One of the essential characteristics of the post-socialist transition is rethinking history and negotiating its meanings. As the capital of the newly independent state of Croatia, Zagreb communicated and mediated a dynamic process of national identity building, closely linked to the politics of heritage. The article explores the role of statuary and street toponymy in post-socialist identity building in the Croatian capital. The removal/installation of public plaques and statuary as well as the renaming of streets and squares in postsocialist Zagreb was a revealing indicator and an instrument in the post-socialist (re)writing/(re)signifying of space. These political acts have disclosed the ‘Other’, in relation to whom the construction of post-socialist Croatian identity was developed. The article argues that symbolic rewriting of Zagreb’s city-text was organized and shaped primarily by discursive practices of Othering and Selfreferencing, as systematic acts of articulation in the frame of the politics of landscape. The transition process was accompanied by semantic displacements in the landscape which occured in three ways: by a) relocation of certain streets and monuments from central to more peripheral zones, or vice versa, b) resemiotization of memorials, and c) ‘secondary sacralization’, or resemiotization of places.

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One of the observable aspects of social change during the transition period in most post-socialist countries is the revival of religion. The resurgence of churches has accompanied national revival and in some countries it is also connected to a growing post-socialist nationalism. This article focuses on the development of different -'transnational' -religious options in an area of ethnic conflict by presenting a case study of the post-war growth of the Baptist Church in the Banovina region in Croatia, close to the Bosnian border. Research results are based on halfstructured interviews with church representatives and members.The research shows that there has been a considerable post-war expansion of the Baptist Church in the Banovina region, and that it is mainly ethnic Serbs and people from mixed marriages who have joined the Church. Many of them have a background as communists. For them, neither the Catholic Church, which is regarded as a Croatian church, nor the Serbian Orthodox Church are viable religious options. Instead, there are three factors that make the 'Baptist option' attractive. First, it is grounded in the historical tradition of the Baptist Church in this region and on memories and myths activated in the war and post-war periods. Second, the Baptist Church has made a middle transnational option available in an ethnically mixed area. As such it attracts those who are searching for a niche of neutrality in an ethnically strongly divided region characterized by conflict. Third, the considerable humanitarian work and help of organizations related to the Baptist Church during and after the war not only added in the eyes of many people in need to its image elements of existential shelter, but also brought the Church out of the shadows and made it more 'visible' -thereby improving its former reputation as an obscure sect.

Kvaliteta života složen je i višedimenzijski konstrukt, preširok da bi se mogao opisati jednostavno, stoga je nemoguće razviti jedinstvenu definiciju. Postizanje konsenzusa u definiranju kvalitete života svakako komplicira činjenica da se tim konceptom bavi niz disciplina. Geografija, ekonomija, medicina, sociologija, psihologija, antropologija, filozofija, marketing nalaze interes u proučavanju određenih aspekata kvalitete života. U moru pristupa proučavanju kvalitete života specifično geografski doprinos nije lako razaznati, tj. nije lako odrediti u kojim bi aspektima proučavanja kvalitete života geografski pristup mogao biti najplodniji. Cilj je ovoga rada pojasniti odlike geografskoga pristupa u proučavanju kvalitete života kroz raspravu o nastanku i razvoju interesa za tu problematiku u okviru geografije te kroz prikaz teorijskih modela istraživanja.Ključne riječi: geografska istraživanja, kvaliteta života, povijesni osvrt, teorijski modeli Quality of life is a multi-dimensional and complex construct, too broad to be described in simple terms, and, as a result, it is impossible to develop a single, universallyaccepted definition thereof. Reaching a consensus for a definition of quality of life is complicated by the fact that this concept is dealt with by a host of disciplines. Geography, economics, medicine, sociology, psychology, anthropology, philosophy, and marketing all find areas of interest in investigating certain aspects of quality of life. It is difficult to clarify the specific geographic contribution from the veritable sea of approaches to investigating quality of life, i.e. it is not easy to single out the aspects of investigation of quality of life for which the geographic approach could yield the best results. The goal of this paper is to clarify the qualities of the geographic approach in investigation of quality of life through discussion about the appearance and development of interest for this issue in the framework of geography, as well as by demonstrating theoretical models and classifications of research. UvodKvaliteta života složen je i višedimenzijski konstrukt, preširok da bi se mogao opisati jednostavno, stoga je nemoguće razviti jedinstvenu definiciju. Cummins (1999) je uspio izdvojiti više od sto definicija kvalitete života, što taj pojam čini jednim od najnedosljednije korištenih pojmova u humanističkim i društvenim znanostima (Cummins i dr., 2004). Definicije kvalitete života variraju u velikom rasponu: od općenitih, poput "stupanj onoga što život čini dobrim ili kvalitetnim" (Bowling, 1997) ili "nužni uvjeti za sreću" (McCall, 1975), do specifičnih, poput "poželjni rezultat politika i programa" (Schuessler i Fisher, 1985). Neki autori čak ističu besmislenost potrage za jedinstvenom konceptualizacijom s obzirom na neodređenost pojma i varijabilnost načina i perspektiva kroz koje se o njemu promišlja (Stover i Leven, 1992;Bowling, 2002). Izgleda da jedini zajednički nazivnik među mnogobrojnim znanstvenim konceptualizacijama kvalitete života jest činjenica da se u koncept kvalite...