Social activism and the city : cultural sociology and radical politics in 21st century Cyprus

This article discusses alternative cultural communication processes in the context of urban activism in inner Nicosia, as manifested in the last two decades. It examines a variety of cultural and social practices and their political implications in terms of their interaction with the surrounding space and wider society. The city’s division, the growth of the immigrant population and the attempted regeneration of inner Nicosia set the context for a variety of practices of contestation of nationalist and commercialist cultures, challenging them in the fields of culture and lifestyle. Through an overview of the key dimensions of activist interventions in the public space in the last two decades, the article argues that there are both elements of connection across issues, movements and processes as well as continuity across time. By examining practices rooted in social dynamics and expressing dissenting political and cultural worldviews, a more nuanced cultural sociology of the Greek Cypriot community may be constructed which goes beyond generalist images emanating from the mainstream public sphere. Through their diversion from mainstream ideas, politics and everyday life, the urban movements presented here engaged in redefining the meaning of the inner city and the life in it and registering it for more than a decade as an alternative place.