A rapidly growing number of double homes connect
different parts of Europe in new ways. The second
home can be a cottage in the woods, an apartment in
the Costa del Sol or a restored farm house in Tuscany.
However, other forms of double homes must be
added to these landscapes of leisure. There are long
distance commuters who spend most of their week in
an overnight flat, in a caravan on a dreary parking lot
or at a construction site. Economic migrants dream of
a house ‘back home’ for vacations or retirement. Dual
homes come in all shapes and sizes – from the
caravans of touring circus artists to people turning
sailboats into a different kind of domestic space.
This special issue of Ethnologia Europaea captures
some dimensions of lives that are anchored in two
different homes. How are such lives organized in time
and space in terms of identification, belonging and
emotion? How do they, in very concrete terms, render
material transnational lives?
The next issue of the journal (2008:1) will take such
a comparative perspective into another direction as
the authors will consider different kinds of research
strategies to achieve European comparisons and to
gain new cultural perspectives on European societies
and everyday life.
