presentation highlights how these seemingly ephemeral structures reveal deeper dynamics of adaptation, resilience, and contestation.
Overall, the seminar offers a multi-dimensional reading of kiosks as both material artefacts and social infrastructures, reflecting Albania’s transition from isolation to global interconnectedness.
Robert Pichler is a Historical Anthropologist at the Institute for Habsburg and Balkan Studies, Austrian Academy of Sciences. In 2017, he received the venia docendi in Southeastern European History. He currently serves as President of the International Association for Southeast European Anthropology (InASEA) and sits on the board of the Center for Balkan Societies and Cultures (CSBSC). His research focuses on migration, social history—particularly family and kinship—nation-building, and visual studies. In addition to his academic work, he is also a photographer, integrating visual media into both scholarly and artistic projects.
