Bucharest Barks: Street Dogs, Urban Lifestyle Aspirations, and the Non-Civilized City by Lavrentia Karamaniola A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Anthropology) in the University of Michigan 2017 Doctoral Committee: Associate Professor Krisztina E. Fehérváry, Co-Chair Professor Alaina M. Lemon, Co-Chair Professor Liviu Chelcea, University of Bucharest Associate Professor Matthew S. Hull Professor Robin M. Queen “The gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor.” “I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain! One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.” Extracts from “Sisyphus Myth” (1942) by Albert Camus (1913–1960) Sisyphus by Titian (1490–1567) 1548–1549. Oil on canvas, 237 x 216 cm Prado Museum, Madrid Lavrentia Karamaniola
[email protected] ORCID iD: 0000-0002-2194-3847 © Lavrentia Karamaniola 2017 Dedication To my family, Charalambos, Athena, Yannis, and Dimitris for always being close, for always nourishing their birbilo, barbatsalos, kounioko and zoumboko To Stefanos, for always smoothing the road for me to push the rock uphill ii Acknowledgments This project could not have been possible without the generous and continuous support of a number of individuals and institutions.