Athens 2015: seminar with locals

An integral part of the winter seminar tradition are the internal seminars held at a chosen location, and this year we were fortunate to be hosted by the The Finnish Institute at Athens.

Dr. Jari Pakkanen, the present director, got our seminar started with an introduction into the activities of the Finnish Institute, to be followed by internal discussion and lectures by Greek scholars.

The first visiting speaker Sokratis Koniordos, professor of sociology at the University of Crete, dealt with Ongoing Greek crisis and its prospects, tracing the links between the global economic bubble of 2008 and Greece’s current situation.

The second speaker, Thanos Veremis, professor of modern history at the University of Athens, addressed the somewhat overlooked story of Greece’s Ottoman Past, with various insights into the development of the Greek segmented society.

In addition to the lectures, we held three internal seminars dedicated to three different topics: different takes on wellbeing; the challenges of translating research results into practice or public policy; and the relationship between art and scientific work. The fruits of these will be discussed later, also in this blog!

[Photos by Pertti Alasuutari and Marjaana Rautalin]