Chapter 7. Creating a Familiar Space: Child Care, Kinship, and Community in Postsocialist New Zagreb

Translocal Care Across Kosovo’s Borders

“…became clear that family and kin care ranged from daily childcare, widespread in Croatia (Leutloff - Grandits, Birt and Rubić 2010;Leutloff -Grandits 2012;Rubić and Leutloff -Grandits 2015) and Italy (Ghezzi 2010), to crisis intervention and to the ritualization of joint holidays in a 'family house' at the countryside (more common in Sweden) (Gaunt and Marks 2010; see also Heady and Schweitzer 2010). In fact, family and kinship were re-created and transformed palpably by everyday or ritualized activities and performances, material manifestations, symbols and, last but not least, care.…”

Managing the Aging Present and Perceiving the Aging Futures: (In)Formal Systems of Care in (Pre-)Pandemic Croatia

“…The intertwining of work with migration is one of the most noticeable cultural anthropological areas of research in which the issue of care is also explored. What is particularly important in the context of such research in terms of contributing to the cultural-anthropological understanding of care is the notion of care as a multifaceted phenomenon that incorporates not only medical but also emotional, social, moral, and economic aspects that may be provided and maintained at proximity or from a geographical distance (Rubić and Leutloff-Grandits 2015;Palmberger and Htromadžić 2018, p. 3). Although caring relationships are always to a certain extent characterized by intervention in the lives of care receivers, which ranges from mild to completely paternalistic (McKearney and Amrith 2021), it is important to emphasize that our research showed that paid caring work does not necessarily and always mean only basic, emotionally neutral, or "cold" care about the old ones.…”

“…Formal forms of elder care have been improved development since the Second World War, but its capacities have been continuously insufficient (cf. Rubić and Leutloff-Grandits 2015). Older people rely on informal forms of care, i.e., the help of family, relatives, and friends, whose numbers, as the trend of emigration from certain areas increases significantly, are decreasing, which greatly impacts the possibility of providing informal care.…”

“…Older people internalized it in a way that they perceived themselves as a "burden" to young people and this issue has been noted at a wider, European level (cf. Rubić and Leutloff-Grandits 2015). During the pandemic, the elderly experienced intensified feelings of vulnerability, of a lack of control over their lives, capabilities, and ability to make decisions about their own health, as well as increased anxiety and depression (cf.…”

“…Single-person households in cities are diverse: they were partly created by the dissolution of three-generation households, i.e., the separation of young people from their parents' home (neo-local housing) while remaining close to the elderly. New households are frequently found within the same urban settlement as an informal social security strategy (Rubić and Leutloff-Grandits 2015). Some of the elderly live in "traditional" institutions for older people (nursing homes with up to a hundred residents), with organized meals, health care and social programs, and accommodation in a double room.…”