THE MODERN SOCIAL CONCEPTION OF SLOVENE SPACE SLOVENSKI PROSTOR V SODOBNI DRUŽBENI PREDSTAVI Ana Kučan A view from Kalce towards Logatec (Slovenia, photography Ana Kučan). Pogled od Kalc proti Logatcu (Slovenija, fotografija Ana Kucan). Abstract UDC: 712.2:316.64(497.4) The modern social conception of Slovene space KEY WORDS: landscape, landscape planning, landscape units, place-attachment, identity, social perception, social conception, symbolic landscape, Slovenia The thesis of the research assumes that national identity is bound to the environment, that is, to specific landscapes or even to an idealized landscape type. Means of communication within the socialization process shape the social perception of the national space or territory. The social conception ofthe national space therefore tends inevitably towards uniformity, regardless of its actual geographical diversity. Specific landscapes or places within the national space emerge as representative of the whole, usually appearing as symbolic places or as conceptualized landscape types composed of various and distinct landscape features that epitomize the national space. The results of the public opinion survey presented in this article confirm the findings of an analysis of pictorial presentations of landscapes in tourist and political propaganda. The results show that in the course of history, national identity is defined not only by symbolic places but also by special landscape types and that the popular conception of the national space does not exist as an absolute: It changes in different time periods and adopts various meanings among particular social strata or groups depending on the context of its use. The study confirmed the existence of a prototype, a motif that is no longer linked to a precisely specified place and thus loses the particularities of a concrete location. It is no longer linked to a specific geographic location and as such assumes the role of representative of the whole in the conception. Izvleček UDK: 712.2:316.64(497.4) Slovenski prostor v sodobni družbeni predstavi KLJUCNE BESEDE: krajina, krajinsko načrtovanje, krajinske enote, navezanost na kraj, identiteta, družbena predstava, simbolne krajine, Slovenija Hipoteza raziskave je predpostavila, da se v določenem okviru nacionalna identiteta veže tudi na prostor in tako pomaga oblikovati njegovo podobo: krajine. Družbena percepcija nacionalnega prostora se oblikuje s komunikacijskimi sredstvi znotraj procesov socializacije. Tako družbeni koncept nacionalnega prostora neizogibno teži k enovitosti, ne glede na dejansko geografsko raznolikost. Posamezne krajine ali kraji znotraj nacionalnega prostora vzniknejo kot »pars pro toto« in delujejo kot njegovi predstavniki. Ti so ponavadi predstavljeni kot simbolični kraji ali pa kot v predstavi nastali krajinski tipi, sestavljeni iz različnih izbranih posameznosti. Kot taki epitomizirajo nacionalni prostor. Rezultati raziskave javnega mnenja, predstavljeni na naslednjih straneh, so potrdili ugotovitve iz analize likovnih predstavitev slovenskega prostora v turistični in politični propagandi. Pokazali so, da se je nacionalna prostorska identiteta opredeljevala ne le s simbolnimi kraji, temveč tudi s posebnimi krajinskimi tipi; da nacionalni koncept prostora ne obstaja kot absolutna kategorija - presega sicer različna časovna obdobja, vendar lahko v posameznih družbenih plasteh ali skupinah pridobi različne pomene in je odvisen od namena, s katerim je priklican v družbeno zavest. Tako ni nujno, da se konceptualna podoba povsem ujema s prostorsko stvarnostjo. Adress - Naslov Ana Kučan, Ph. D. Oddelek za krajinsko arhitekturo Biotehniška fakulteta Jamnikarjeva 101 1111 Ljubljana Slovenia Phone - telefon: +386 (0)61265 172 Fax - faks: +386 (0)61265 782 E-mail - e-pošta: ana.kucan@bf.uni-lj.si 112 Contents - Vsebina 1. Introduction 115 1.1. The definition of the term »landscape« 116 1.2. Levels of Landscape Units 117 1.3. Hypothesis and Goals 118 1.4. The Research Model 119 2.. The Public Opinion Survey 119 2.1. Goals 119 2.1.1. The Size Classes of Landscape Units 120 2.1.2. The Pilot Survey 121 2.1.3. The Changeability of the Conception 121 2.2. Defining the Sample 121 2.2.1. Methods of Selection and Inquiry 122 2.2.2. Demographic Characteristics of the Sample 122 2.3. The Questionnaire 122 2.3.1. The Selection of Photographs in the Questionnaire 130 2.3.2. Questions 135 3. Results 136 3.1. Coding of the Open Answers 136 3.2. The Changeability of the Conception 137 3.3. The Size Classes of Landscape Units 138 3.3.1. Components 138 3.3.2. Combinations of Components 141 3.3.3. Places 144 3.3.4. Landscape Types 146 3.4. Differences between Groups of People within the Sample 148 4. Discussion 148 4.1. The Changeability of the Conception 148 4.2. Size Classes of Landscape Units 149 4.2.1. Components and Combinations 149 4.2.2. Landscape Types 153 5. Conclusion 156 6. Bibliography 166 6.1. Sources of Illustrations and Photographs 167 7. Povzetek 167 113 1. Introduction In landscape planning we constantly encounter the problem of how to define the identity of the landscape. What immediately comes to light in this context is the problem of the erroneous perception of spatial identity as unchangeable; it is dealt with as a physical phenomenon, a given situation in space, while in reality it involves ever new relationships since landscapes are created through the reciprocal interaction between the space and the individuals and society who change the space and inscribe their history on it through their actions. A space can be described according to the physical components of which it is composed, but in this case we grasp only its image at a particular moment in time. However, when planning, we must determine the prevailing social values that are expressed through the social identification with the space. The psychological and sociological findings regarding the collective place-attachment (Lenz-Romeiß 1970) have already revealed that this identification is about belonging to what the physical components symbolize and not to themselves as such. Thus, the presented study emerged from a planning problem; however, due to the nature ofthe subject of investigation, the research was of a more anthropological and sociological nature. Let us assume that the genius loci, the spirit of place, is nothing other than the human conception of it. We must therefore first ask ourselves what landscape identity is in general and how it comes into being: by which factors is it formed? Relative to the perception of national identity in Slovenia, the question particularly arises of whether, given the well-known geographical diversity of Slovene territory, there is a possibility (and suitability) for the existence of a single conception stable in time and harmonious with space, a symbol toward which the concept of »national unity« tends by itself. Establishing the national identity or invoking it is topical at certain moments: it is neither inherent nor ordinary (Smith 1991: Južnič 1993). National identity is oriented to a certain degree toward a uniformity that can be in obvious contradiction to the spatial diversity1; on the other hand, do common features perhaps exist within this diversity or even in spite of it? And if they exist, do they exist in the landscape or in the social conception of it or possibly even in both, in one as the consequence of the other and vice versa? Although it may seem unusual at first glance, this study does not start with the physical reality of the landscape per se but rather seeks the social conception of space created within it in the course of development. It focuses on seeking those components that define Slovene landscapes as »Slovene« ones through the analysis of landscape images in the social conception. It presents and evaluates several factors that influenced the formation of the landscape identity in the social conception. We should probably add here that the study did not seek an absolute landscape identity for Slovenia describable with geographical data but rather attempted to understand how the social conception of space was formed and how it was linked to the national identity. Until the middle of the 19th century, awareness of the landscape existed primarily at the local level and people identified themselves with an area. It is generally accepted that the national consciousness began to develop at that time and spread only gradually from narrow intellectual circles to the population in general. In Slovenia the thesis exists that, as Vodopivec (1996: 10) puts it, »national consciousness pushed out and finally replaced the provincial consciousness and the feeling ofthe regional belonging«. Vodopivec himself does not agree, however, and believes that it is possible to prove that all the feelings of belonging continued to live side by side. Thus, the present study was accompanied by a doubt that only one singular mental image of the Slovene landscape existed; however, it was encouraged by observations that exactly this type of conception had formed in our everyday life and was exploited by individual economic and political interests. There is also the question of how such a singular image affects the relationship of society and its individuals to the space and thereby the diversity of the Slovene landscape reality. Human identification with space has its roots in what Heidegger understands as dwelling (das Dasein) -in the process through which people transform the place of their being (existence) into their home, 1 This was observed in the case of France by Fernand Braudel in the first part of his unfinished trilogy on French history The Identity of France, History and Environment and by Pierre Nora in Les lieux de Memoire. 115 which is based at least in part on an emotional perception ofthe world (Heidegger 1977). In any event, the human existence is defined in terms of space, which is true as much for the individual as for the group. The home- or as Južnič (1993) calls it, the sentimental orientation - is on the one hand defined as the place of residence with its familiarity and on the other as the value system that fosters the selection of individual parts of environment relative to their significance. The present study relies on the basic assumption that the national identity as a special form of group identity is established in the spiritual sphere of a nation, also embodied, however, outside it in the field of physis, in space as a totality of natural circumstances, human activity, and the social value system, that is, in the landscape. In the interaction of these factors, unique landscape patterns emerged typical of the specific areas and cultures in which they were created that as such probably became recognizable at the local, regional, and even national levels. 4 Figure 1: Rodna gruda (»Native soil«) by Maksim Gaspari, pre-World War II postcard. Slika 1: Razglednica »Rodna gruda« (Gaspari) iz časa pred drugo svetovno vojno. 1.1. The definition of the term »landscape« Here we must explain to some extent the problem of individual units in the landscape. From the professional viewpoint, this is still a fundamental question and a problem that has not yet been completely solved. The trouble with isolating a landscape unit with its own characteristics lies primarily in the fact that landscapes have no clear borders and that individual smaller units are parts of bigger units and therefore the two are mutually dependent in some kind of hierarchical spatial structure. This problem is also present in the definition of the term »landscape« itself. The origin of the English word »landscape« is over three hundred years old and means »a portion of the earth's surface that can be comprehended at a glance« (Jackson 1984: 3). Such parts are scenes only 116 when we observe them. In many cases, we can distinguish the boundaries of the landscape we are observing at a given moment, namely, the boundaries that limit our view - the line of the horizon. However, this is not everything. In the beginning, even in the Slovene language, the term actually meant more the picture of a scene than the scene itself, that is, the artistic interpretation of the landscape. An artist composed individual components of space in accordance with his conception into a landscape scene. The proportion of manipulation was diminished somewhat by photography, but landscape photographs are still only arbitrary slices of an unlimited space and therefore do not present the whole but only its parts. In popular use in Slovenia, the word »krajina« (»landscape«) still primarily denotes a painting. The word is derived from »kraj« (»place«), asemantically extraordinarily broad base that denotes locus as in »place«, »country«, »region« as well as finis as in »end«, »edge«, »bank« (Bezlaj 1982: 79). The Slovene term krajina [pronounced krajina] initially denoted a border region or march, as were Bela krajina, Vojna krajina, and Bosanska krajina at the time.2 In this usage, the word retains its original meaning; in modern Slovene, however, because of the broader meaning the word gradually acquired, it might be a good idea to separate the term krajina [pronounced krajina] from the term pokrajina [pronounced pokrajina] - the two are presented as synonyms in the Slovar Slovenskega Knjižnega Jezika ( »Dictionary of Slovene Literary Language«) - and use the latter consistently instead ofthe foreign word regija (»region«) as some geographers already do (Vrišer 1976: 24; Gams 1984: 79-70). In conceptualizing space, however, a motif appears that is no longer dependent on one's standpoint. A »motif« is a specific aggregation of individual landscape components that can be encountered in various spatial contexts. In the processes of perception and comprehension it can very well appear as an individual landscape unit. 1.2. Levels of Landscape Units Gradually the meaning of »landscape« changed with the development of the field of expertise but the term »landscape« still covers parts of space in various size classes. Thus, there are various levels of individuation - definitions of individual landscape units - in the landscape, and therefore landscape »subjects« can be represented by individual components and the patterns they form by combinations and also by places or variously sized areas. By increasing the extent of land »that can be comprehended at a glance«, the level of detail is lost and the more general characteristics common to the greater part of the space begin to prevail. The definition of a »subject« also presents a problem because a subject in the landscape as a space without boundaries is determined by a dominant context: a hierarchical spatial structure in which the parts of space are interwoven one with another, transform from one into another, and complement one another. For this reason, the question therefore remains open from which level of individuation do spatial units combine into a model or type, that is, is it possible that all the levels cooperate at the same time in the formation of a model? Here it is important to draw attention to the basic apperception of space that originates between man and the space reshaped due to human adaptation activities. Examples include the definitions of »left-right«, »above-below«, »near-far«, »personal space«, and »foreign« space (Polič 1978; Južnič 1987). A focused comprehension of the experience of space affects its meaning, which is not merely a matter of the individual since our conceptions of the environment depend on social and cultural factors. Therefore differences can arise between the space as an objectively given fact and the social perception and comprehension of this »reality«. 2 In his etymological dictionary, Bezlaj (1982: 92) also draws attention to the connection between Krajina and Kranjska (Carniola). A link between kraj (end, border) and the name of the province Kranjska was also established by Linhart (1791) in the second volume of Poskusa zgodovine Kranjske in drugih dežel južnih Slovanov Avstrije (Essay on the History of Carniola and other Southern Slav Provinces of Austria (in: Problemi 8 (1970) 91-92: 25). 117 1.3. Hypothesis and Goals The hypothesis of the study assumes that: • national identity is not bound merely to territory determined by borders; • a social conception exists that corresponds to an ideal landscape type; • this conception is composed of a collage of selected places, landscape patterns, and individual features, and • is not absolute: it depends on familiarity with a space, on the intention with which we call it into our consciousness, and on the period, that is, on the value system currently prevailing in the society. From these assumptions, the following goals for the study logically emerged: • to discover whether a specific social conception of the national space exists, • if it exists, of what components is it composed, • to discover the ways the components acquire their identification role, and • to ascertain the relationship between the physical and symbolic factors that determine it. To answer these questions, the study tackled the problem in three complementary ways. After studying the psychological and sociological research on the perception of the physical environment and establishing the conceptual approach, the study took the following diagram of conception forming as its starting-point. As records of human intervention in space, landscapes can be the carriers ofthe collective identity and the historical memory. Being utilitarian, they do not hold direct messages; symbolic meanings are attached to them subsequently. The social conception of space is formed in the systems of communication between the society as a producer and the individual as a consumer. Thus landscape features act as message carriers. We attribute meaning to the perceived environment, such as it is, and this influences: • our behaviour, and • the conception we convey to others. This process is repetitive, and because of the processes of perception and assessment and the mythical properties, in particular the attribution of meaning in accordance with diverse interests, the result does not necessarily match the spatial reality. Figure 2: Diagram of cyclical interactions between the individual, the society, and the landscape that shows the formation of conceptual categories. Slika 2: Diagram cikličnih interakcij med posameznikom, družbo in krajino, ki prikazuje oblikovanje konceptualnih kategorij. 118 1.4. The Research Model The study assembled a symbolic picture of the national space from landscape scenes linked to the conception of Slovene identity that circulates in the systems of social communication. The choice of visual material is supported by the fact that we primarily perceive landscapes visually and because the depictions of landscapes themselves infer a choice within a value system, that is, symbolic assessments and the collection of signs are incorporated. Given the nature of the problem, the research comprised three parts, each investigating a part of the hypothesis. The first part involved an historical review first of the evolution of the Slovene ethnic identity and later of the Slovene national identity3 and a search for their links with individual parts, places, and landscape features ofthe »home space«. It examined how particular areas entered the social consciousness and considered landscape descriptions in works of literature and painting that reveal how artists and other promoters of Slovene nationhood tried to express the Slovene character of particular spaces. The second part, an analysis of pictorial advertising material, was aimed at discerning the components of visual language associated with Slovene nationhood in tourist, commercial, and political propaganda between 1945 and 1995. The third part was a public opinion survey to confirm the immediate recognition of these components by the general public. 2. The Public Opinion Survey 2 .1. Goals The survey revealed the current standing of certain places, landscapes, or landscape types in the Slovene value system. It was aimed additionally at investigating the social perception in Slovenia of the national space. As opposed to a general social conception, it provides a collection of rather personal opinions about the characteristics of the Slovene landscape and deliberately does not seek to overcome individual predilections and predispositions. The goal of this part of the study was to discover whether there were differences in the conceptions of individual groups within the society relative to their social standing or the location of their residence and whether there were differences as regards the intention of the conceptions, that is, differences between the spatial conception that is supposedly transmitted between generations, a kind of »fatherland education«, and the conception used to establish and maintain one's self-image in relation to other people. In contrast to the other two parts of the research, the survey, through recognizing the characteristics and significance of the landscape units that build the conception of Slovenia in the perception and assessment of individuals, was aimed at discovering more intimate layers of the place-attachment of the population to the place they live. The type of questionnaire and the choice of landscapes as much as the choice of the medium for presenting the landscapes and the selection of the physical dimensions of the landscape scenes were aimed at discovering the possible conceptualization of a uniform conception of the space defined by the adjective »Slovene«. Do those surveyed recognize a landscape according to the characteristics of a landscape type? And based on these characteristics, do they recognize, for example, landscapes with a certain significance as »Slovene«? The aim of the questionnaire was to determine which spatial components appear in one or another role and to explore how large the influence of symbolic values is on the selection of spatial units 3 The Slovene ethnic identity began to form long before the concept of Slovene nationhood ripened. Since due to specific historical circumstances, it could not be identified with the symbols and the institutions of nationhood, it found the core of its identity in culture, especially in the language, and in economic connections (Pirjevec, Rus, Urbančič in Problemi 8 (1970) 91-92; Grafenauer 1987; Hribar 1989; Kos 1979; Ilešič 1950; Linhart 1791; Kardelj 1970; Prunk 1986; Zwitter 1964; and other historical sources); however, it was also expressed in the space, as the results of the study show. 119 and/or individual characteristics as part of formulating a conception of the Slovene space as a whole. Symbolic meanings are present on both levels of establishing identity, as much on the level of continuity as on the level of differentiation, but the question is posed of what kind of symbolic connections operate on these levels. Among other things, the survey was aimed at discovering the presumed differences between the socially - accepted conception of the significance of individual places and areas and the prevailing characteristics of Slovene landscapes on the one hand and individual views on the other. Furthermore, it was meant to provide answers to whether differences exist in the conception of space relative to the purpose it is called upon and to whether differences exist between individual groups within the society in such perceptions of space. The survey was thus aimed primarily at discovering: • whether those surveyed recognize certain spatial features that could be attributed to Slovenia as a whole, and • which places or areas are attributed greater importance in representing Slovenia. It did so by directly identifying the characteristics of the common conception assembled from individual conceptions by showing them the factual characteristics of the space using lists of spatial components and photographic images of more complex spatial configurations. 2.1.1. The Size Classes of Landscape Units The hypothesis presumed that the identity of a national space is formed on various levels and that it is linked with the problem of individual units in the landscape. This means that the conception of the Slovene space is composed of variously sized and variously constituted units. These can be locations of special importance such as the capital, regional centers, destinations of popular outings, and so forth; they can also be areas that have acquired symbolic significance in the historical memory. This may also possibly apply to individual landscape features that were united into a type by categorization and only as such become a conceptualization of the Slovene space. The goal of the survey was to check the probability of the existence of a spatial identity on the national level and to determine what kind of spatial unit is linked to the social conception of the Slovene space. The assumption that the spatial identity in the social conception is connected to individual spatial components or characteristics and their combinations was already confirmed by the analysis of the propaganda material. The survey, however, tried to discover whether this connection also exists on a more personal level. The subquestion is, of course, to which components it is tied and in what combinations these components appear: do these components appear frequently in the space (landscape) or is their symbolic meaning more important in the identification. The frequency of spatial components can be accurately and objectively determined by making an inventory of the space and an analysis of the data thus obtained, a common approach in landscape planning. The symbolic meanings can perhaps be extracted from an analysis of the answers to the questions that disclose the individual's vision of the space, especially if we compare them with the results of the analysis of the propaganda material. The analysis of the propaganda material confirmed the previously mentioned three-fold nature of the component units of the concept: • the places or the areas, the topoi, which appear as unique, clearly recognizable, and irreplaceable and which the conception equates with Slovenia; • the landscape motifs without clear connections to a certain place that together create the general landscape image of Slovenia; • individual components that in the spatial sense build both the places and the motifs and in the symbolic sense also appear independently as representatives of the Slovene space. 120 The analysis is supplemented by a geographical distribution of motifs from which it can be seen that only certain areas of Slovenia appear as components of the conception of the Slovene space and that the constituent components selected from the entire territory of Slovenia are by no means geographically uniformly distributed. 2.1.2. The Pilot Survey A pilot survey showed that landscapes exist with strongly expressed identities that geographically are distinctly recognizable and others that those surveyed almost uniformly identified with various regions of Slovenia. Here emerged a possibility for broadening the main survey: if the landscape scenes those surveyed identified with specific geographic areas were in some way related to each other, we could possibly extract a type based on the repetition of components that formed similar scenes. However, to determine whether such a type is perceived as »Slovene« by those surveyed, it would also be necessary to ask whether they thought each scene was Slovene or not and then compare the answers. The pilot survey did not ask this »Slovene character« question. However, it did verify the selected list of characteristics, and individual additions resulted from the answers received. In any event, the pilot survey helped answer the question whether there is a concept that we could call »the Slovene landscape« and in what way and through which factors does a specific group of people recognize and ascribe meaning to the space or territory in which it lives. 2.1.3. The Changeability of the Conception The question about the existence of various conceptions of the same concept should be answered by the results from the supplementary questions intended to discover whether differences exist in the conception of a Slovene space relative to its use. From the analysis ofthe propaganda material, the time dynamic is obvious, the changing of the conception of space connected with the changing perception of a certain social group through various time periods. Following the research model about varying conceptions ofthe same concept (Roth, Frisby 1986), it is also possible to conclude that within one social group in the same time period there are many perceptions of the same object, depending on its use. If it is the perception that defines the identification (recognition) of space or the identification of an individual or a certain community with the space they inhabit and the perception itself is also conditioned by the use (Canter 1977), then very probably there are differences in the meanings of individual parts of space, either in the places or in the landscape types and individual components. The reason probably lies in the use and certainly whether we are dealing with an individual's personal assessment, the desire to convey this perception within some community (more precisely, to transmit values between generations, that is, the »fatherland education« that makes it possible to maintain the continuity aspect of group identity), or the communication of one's self-image to the outside world (specifically, establishing one's identity by comparison with other groups in other spaces - the differentiation aspect). 2.2. Defining the Sample Given the subject of discussion and in order to achieve the greatest possible validity, it made sense to carry out the public opinion survey4 on the basis of a representative sample whose structure would reflect 4 A public opinion survey, provided it is undertaken on an appropriate sample population and that the questions are asked in accordance with precise methodology, reveals opinions from which we can draw conclusions about patterns of behaviour. Even when a survey is optimally designed relative to the sample population and the questions posed, the problem remains of the extrapolation from discovered opinions to specific behaviour. Above all, we must stress that research of public opinion reveals correlations and not cause-effect relationships. Only if the study was repeated and the present investigation was followed by others could we verify the durability or changeability of opinions in determined time periods. The statistically significant differences appearing in the representative sample most probably also exist in the general population. The rule for determining a representative sample is based on the principle of randomness or chance, which means that every adult inhabitant of Slovenia has the same possibility of being included in the sample. 121 that of the population. The representative sample was determined by the Center for the Research of Public Opinion and Mass Communications at the Faculty of Social Sciences, which also carried out the survey. Questions about the characteristics of the Slovene space were included in an international study of values entitled Slovensko javno mnenje 1995/2 (SJM95/2 - »Slovene Public Opinion«). The sample included 1050 individuals. The minimum age of the sample population was eighteen, and an upper age limit was not defined. The sample population was also identified by sex, level of education, and profession. At the time of the survey, all had their permanent residence in Slovenia. The survey included people from all regions of Slovenia in numbers proportionate to the populations of the regions. 2.2.1. Methods of Selection and Inquiry The survey was carried out in two parts. First there was an oral survey in the field when the sample population was questioned, and a follow-up questionnaire was later sent by mail. The oral survey took place in September and October 1995. In the field survey, four questions about the characteristics of space (without photographs) were included among the questions about values (see Fig. 3). In the second (written) part of the survey, the same sample population received colour photographs and a questionnaire to complete and return by mail5 (see Fig. 4). The first sample population (Sample 1) returned 402 valid questionnaires that were then linked to the demographic data from the oral survey. Thus, although the basic sample population was smaller, its structure did not change considerably, and consequently its representativeness was not destroyed. This sample formed the basis for the treatment of the data from the questionnaires linked to SJM95/2, which enabled cross-referencing to the demographic data and to answers to other questions in the survey about values. Although the number of questionnaires returned by those who participated in the field survey was lower than expected, a little below 50%, it was still representative according to the quotas. An additional 500 questionnaires were sent to those who had not answered the questions about the characteristics of the Slovene space in the SJM95/2 survey. These subsequently returned 313 questionnaires. Together with the 402 questionnaires linked to the SJM95/2 survey with questions about the characteristics of the space, these questionnaires formed a total sample of 715 (Sample 2) on which to base the discussion of the questions linked to the photographic presentations of landscapes and places. 2.2.2. Demographic Characteristics of the Sample The sample was uniformly distributed as regards both sex and age. In both samples there were slightly more women than men: 56.2% (Sample 1) and 53.6% (Sample 2). A little more than half of those surveyed in both samples were of active working age at time of the survey (between 31 and 60 years of age): 53.0% (Sample 1) and 51.4% (Sample 2). There were 24.4% (Sample 1) and 25.6% (Sample 2) younger people, and 22.6% (Sample 1) and 20.7% (Sample 2) were older. Other demographic data was available only for Sample 1. 2.3. The Questionnaire The oral part of the survey included four questions, three open and one multiple-choice question. The questionnaire sent by mail consisted of questions linked to photographic presentations of individual parts of the Slovene space and certain important places and areas. Parallel with these were several additional questions. 5 The Center for the Research of Public Opinion and Mass Communications began sending questionnaires with a control letter immediately after the results of the oral first part of the survey which took place in the field began coming back, that is, in October 1995. The completed questionnaires were returned by mail until the first days of December 1995. 122 V438 IN YOUR OPINION, WHERE SHOULD ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHERS TAKE OUR CHILDREN IN ORDER TO BEST ACQUAINT THEM WITH THE SLOVENE SPACE? LIST AT MOST THREE SUCH PLACES OR AREAS: i i V4 3 9 i i V4 4 0 i i V4 41 V440 WITH THE SAME PURPOSE IN MIND, WHERE WOULD YOU TAKE A VISITOR FROM ABROAD WHO IS VISITING SLOVENIA FOR THE FIRST TIME? AGAIN, LIST AT MOST THREE SUCH PLACES OR AREAS. i i V442 i i V443 i i V444 V445 WHEN YOU THINK OF SLOVENIA, WHICH LANDSCAPE CHARACTERISTICS COME TO MIND? CHOSE AT MOST THREE FROM THE FOLLOWING LIST: 01 - lakes 02 - mountains 03 - hilly land 04 - villages 05 - sea with coast 06 - hedges between fields 07 - rivers and streams 08 - »kozolci« 09 - vineyards and orchards 10 - individual trees i_ _i V445 11 - karst phenomena (caves) 12 - small churches on elevations i_ _i V446 13 - forest 14 - fields and meadows i_ _i V447 15 - other: 16 - do not know, no answer V448 WHICH PLACES OR AREAS OF SLOVENIA DO YOU PERSONALLY THINK ARE CLOSEST TO YOUR HEART? i i V4 4 8 i i V4 4 9 i i V4 5 0 Figure 3: Questions from the oral (field) part of the survey. Slika 3: Vprašanja iz ustnega (terenskega) dela ankete. 123 Figure 4: Questionnaire sent by mail. Slika 4: Vprašalnik, poslan po pošti. QUESTIONNAIRE on the characteristics of Slovene space Landforms, vegetation, waters, settlements, and patterns of land use are spatial features. Together they form the image of a landscape. Some of these components can be considered characteristic, and we recognize a region by means of them just as we recognize an acquaintance by his or her facial features or characteristic manner of walking. Keep this explanation in mind as you answer the questions. Your open and precise answers, together with the answers of others surveyed, will help form better and generally acceptable proposals for the protection of the Slovene landscape. We will show you eighteen photographs. We are interested in whether you think these photographs were taken in Slovenia or not. Please first circle the number (1 or 2) before the text of the answer to answer the first part of the question (a). If you circle the affirmative answer, then proceed to the second part of the question (b). Write on the line below which place or area you believe appears in the photograph. 124 For the following photographs, please answer the first part of the question and if the answer is affirmative, answer the second part as well. 5a Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 5b If yes, where?_ Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 6b If yes, where?_ 7a Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 7b If yes, where?_ 8a Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 8b If yes, where?_ Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 9b If yes, where?_ 10a Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 10b If yes, where?_ 125 For the following photographs, please answer the first part of the question and if the answer is affirmative, answer the second part as well. 11a Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 11b If yes, where?_ 12a Was the photograph taken in Slovenia? 1 yes 2 no 12b If yes, where?_ 126 For the following photographs, please answer the first part of the question and if the answer is affirmative, answer the second part as well. 19 With which of the listed components below would you best describe Slovene space? Please read the entire list first and then circle the numbers in front of the components. Choose a maximum of five items. 1) lakes 8) »kozolci« 2) mountains 9) vineyards and orchards 3) hilly land 10) individual trees 4) villages 11) karst phenomena (caves) 5) sea with coast 12) small churches on elevations 6) hedges between fields 13) forest 7) rivers and streams 14) fields and meadows 20 How well do the various places or areas shown in the photographs represent Slovenia? Circle one number for each photograph. ab 1) very poorly 4) well 2) poorly 5) very well 3) adequately 1) very poorly 4) well 2) poorly 5) very well 3) adequately 127 1) very poorly 4) well 2) poorly 5) very well 3) adequately 1) very poorly 4) well 2) poorly 5) very well 3) adequately 1) very poorly 2) poorly 3) adequately 4) well 5) very well 1) very poorly 2) poorly 3) adequately 4) well 5) very well 21 Rate the spatial components listed below according to how characteristic they are for Slovenia. In each line, circle the number that best reflects your opinion. not characteristic at all barely characteristic moderately characteristic quite characteristic very characteristic lakes 1 2 3 4 5 mountains 1 2 3 4 5 hilly land 1 2 3 4 5 villages 1 2 3 4 5 sea with coast 1 2 3 4 5 hedges between fields 1 2 3 4 5 rivers and streams 1 2 3 4 5 »kozolci« 1 2 3 4 5 vineyards and orchards 1 2 3 4 5 individual trees 1 2 3 4 5 karst phenomena (caves) 1 2 3 4 5 small churches on elevations 1 2 3 4 5 forest 1 2 3 4 5 fields and meadows 1 2 3 4 5 128 22 You would like to present our landscape to an acquaintance abroad who has never been to Slovenia. Which place or area would you sent on a postcard? Write your answer on the line. a )_ What would be in the picture? b )_ 23 Rate how well the places or areas listed below represent Slovenia. In each line, circle the number that best reflects your opinion. least poorly adequately well most Cerknica Lake 1 2 3 4 5 Vipava Valley 1 2 3 4 5 Piran 1 2 3 4 5 Mount Triglav 1 2 3 4 5 Logarska dolina Valley 1 2 3 4 5 Bled 1 2 3 4 5 Mura River flatlands (Prekmurje) 1 2 3 4 5 Lake Bohinj 1 2 3 4 5 Kostanjevica on the Krka River 1 2 3 4 5 Pohorje 1 2 3 4 5 Haloze 1 2 3 4 5 Sečovlje saltworks 1 2 3 4 5 Gorjanci Mountain Range 1 2 3 4 5 Kras (the karst region) 1 2 3 4 5 Trenta Valley 1 2 3 4 5 24 Where did you spend your childhood? The questions were composed so as to complement each other and at the same time serve as a mutual control - the results of one question were supposed to help clarify the results of another. In composing of the survey, the attention was primarily devoted to the problem of how to best describe the landscape space of Slovenia without imposing our own conceptions on those surveyed. Therefore, the questionnaire retains the three previously mentioned levels of landscape unit size classes - place, motif, component - and asks about them with both photographs and text. The space is described using carefully chosen spatial units that can act both as individual units and as general phenomena, depending on the context of conceptualization. Each smallest part of space can signify a place to an individual if the individual recognizes it as such (Canter 1977, Lenz-Romeiß 1970) although it was expected that these personal differences would be lost in the large sample. The survey asked about motif on two levels: about the characteristics or selected components of the space that in various combinations formed landscape patterns and about the landscape types or broader landscape patterns with which we can describe the diversity of the Slovene space. 129 2.3.1. The Selection of Photographs in the Questionnaire The selection of photographs was governed by the content and the manner of carrying out the survey. The size of the questionnaire determined by the manner of carrying out the survey and the psychological capacities of those surveyed resulted in limiting the number of photographs. Consequently, the second level of the regional division of landscape types into eighteen landscape units (Marušič et al. 1994) appeared to be an objective description of the Slovene landscape space suitable for the survey. The eighteen chosen descriptive groups describe the Slovene space well enough for the purposes of the photographic part of the survey but do not show more detailed differences. The appropriateness of the selection is also supported by the classification of the landscape areas of Slovenia into seventeen classes of similarity on the basis of digitalized spatial data (Jug 1995). The photographs chosen illustrated the most typical features of individual types while being as anonymous as possible - they did not show commonly known segments of the Slovene space such as tourist resorts that regularly appear in the media. Due to the smallness and relative accessibility of almost all parts of Slovenia, total anonymity was difficult to achieve. In spite of the fact that a photograph is only a segment from an unlimited landscape space (in reality an observer has a much wider field of vision since he perceives the landscape as a whole), from the results of research about the effectiveness of using photographs in research about landscape values (Coeterier 1983; Zube 1978) we can conclude that in research of the observer - landscape relationship, colour photographs are an acceptable substitute for the real landscapes if they are taken from a visual angle similar to the human one. The decision on whether photographs are a good or a bad substitute for reality depends on the landscape itself and on the goal of the research. Two sets of criteria determined the selection of photographs: 1. Criteria related to the scene: • the physical dimensions must illustrate the landscape type (the scene must be typical for the landscape type it represents), • the segment of space shown must be as anonymous as possible (it must avoid generally known or famous places), • the scenes must cover approximately the same surface area and the same visual angle (the surface area depends on the characteristics of the landscape type, for example, flatlands or hills), • several perspectives: near, middle distance, and panoramic or in accordance with the characteristics of the landscape type. 2. Criteria related to the medium: • colour prints (a black and white photograph functions too graphically; showing slides to such a large sample is not feasible), • photographs must be taken at the height of the vegetation period (June, July, August), • photographs must be taken on clear days with no or very low humidity. For the presentation of a landscape type, what is in the photograph and in what combination is very important. During the analysis of propaganda material in the first part of the study, the pictorial presentations of landscapes were also classified into types according to these criteria. The components of a scene must be recognizable, so it is necessary to consider the characteristics of the medium and average characteristics of the observer. In order to make conditions as equal as possible the photographs were taken on clear days during the summer. The only exceptions were cases where different conditions improved the presentation of the characteristics of the chosen landscape type. For exam- Figure 5: Map of Slovenia showing the second level of regional division into 19 landscape units with the numbers of the photographs representing them in the mailed questionnaire. Slika 5: Karta Slovenije z drugo stopnjo regionalne razdelitve na 19 krajinskih enot s številkami fotografij, ki so jih predstavljale v vprašalniku, poslanem po pošti. 130 List of landscape units from both levels of regional division with the corresponding numbers of photographs: No. of photograph No. of Names of unit landscape units No. of photograph No. of Names of unit landscape units 1.1 1.1.1 1.1.2 1.1.3 1.1.4 1.1.5 1.1.6 1.2 1.2.1 1.2.2 1.3 1.3.1 1.3.2 2.1 2.1.1 2.1.2 2.1.3 2.1.4 2.1.5 2.1.6 2.2 2.2.1 2.2.2 2.2.3 2.3 2.3.1 2.3.2 2.3.3 2.3.4 2.3.5 2.4.1 2.4.2 2.4.3 3.1 3.1.1 3.1.2 3.1.3 3.2 3.2.1 3.2.2 3.2.3 JULIAN ALPS / JULIJSKE ALPE Upper Sava River valley/ Dolina gornje Save Dolinke Foothils of Mount Triglav / Triglavsko predgorje Central area of Julian Alps / Osrednje območje Julijskih Alp Upper Soča River valley / Gornja dolina Soče Western Julian Alps / Zahodni Julijci Jelovica plateau / Jelovica KARAVANKE MOUNTAINS / KARAVANKE Karavanke ridge / Greben Karavank Radovljica plain / Radovljiška ravan z obrobji KAMNIŠKE-SAVINJSKE ALPS / KAMNIŠKO-SAVINJSKE ALPE Western Kamniške-Savinjske Alps / Zahodne Kamniško Savinjske Alpe Eastern Kamniške-Savinjske Alps / Vzhodne Kamniško Savinjske Alpe WESTERN SUBALPINE HILLS / ZAHODNO PREDALPSKO HRIBOVJE Upper NadiZa River valley / Dolina zgornje Nadize Tolminsko region / Tolminsko Idrijsko-Cerkljansko region / Idrijsko-Cerkljansko Hills of Selška Sora River / Hribovje Selške Sore Hills of Poljanska Sora River / Hribovje Poljanske Sore Polhograjsko hribovje hills / Polhograjsko hribovje CENTRAL FLATLANDS / OSREDNJA RAVNINA Flatlands of Brezje / Brezjanska ravnina Kranjsko and Sorško Flatlands / Kranjsko in Sorško polje Ljubljana-Kamnik Basin / Ljubljansko Kamniška kotlina EASTERN SUBALPINE HILLS / VZHODNO PREDALSPKO HRIBOVJE Hills of Šalek and Konjice / Šaleško-Konjiško hribovje Savinja River Valley / Savinjska dolina Kamniško in Zasavsko hills / Kamniško in Zasavsko hribovje Dolenjska hills along Sava River / Dolenjsko hribovje ob Savi Foothills east of Laško / Predgorje vzhodno od Laškega KOROŠKA AND DRAVA RIVER VALLEY / KOROŠKA IN DOLINA DRAVE Koroška region / Koroška Drava River valley / Dolina Drave Pohorje Mountain Range / Pohorje PREKMURJE / PREKMURJE Goričko region /Goričko Lendavske gorice region / Lendavske gorice Flatlands of Prekmurje / Ravninsko območje Prekmurja EASTERN REGIONS OF ŠTAJERSKA / VZHODNO ŠTAJERSKE POKRAJINE River Mura flatlands / Ravnina ob Muri Slovenske Gorice region / Slovenske Gorice River Drava flatlands / Dravska ravnina z obrobji 3.2.4 Haloze-Kozjansko region / Haloze-Kozjansko 3.3 SOUTHERN SUBPNONNIAN VINEGROWING AREAS / JUZNE SUBPANONSKE GORICE 3.3.1 Hills of Sava and Sotla Rivers / Posavsko Obsotelsko gričevje 3.3.2 Krško-Breziško Flatlands / Krško-Breziško polje 3.3.3 Krško Hills / Krško gričevje 3.3.4 Central River Krka valley /Dolina srednje Krke z obrobjem 4.1 TRNOVO-NANOS PLATEAU / TRNOVSKO-NANOŠKA PLANOTA 4.1.1 Banjška plateau / Banjška planota 4.1.2 Trnovski gozd plateau / Trnovski gozd 4.1.3 Nanos range and Hrušica plateau / Nanos in Hrušica 4.2 PIVKA-CERKNICA PLATEAU / PIVŠKO-CERKNIŠKA PLANOTA 4.2.1 Pivka plateau / Pivška planota 4.2.2 Plateau Crni Vrh-Logatec / Planota Crni Vrh-Logatec 4.2.3 Cerkniško region / Cerkniško območje 4.2.4 Notranjska Plateau / Velika notranjska planota 4.3 KOCEVJE BASIN AND KOCEVSKI ROG / KOČEVSKA KOTLINA IN KOČEVSKI ROG 4.3.1 Ribniško Kočevska Valley / Ribniško Kočevska dolina 4.3.2 Mount Kočevska with Moravska Plateau / Kočevska gora z Moravsko planoto 4.3.3 Kolpa River and Upper Kolpa Mountains / Zgornje kolpsko gorovje z reko Kolpo 4.3.4 Kočevje-Rog hills / Kočevsko Roško hribovje 4.4 GROSUPLJE BASIN AND SUHA KRAJINA / GROSUPELJSKA KOTLINA IN SUHA KRAJINA 4.4.1 Grosuplje basin / Grosupeljska kotlina 4.4.2 Suha Krajina to the North of the River Krka / Suha krajina severno od reke Krke 4.4.3 Suha Krajina to the South of the River Krka / Suha krajina juzno od reke Krke 4.5 GORJANCI RANGE WITH BELA KRAJINA / GORJANCI Z BELO KRAJINO 4.5.1 Gorjanci range with Mount Radoha / Gorjanci z Radoho 4.5.2 Bela krajina region / Bela krajina 5.1 SUBALPINE PRIMORSKA REGIONS / SUBALPSKE PRIMORSKE REGIJE 5.1.1 River Idrija valley and Upper Brda region / Dolina Idrije in Zgornja Brda 5.1.2 Kanalsko region / Kanalsko 5.2 TRUE PRIMORSKA REGIONS / PRAVE PRIMORSKE REGIJE 5.2.1 Goriška brda hills / Goriška brda 5.2.2 Goriška plain / Goriška ravan 5.2.3 The Vipava River valley / Dolina reke Vipave 5.2.4 Kras (the karst region) / Kras 5.2.5 Coastline region / Slovenska obala 5.2.6 Istria region / slovenska istra 5.3 SUBDINARIC PRIMORSKA REGIONS / SUBDINARSKE PRIMORSKE REGIJE 5.3.1 River Reka valley and Bistriško region / Dolina Reke in Bistriško 5.3.2 Brkini range / Brkini 5.3.3 Karst-subdinaric littoral area / Kraško subdinarsko primorje 8 3 12 7 17 10 9 5 6 13 18 16 2 4 14 15 11 Figure 6: Map of Slovenia showing the third level of regional division into 66 landscape units. Slika 6: Karta Slovenije s tretjo stopnjo regionalne razdelitve na 66 krajinskih enot. 132 Figure 7: Procedure for creating pictographs for the description of landscape motifs Slika 7: Postopek oblikovanja piktogramov za opis krajinskega motiva. ple, in the photograph of the » Central Flatlands« unit, the high lying thin layer of humidity was welcome because it removed the surrounding landscape type from the field of vision as well as a clearly recognizable horizon that would have made identification ofthe location ofthe photograph possible, not because of the landscape pattern but rather due to a landmark that is part of the neighbouring landscape unit. TABLE 1: LIST OF PHOTOGRAPHS WITH LOCATIONS OF SCENES. PREGLEDNICA 1: SEZNAM FOTOGRAFIJ Z LOKACIJAMI PRIZORIŠČ. No. of Photo Geographic location of scene in photograph in Atlas Slovenije (1985 ed.) Landscape unit presented 1 Planinsko polje 144/B3-164/A1 Pivka-Cerknica plateau 2 Sv. Ana nad Koprivno 60/B1 Koroška and Drava Valley 3 Vinji Vrh near Novo mesto 153/A3 Southern subpannonian region 4 Gradišče pri Vipavi 161/B1 True Primorska region 5 Mengeško polje 107/B2-107/B3 Central Flatlands 6 near Zagradec in the Krka Valley 168/B1 Grosuplje Basin and Suha krajina 7 Begunjščica v Karavankah 56/B2 Karavanke Mountains 8 Log pod Mangrtom 51/B3-52/A2 Julian Alps 9 Mozeljsko polje na Kočevskem 203/A1 Kočevje Basin and Kočevski Rog 10 Spodnje Danje pod Ratitovcem 103/A1 Western subalpine hills 11 near Jeruzalem in Slovenske Gorice 72/A1 Eastern Štajerska region 12 Malo Polje nad Colom 143/A3 Trnovo-Nanos plateau 13 Gojka pri Frankolovem 91/B1 —91/B2 Eastern subalpine hills 14 near Filovci in Prekmurje 22/A3-22/B3 Prekmurje 15 below Mount Prelože in the Brkini range 197/A1 Subdinaric Primorska region 16 Kostanjevica na Kanalskem kolovratu 119/B1 Subalpine Primorska region 17 Zgornje Jezersko with Mt. Grintovec 59/A3—85/A1 Kamniške-Savinjske Alps 18 Lokvica pri Metliki 190/A2 Gorjanci range and Bela krajina 134 The second level of the regional division into eighteen landscape types with the names of the landscape units and corresponding photograph numbers is shown in Figure 5. 2.3.2. Questions The question for the first eighteen photographs was the same and twofold: first those surveyed had to state whether the photograph had been taken in Slovenia (forced choice). Each photograph presented a certain landscape type, and those surveyed had to judge whether it was a part of the Slovene space. The »Slovene« character is implicit; the interpretation could be limited only to what the landscape scenes judged as Slovene have in common and in what ways they differ from those that were not or with a low level of agreement judged as Slovene. The second part of the question tried to discover something else that could possibly help explain the judgements of those surveyed regarding the »Slovene« character of the landscape scenes presented. If they answered the first part of the question affirmatively, they were asked to define the presented scene in more geographically detailed terms, that is, to state where they though it was located or what area of Slovenia was shown in the photograph (open question). The goal was not to discover whether those surveyed precisely recognized a place or an area but rather what associations the photograph awakened, that is, to which landscape type it was ascribed. Another two questions were aimed at seeking the motif, one in the oral survey and another in the written questionnaire (19).6 For both questions, those surveyed had to choose from a collection of fourteen spatial components defined in advance by means of a pilot survey no more than three (oral survey) or five (questionnaire) such components which best described the Slovene space. Thus they composed combinations of components, that is, landscape types or landscape motifs. The difference in the number of possible answers was intended to show whether a narrower selection resulted in a more considered decision that was more firmly anchored in the value system. The questions were posed in semantically various ways so as to reveal as many as possible levels of meaning in the choices. This is important primarily so that the questions do not repeat cliches from tourist propaganda material and try to awaken associations linked to the conception of the national space in those surveyed by other means. In the written questionnaire, those surveyed (Sample 2) had to assess the collection of the same fourteen components relative to how typical they were for Slovenia. The combinations of components to which landscape identity is bound are also discernible from the analyses of answers to the questions linked to the photographs. In the questions attempting to determine to which commonly known places or areas - let us call them »famous« individual units - the spatial identity is bound and which are those components that appropriately (in an way acceptable to the community) represent the Slovene landscape space, the selection of photographs and questions was supported by the analysis of the propaganda material and the results of the pilot survey. Those surveyed assessed the selected places in the photographs relative to how well they represent Slovenia (20 a-20 f). A smaller selection of photographs was limited to only those places that already have a crystallized symbolic meaning for the Slovene national identity - Mount Triglav, Piran, Lake Bled, Cerknica Lake, Logarska dolina - taken so that their typical features were as easily recognizable as possible.7 Added to these was a photograph of an anonymous landscape scene that the hypothesis assumed contained characteristic components of a Slovene landscape type (fields/meadows, »kozolci« - typically Slovene hay drying racks, small churches on elevations, forest). In spite of its outstanding individuality, is also assumed that the photograph of Logarska dolina seems typical due to its distinctive combination of components. By 6 The numbers in parentheses denote the sequence numbers in the oral survey and in the written questionnaire. The same numbers will be used in the text for future reference to the questions. 7 The criteria for choosing photographs related to the medium itself are the same as those for the photographs presenting the landscape units of Slovenia. The criteria related to the choice of scene differ only in that the anonymity of the scene was not necessary for this question but, quite the contrary, as much recognizability as possible (except for the inserted »hypothetical type« photograph). 135 means of these two inserted pictures, we wished to verify whether those surveyed assessed the symbolic types equally as the symbol places. They assessed only the photographs without any names of places (toponyms). They had to compare them and assess them only relative to what they saw in the photographs and recognized (that is, what they thought they recognized). The photograph alone without a name offered them many more associations about which area or place might be in the picture. Because of the narrowly limited number of photographs of places, the places in the additional question were also presented by name - without a photograph, however - so the choice could be broader and more uniformly distributed in the regional sense (23). This question was posed as a parallel control question. Comparing the two answers would show whether there were differences in the assessment of the same place when it was represented only by a photograph, that is, by its physical dimensions, and when it was represented only by name, in which case the symbolic associations were more important. Those surveyed had to compare the »famous« places that appear frequently in propaganda material and asses them as to how well they represent Slovenia. The names of all the places presented in the photographs in questions 20 a-20 f were also placed among them, with the deliberate exception of photograph 20 c since it was not included as a locus but as a type. Fifteen places and areas were assessed on a five-step scale reaching from 1 (least) to 5 (most). In this question the decision depended on the individual's conception of the place awakened by the toponym - it was assumed there would be differences between the assessment of the photographs where the physical dimensions of the presented landscape affected the assessments and the assessment of the toponyms where symbolic values affected the assessment more. 3. Results The results from the survey were processed with a computer using the Statistica and SPSS statistics programs. The basic formal and technical processing was based on descriptive methods, followed by statistical verifications: the calculation of correlations, the method of classification into groups, the multidimensional scaling that corresponds to the nominal nature of the greater part of obtained results, and the test of characteristics. For the open questions with many possible answers, the descriptive analysis included all the answers regardless of whether they appeared in first, second, or third place. The choices themselves were important and not their order of appearance. The methods of classification into groups considered the multiple-choice questions. They reveal the connections and tell us how large they are; in addition, by showing the classification of answers into groups, they also reveal their quality characteristics. The same applies to the multidimensional scaling. Information was also obtained about the connections between symbols using canonical discriminative analysis. The differences between individual groups within the sample were established in a simple manner using cross tables. Ifthe calculations showed differences, their statistical significance was established by analyzing the variance. 3.1. Coding of the Open Answers The predominantly open questions generated a host of different answers that had to be organized into groups. The code system had its origin in the diversity of the answers themselves. From the point of view of the problem of individual landscape units, the answers were classified into geographically different size classes. These included everything from the general geographical labels such as the alpine world and flatlands, descriptions of the surface cover such as forest and field, and denotations of more special uses of space such as park and garbage dump to the names of regions and local toponyms as well as local names for individual plots of land. Answers also appeared indicating a geographical location: western Slovenia, the northeastern world, and so forth. The first survey of the answers, during which we ranked them in a list, showed that more general categories appeared more frequently. Although there were many local toponyms, very few of these appeared more than once. We there- 136 fore decided to retain the more general classes, regions and the more frequent localities. Other answers were classified into groups corresponding to the eighteen regional types presented by the photographs in the survey. Thus, the code system classified the answers into groups determined in advance and as well according to the third, more detailed division of regional types (Marušič et al 1994) that covers sixty-six landscape units. Each of the eighteen units belonging to the second level is analyzed in more detail on the third level. As to the contents, this division corresponds to the structure of the answers received, including the answers to the open questions that were not linked to photographs. The survey ofthe answers also revealed a mixture ofplaces, areas, and individual spatial components that the code system tried to retain as reliably as possible. For example: • region: Gorenjska • second level of division: Kamniške-Savinjske Alps, • third level of division: Savinjske Alps, • frequent locality: Logarska dolina, • spatial component: mountains. For the toponyms designating areas of a smaller size class than defined by the third level of division of regional landscape types (Fig. 6), the location was found on the 1:50,000 scale maps in Atlas Slovenije (1985) and they were placed in a corresponding (larger) landscape unit of the third-level regional division. An example: • toponym: Robanov kot ^ third level of division: Savinjske Alps The differences in the number of categories between the code systems for individual questions are the consequence of the conceptual differences between the questions that were required by the content comparison and were also mirrored in the answers. 3.2. The Changeability of the Conception The results of the answers to the questions about the personal, »fatherland education«, and presentational concept of the Slovene space showed differences immediately. In accordance with the code system, the answers to all the three questions were classified into almost equal sized groups (60, 64, and 62); however, these groups are not the same according to the contents: different combinations of answers appear for different questions. For the »presentational« concept, fewer parts of the Slovene space are included in the answers although a many tourist sites are mentioned (missing, for example, are places from the subdinaric and subalpine Primorska regions). Bled dominates distinctly (32.2%), followed by Postojna Cave (18.1%) and health resorts (16%). Also quite frequent are Bohinj (13.1%), sea with coast (11.2%), Prekmurje (11%), Ljubljana (10.7%), Gorenjska (10.5%), hills and mountains (9.9%), the Julian Alps (7.3%), Primorska (8.6%), Mount Triglav (7.3%), Portorož (7.3%), Trenta Valley and Bovec (7.1%), and Kras, Logarska dolina, and Pohorje (each 6.3%). For all other places except Maribor (5.5%), the frequency of appearance is below 5%. The »fatherland education« concept includes almost all parts ofthe Slovene space. Tourist sites (Portorož, Bohinj, Bled, Ljubljana, Postojna Cave, Otočec) were generally less frequently chosen. Hills and mountains (24.4%) and sea with coast (16.9%) appear much more frequently. Two regions with high frequencies are Gorenjska and Primorska (17.9% and 15.8%). The frequency ofthe item Julian Alps (11.2%) increased, and Prekmurje (19%) appears much more frequently. New items also appear such as everywhere in Slovenia, Savica Falls, and saltworks, while the frequency of the answers also increased strongly for in the countryside (from 2.4% to 5.5%) and Kras (from 6.3% to 9.9%). The greatest drop in frequency can be observed for the toponym Bled (from 32.2% to 12.5%). A similar drop can be noticed for health-resorts (from 16% to 1.3%). The frequency also dropped for the toponyms Bohinj (7%) and Mount Triglav (4.4%), while the frequency of the Štajerska region increased (8.6%). 137 If we now compare these findings with the collection of places Slovenes hold dearest, we see that the frequency ofthe toponym Bled again increases (20.3%), as does the toponym Bohinj (from 7% to 13.1%). The frequencies also increase for the regions Gorenjska (20.8%), Štajerska (10.3%), Dolenjska (from 6.2% to 10.5%), and somewhat less for Koroška (by 1%), while the frequency of mention for the regions of Primorska, Bela krajina, Notranjska, Kočevska, and Pohorje remains almost unchanged. The frequency drops for Kras (from 9.9% to 4.9%), while the frequency for Prekmurje falls sharply from 19% to 11.5%). The answers with a high frequency of appearance belong geographically to Gorenjska, with the exception of Logarska dolina which according to its type is also a mountain valley (see Fig. 16, similar assessments of Logarska dolina and Trenta Valley). The results from questions 22 a and 22 b which were similar in content are reminiscent of the results for the presentational concept: Bled (27%) followed by Gorenjska (13%), Bohinj (6%), hills and mountains (4.5%), and Logarska dolina (4%); all others appear with a frequency of less than 3%. The answers include almost all parts of the Slovene space (missing are the subalpine Primorska area and the Trnovo-Nanos plateau), many places known for their special significance appear, and many general expressions. Remarkable and protected animals also appear among the answers. 3.3. The Size Classes of Landscape Units 3.3.1. Components For the multiple-choice question in the oral survey (3 possible answers), the most frequently chosen component is mountains (20.5%) followed by vineyards-orchards (12%). These are followed by variable with three possible answers frequency of answers regardless of their order on the list 24 22 20 - - <2 18 er Figure 8: Frequency of choice components by characteristics (V445, oral survey). Slika 8: Pogostost izbora sestavin po značilnostih (V445). 138 Figure 9: Frequency of choice components by characteristics (19, questionnaire). Slika 9: Pogostost izbora sestavin po značilnostih (19, vprašalnik). lakes, sea, karstphenomena, and small churches on elevations (10.5%-8%) and then by »kozolci« and forest (6%). The next group of components occurring with similar frequency appears in the following order: villages, hilly land, fields-meadows, and rivers-brooks (5%-3.8%). The least chosen- below 1%-are the components hedges between fields (0.5%) and individual trees (0.2%) (see Fig. 8). In response to the multiple-choice question (19, questionnaire, 5 possible answers), those surveyed also chose mountains (16%) most frequently, followed by karst phenomena (13%), »kozolci« (11.5%), small churches on elevations (11%), and vineyards-orchards (10.5%). These are immediately followed by lake (9%) and sea with coast (8%). The gap to the next group is quite large: hilly land, villages, forest, fields-meadows, rivers-brooks (between 4.5% and 3%). Again, the least chosen are the categories hedges between fields and individual trees, again with less than 1% (see Fig. 9). The same list of components was assessed by those surveyed with values from 1 (not generally typical) to 5 (very typical). If we look at each of the spatial components individually relative to how typical those surveyed assessed it, we get a similar picture. If we combine the last two classes, quite and very typical, we see that most of those surveyed chose mountains (90.3%) as typical, while the smallest number chose individual trees (22.4%) and hedges between fields (8.5%). A comparison also shows that the order of components according to which the scores from highest to lowest are ranked relative to the mean arithmetic value is somewhat different than the order in which they are ranked relative to the sum of the two highest scores. As a whole, the order is almost unchanged - the only rearrangement occurs for the third place when vineyards-orchards comes before small churches on elevations and »kozolci« because of the sum of the two highest scores. This means that vineyards received some low scores along with high scores. However, by itself the difference is negligible since all the components with an arithmetic mean value above 4 also remain in the same group if assessed only by the sum of the two highest scores. 139 mountains karst phen. (caves) small churches on elevat. »kozolci« vineyards, orchads forest lakes hilly land villages sea with coast fields, meadows rivers, streams individual trees 1 2 3 4 5 Arithmetic mean Figure 10: Assessment of the characteristics of components (21, questionnaire). Slika 10: Ocena značilnosti sestavin (21, vprašalnik). The results of the ranking in groups reveal similarities between the list of components in the multiple-choice question (19, questionnaire) and in the scoring question (21, questionnaire). The answers to the choice question (5 possible answers) are ranked in two groups, while the components are ranked in four groups according to the similarity of scores (1-5). In both cases, the components hedges between fields and individual trees are ranked most similarly. In the diagram of answers to the choice question, exceptional natural phenomena and symbolic cultural components (lakes, sea, vineyards-orchards, mountains, karst phenomena (caves), »kozolci«, and small churches on elevations) are ranked in one group. Components present everywhere in Slovenia and therefore geographically frequent and everyday significance (hilly land, villages, fields-meadows, hedges between fields, individual trees, rivers-brooks, forest), are ranked in another. Those surveyed chose from the list the components that in their opinion would best describe the Slovene space. They ranked those components already having a certain symbolic value in one group and, if we compare the scores, also scored them higher as being characteristic of Slovenia. From this we can conclude that those surveyed assessed as more typical for Slovenia those components to which the symbolic meaning of Slovene identity had already been attributed. The reason could be their exceptional value in the collective consciousness. Or vice versa, their special meaning and exceptional place in the collective consciousness are due to their landscape exceptionality or geographical rarity. The second level of division of the tree diagram of combinations of spatial components relative to the assessment of characteristics (21, questionnaire) into four classification groups additionally confirms the connection of the symbolic meaning with the height of the score. Two groups are larger, and two smaller. The first larger group consists of mountains, karst phenomena (caves), vineyards-orchards, »kozolci«, and small churches on elevations, and the second of hilly land, villages, rivers-brooks, forest, and fields-meadows. The two smaller groups are, on the more typical side, lakes and sea with coast and on the other non-typical side hedges between fields and individual trees. In both tree diagrams, the components »kozolci« and small churches on elevations are classified together. / / / 140 lakes sea with coast vineyards, orchads mountains karst phen. (caves) »kozolci« small churches on elevat. hilly land villages fields, meadows hedges between fields individual trees rivers, streams forest 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 Linkage distance Figure 11: Tree diagram of combinations of spatial components relative to the choice (19, questionnaire). Slika 11: Drevesni diagram združevanja sestavin glede na izbor (19, vprašalnik). Ward s method, Euclidean distances 1— ]— H , I H lakes sea with coast mountains karst phenomena vineyards-orchads »kozolci« churches on elevat. hilly land villages river-brooks forest fields-meadows hedge between fields individual trees 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Linkage distance Ward s method, Euclidean distances h 1— 1— 1 Figure 12: Tree diagram of combinations of spatial components relative to the assessment of characteristics (21, questionnaire). Slika 12: Drevesni diagram združevanja prostorskih sestavin glede na oceno značilnosti (21, vprašalnik). 3.3.2. Combinations of Components From the selected list of spatial components, those surveyed had to first choose three components (oral survey) and then five components (19, questionnaire). The answers to both questions were organized as dichotomous variables that made it possible to compare associations of components in com- 141 binations. The combinations of components were established on the basis of the similarity of answers shown for every list by the correlation matrix. Regarding the absolute numbers of choices, ofthe 402 people surveyed, 247 chose mountains, 145 vineyards-orchards, 125 lakes, 116 sea with coast, 105 karst phenomena (caves), 96 small churches on elevations 75 forest, 72 »kozolci«, 58 villages, 52 hilly land, 47 fields-meadows, 44 rivers-brooks, 6 hedges between fields, and 2 individual trees. The last two are rarely chosen components so they can be excluded from the construction of combinations with three possible components. Relative to the basic associations between the chosen components, because of the non-typical distribution the component rivers-brooks also dropped out; however, the component fields-meadows stayed because it was often connected with the component vineyards-orchards. In the classification of conceptions about Slovenia, mountains are in first place. All the other spatial components were recognized by those surveyed as substantially less typical. The conception of mountains as the dominant component is augmented by the conceptually related hilly land. Relative to the pronounced predominance of the component mountains as the basis of all the combinations with three components, all the other components in the combinations have a more or less equally important role of »glued on« components. A component with the score 1 was chosen in the greatest number of combinations, and a component with the score 2 is linked to the component with the score 1 but appears in a smaller number of combinations. The same applies to components with the score 3; they appear in an approximately equal number of combinations that, however, is much smaller than the number of combinations in which the components with scores of 1 and 2 appear. The component mountains is linked to all the other components; forest is distinctly linked to mountains but forms no typical combinations with other components. In the list of combinations with three possible components, only eleven combinations can be interpreted as typical. The drawing illustrates this clearly: small churches on elevations (96) vineyards, orchad (145) sea with coast (166) la (1 forest (75) karst phenomena (caves) (105) Figure 13: Choices in the combinations of three components (V445, oral survey) Slika 13: Izbori v kombinacije treh sestavin (V445). 142 The numbers for individual components mean the absolute number of those surveyed who chose a certain component, while their overlapping shows how many times and with which other component the chosen component appeared in a combination. The drawing can be interpreted this way: 125 of those surveyed chose lakes; more than half (75) of those who chose lakes also chose mountains, and 37 of the latter chose sea with coast as well. The component mountains was chosen by 247 of those surveyed in combination with various other components: 75 of those who chose mountains also chose lakes, while 70 chose sea with coast. Thus, the combination mountains/lakes appeared 75 times and the combination mountains/sea with coast appeared 70 times. A high frequency in combination with the component mountains also appears for vineyards - 71 cases. Each of those surveyed had the possibility of choosing three components but could choose fewer as well. The sum of the numbers in the combinations is therefore not equal to the number of those surveyed who chose a particular component since the question has many possible answers. In assembling the components into combinations, the drawing offers a rough insight. The tree diagram is a statistical proof that the groups exist; however, these groups can also have negative signs and exclude each other. The correlation matrix is built on the same principle. The correlational coefficients for the dichotomous variables are not easily explainable because we get negative coefficients that show the exclusion of components. For example, we interpret the negative coefficients between the sea with coast and »kozolci« so that those who chose the sea with coast did not choose »kozolci«, and vice versa. In the basic correlation matrix, the majority of statistically relevant coefficients are negative, which actually does not correspond to a concept seeking connections and not exclusions. Also in the analysis of associations between the components into combinations with five possible components, the mountains are the leading symbol (19, questionnaire), especially ifwe handle them together with the hilly land component. It is, however, possible that in this combination two components are already superfluous for building a more detailed conception. phenomena (230 small churches on elevations (211) kozolci (208) sea with coast (140) lakes (159) vineyards, orchads (197) Figure 14: Choices in combinations of five components (19, questionnaire). Slika 14: Izbori v kombinacije petih sestavin (19, vprašalnik). 143 The ranking of the absolute number of choices shows differences compared with the list of components from the oral question. The assembly into combinations of five possible components differ from each other although in the classification of conceptions about Slovenia the mountains component is still in first place. In the combinations of five components, karst phenomena, small churches on elevations, and »kozolci« are grouped much closer together, while in typical combinations with three possible components sea with coast, lakes, and vineyards appeared quite close together; in combinations with five possible answers they still appear in typical combinations although vineyards is somewhat more separate. We interpret this drawing just as we interpreted the previous one: 159 of those surveyed chose the component lake, 134 in combination with the component mountains and 104 in combination with the component karst phenomena. We see that the relationships of the combinations composed of five possible components are different. The absolute choice numbers show us that of the 715 people surveyed, 293 chose mountains, 230 karst phenomena, 211 small churches on elevations, 208 »kozolci«, 197 vineyards-orchards, 159 lakes, 140 sea with coast, 92 villages, 87 forest, 83 hilly land, and 69 fields-meadows. The components individual trees and hedges between fields were chosen less than ten times and can also be excluded from typical combinations with five possible components. Thus in the case of five possible answers, the combination mountains/karstphenomena appears most often (184 times). It is closely followed by the combinations mountains/»kozolci« (164 times) and mountains/churches (162 times). The combination mountains/vineyards appears less frequently (146 times). It is interesting that the combinations mountains/lakes (134 times) and mountains/sea with coast (120 times) appear in the same order of appearance although they are ranked as to the frequency only in fifth and sixth place while in the case with three possible answers they appear in first and third place. Comparatively higher is also the frequency of the combinations karst phenom-ena/»kozolci« (137 times) and small churches/»kozolci« (131 times). 3.3.3. Places The results of assessing the photographs (20, questionnaire) relative to how well they represent Slovenia as a whole gave us the following picture: The sum of two categories ofthe highest scores shows that the photograph of Bled d (93.1%) received by far the most high scores, followed by the photographs of Logarska dolina f (89.4%) and Piran e (84.2%). Somewhere in the middle came the photograph c (the »hypothetical type«) with 73.3%, and somewhat lower the photograph of Mount Triglav a (72.1%). The lowest score was received by the photograph of the Cerknica Lake b (46.2%). The results of the scoring based on the toponyms of presented places (23, the questionnaire) relative to how well they represent Slovenia as a whole differ somewhat from the above: Bled, Mount Triglav, and Cerknica Lake did not get the lowest scores in general, and of the three, high scores were most frequently received only by Bled (82.5%) and Mount Triglav (75.8%). The method of classifying the scores of places with a parallel control question in which they were presented only with place names revealed two groups. Except for Cerknica Lake, all the places previously presented in photographs were classified into one group including Mount Triglav. This group also included Kras, Trenta Valley, and Lake Bohinj. The latter two together with Logarska dolina comprise a classifying subgroup that once again indicates the formation of a representative type of Slovene landscape. Lake Bohinj as well is encircled by picturesque mountains. These places thus constitute what we can call the »mountain type« of Slovene landscape. Mount Triglav and Bled form a second subgroup that in addition to having the characteristics of the mountain type also has a symbolic meaning. A third subgroup that is somewhat more distant in terms ofthe connecting distance is composed of Piran and Kras, both with a symbolic meaning and a similar geographical position in the True Primorska region. 144 Photographs of: d. Bled J f. Logarska Valley / e. Piran / Church on the hill, c. with »kozolec« and fields 1 a. Mount Triglav J b. Cerknica Lake 0 1 2 3 4 5 Arithmetic mean Figure 15: Assessment of the representativeness of places presented with photographs (20, questionnaire). Slika 15: Ocena reprezentativnosti krajev, predstavljenih s fotografijami (20, vprašalnik). Bled Mount Triglav Lake Bohinj Trenta Valley Logarska Valley Piran Kras (karstregion) Pohorje Mnt. Range Kostanjevica on Krka River Mura flatlands Cerknica Lake Vipava Valley Haloze Sečovlje saltworks Gorjanci Mnt. Range 1 2 3 4 5 Arithmetic mean / I ) Figure 16: Assessment of the representativeness of places presented only by name (23, questionnaire). Slika 16: Ocena reprezentativnosti krajev, predstavljenih samo z imeni (23, vprašalnik). 145 Ward's method, Euclidean distances Lake Cerknica Vipavska dolina Mura Flat Land Haloze Kostanjevica na Krki Pohorje Sečovlje Saltworks Gorjanci Piran Kras Mount Triglav Lake Bled Logarska dolina Lake Bohinj Trenta Valley 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Linkage distance Figure 17: Tree diagram of combination of places relative to the assessment of representativeness (23, questionnaire). Slika 17: Drevesni diagram združevanja krajev glede na oceno reprezentativnosti (23, vprašalnik). It is interesting to compare the answers to the two questions. According to the scores of places presented only by name, the places closest to each other are Bled and Mount Triglav; while relative to the scores from the photographs, they are not classified into the same group. Similar relationships are shown by the non-metric multidimensional scale.8 This can mean that the photograph of Mount Triglav is not sufficiently recognizable as an individual unit in the symbolic sense, while as a component as such it awakens clear symbolic associations as in the case of Bled. From this we can infer that at least in this case the factors of the spatial national identity are not primarily physical but rather symbolic. The similarity is obvious among the components within this group that clearly is not based on the physical components, so Bled and Mount Triglav might well be similar to each other primarily because of the meaning they have as Slovene symbols. In spite of its credibility, this hypothesis is probably only partly true. For one thing, it does not fully explain the classification order of the scores; secondly, the choice of whether Slovenia is represented well or poorly by the place in the photograph might also be influenced by the quality of the photographs. We can imagine a mixed model of choosing in which those surveyed first assessed the photograph according to the presented motif they understood as the place itself- if they recognized it as a place - and only then decided relative to the colours, percentage of air-humidity, etc. 3.3.4. Landscape Types For questions 1 to 18 appertaining to individual photographs (see Fig. 4), the answers differed in various ways. Some photographs triggered more similar answers, and others less. The differences appeared on various levels. Regarding how many different associations (relative to possible location in Slovenia) individual photographs triggered, much is revealed by the number of different groups in which the answers were classified, the number of those surveyed who chose not to answer (the missing answers), and by a comparison of the answers with the percentage of affirmative answers to the question of whether the landscape photograph was taken in Slovenia. In the case of some pho- 8 A study on the comparability of both non-metric methods was done by Gärling (1976). 146 h H H 1— b 1— -I tographs, such as the photograph showing the True Primorska region type (No. 4), a very large number of answers arrived, largely correct and very similar. In the case of the three photographs showing the mountain type landscape - Julian Alps (No. 8), Karavanke Mountains (No. 7), and Kamni-ske-Savinjske Alps (No. 17) - many similar answers also arrived that, however, did differ one from another. With these photographs there were also very few missing answers. While those surveyed correctly classified the Primorska regions »into themselves«, on the other hand they classified the three mountain landscape areas »into one another«. While they realized that there was a mountain landscape in the photograph which they logically connected to one of the mentioned three areas in Slovenia, they mistook the areas one for another. A majority of those surveyed believed the photographs had been taken in Slovenia. Even the photograph chosen the fewest times as having a Slovene character was selected by more than a half of those surveyed. TABLE 2: STRUCTURE OF ANSWERS FOR LANDSCAPES THOSE SURVEYED CLASSIFIED INTO A SMALL NUMBER OF DIFFERENT SPATIAL CATEGORIES (GEOGRAPHICALLY LIMITED LANDSCAPES). PREGLEDNICA 2: STRUKTURA ODGOVOROV PRI KRAJINAH, KI SO JIH VPRAŠANI UVRŠČALI V MAJHNO ŠTEVILO RAZLIČNIH PROSTORSKIH KATEGORIJ (GEOGRAFSKO OMEJENE). photograph landscape number of number of number of taken in number unit different answers missing answers correct answers Slovenia (affirmative) 4 True Primorska region 24 157 387 83.1% 5 Central Flatlands 24 211 52 76.6% 8 Julian Alps 26 172 347 83.8% 14 Prekmurje 30 292 143 67.8% 17 Kamniške-Savinjske Alps 31 155 102 88.4% 7 Karavanke Mountains 33 206 203 78.7% Those surveyed recognized the landscape types in these photographs as distinctly defined, independent, mutually separate landscape types whose locations they could easily determine in the geographical space of Slovenia. In contrast, in other photographs they recognized the similarities among landscape types more than the differences and classified them in a more dispersed fashion in the geographical sense. The correct answers were those answers that recognized the landscape type in the photograph in the geographical sense, those that recognized individual localities within the same type, and those that offered the broader geographical group to which the presented type belongs, such as Gorenjska in photograph 8. TABLE 3: STRUCTURE OF ANSWERS FOR LANDSCAPES THOSE SURVEYED RECOGNIZED AS SIMILAR AND CLASSIFIED INTO A LARGE NUMBER OF DIFFERENT SPATIAL CATEGORIES (GEOGRAPHICALLY DISPERSED LANDSCAPES). PREGLEDNICA 3: STRUKTURA ODGOVOROV PRI KRAJINAH, KI SO JIH VPRAŠANI PREPOZNAVALI KOT PODOBNE IN SO JIH UVRŠČALI V VELIKO ŠTEVILO RAZLIČNIH PROSTORSKIH KATEGORIJ (GEOGRAFSKO RAZPRŠENE). photograph landscape number of number of number of taken in number unit different answers missing answers correct answers Slovenia (affirmative) 11 Eastern Štajerska region 37 214 284 74.5% 3 Southern subpannonian region 38 224 155 79.4% 15 Subdinaric Primorska region 39 378 81 59.4% 1 Pivka-Cerknica plateau 40 298 144 67.5% 10 Western subalpine hills 41 264 225 75.9% 9 Kočevje Basin and Kočevski Rog 44 351 51 62.5% 12 Trnovo-Nanos plateau 45 380 75 57.8% 13 Eastern subalpine hills 45 290 134 75.2% 6 Grosuplje Basin and Suha krajina 45 351 103 71.6% 18 Gorjanci range and Bela krajina 47 255 153 79.0% 16 Subalpine Primorska region 47 418 23 55.0% 2 Koroška and Drava Valley 48 219 163 82.4% 147 Even more illustrative is the data telling us in which categories those surveyed classify individual landscape units presented by photographs. For several photographs, the answers are geographically more concentrated than for others. 3.4. Differences between Groups of People within the Sample To determine differences between groups of people within a sample, only Sample 1 (n = 402), for which the necessary demographic data was available, was relevant. Only gender data was obtained in Sample 2 (n = 715), since the mailed questionnaire asked for this demographic information only. The statistical verifications found no differences of major significance. Probably the homogeneity of answers is at least in part a consequence of the contents of inquiring that asked those surveyed to consider their general conception of the Slovene space. The differences were in part mirrored in the age structure and most obviously in the educational level of those surveyed. As the choices are very much a matter of personal opinion, it is not possible to axiomatically claim the findings are true for the whole population although they certainly were shown as statistically typical in the chosen sample. The differences in the educational level were shown by the canonical discriminative analysis (Wilks' lambda = 0.83) that was done in the assembled list of spatial components from the oral question. While all those surveyed, regardless of their education, have in common that they chose the component mountain, in the choice of other components certain differences appeared. Those surveyed with the lowest education (elementary school) chose vineyards-orchards and lakes but not »kozolci« and small churches on elevations. Those surveyed with vocational school training chose small churches on elevations, sea with coast, and »kozolci« but not forest. The group with secondary school education chose sea with coast and not forest, while the group with the highest level of education (university) chose »kozolci« and small churches on elevations. This means that along with mountain as the most characteristic symbol for Slovenia, the group with university education chose two cultural components that have become significant features of Slovenia in the media. The group with the lowest education level chose the water phenomena (lakes) and the specific component of the vinicultural landscape (vineyards). 4. Discussion 4.1. The Changeability of the Conception The qualitative and the quantitative differences between the lists of answers to the three supplementary questions prove the existence of various conceptions of the same concept relative to their use. Figure 18 shows the differences between conceptions in some of the most typical cases. In the conception of space devoted to foreigners, that is, the conception defining the differentiation of the Slovene space, tourist sites such as Bled and Postojna Cave prevail; however, in the conception devoted to transmitting values between generations, their importance decreases sharply. Here the importance of Prekmurje, hills and mountains, and sea with coast increases. We can conclude that in the spatial conception the awareness of the dimensions and diversity of the Slovene space increased. Relative to acquainting children with Slovene landscapes and regions, many of those surveyed believe that elementary - school teachers should take them to Prekmurje; we can therefore infer that in their opinion Prekmurje is too little known and that Slovene children must learn to recognize it as a part of the Slovene space. This assumption is supported by the appearance of many lesser known places in the list of answers to the question about transmitting values, the »fatherland education« question. These appearances 148 Figure 18: Comparison between personal, »fatherland education«, and presentational conceptions. Slika 18: Primerjava med osebnim, vzgojnim in predstavitvenim konceptom. can only be explained by saying those surveyed believe that children must become familiar with local (birth) places. It is also possible, however, that those surveyed wish to acquaint children with places they themselves have not visited. The fact that those surveyed hold dearest their home places and the places they spent their childhoods and wish to impart some of this feeling of importance to their children is also evident from the differences in the frequency of answers in the group Celje, Velenje (many of those surveyed were from this area): »fatherland education« 1.3%, presentational 0.3%, and personal 3.8%. The importance of the diversity and becoming familiar with the variety of space in the conception devoted to children (»fatherland education«) is additionally emphasized by specific localities which are not found in the other two lists. Let us list only the most important: saltworks, Savica Falls, and the syntagm everywhere in Slovenia. The quite low frequency of Mount Triglav in all three questions can be explained largely by the import of the question which suggests physical accessibility (Where would you take...?). The variability of frequency between individual conceptions is especially evident in the case of the answer Bled. 4.2. Size Classes of Landscape Units 4.2.1. Components and Combinations The two questions for which those surveyed had to choose combinations of components differed somewhat semantically and at the same time allowed for various numbers of possible answers. The 149 results of the frequencies of answers to both questions differ in spite of the fact that in both cases the same selection of spatial components was presented. To what can the differences be attributed? 1. It is possible that the reason for the differences lies in the significant details hidden in the questions. One asks about the characteristics of the landscape or region they have in mind when they think of Slovenia and the other about choosing those components that best describe the Slovene space. 2. The answers were also probably influenced by the number of possible answers, that is, five possible answers for the first question and three for the second. With a smaller number of answers, the weighing of the choice is greater and the decision is more difficult: The choice must be made more carefully since there are fewer possibilities available. We can conclude that the answer is more »precise«. Both the differences and the similarities between the results are important for the discussion. We can see from a comparison ofthe tree diagrams classifying components into groups that in both cases those components are joined in one group to which a symbolic meaning is also attributed in the social consciousness, since in question 21 these also scored higher. Only the situation of the component vineyards-orchards in this collection is surprising since does not appear very often in the propaganda material. If we compare the findings offered by a search for combinations in both lists, we can say the components mountains, karst phenomena, lakes, sea with coast, vineyards-orchards, »kozolci«, and small churches on elevations are the components to which in the opinion of those surveyed the national spatial identity is bound. This is a question of the national identity on the level of differentiation. These components are most often chosen in the meaning associations of presenting Slovenia abroad. Such a conclusion is also supported by the high frequency of appearance ofthe component karst phenomena (caves). Geographically speaking, a large part of Slovenia is karst, so karst phenomena in many various forms ranging from macro to micro relief phenomena and the appertaining flora and fauna are indeed frequent in the Slovene space. However, the reason for this high frequency lies rather in the symbolic meaning the Kras region has gradually acquired in the course of history, together with certain karst phenomena exceptional both in Slovenia and around the world since Janez Vajkard Valvasor's descriptions of the Duchy of Carniola.9 Hilly land is also geographically frequent in Slovenia, yet it did not appear very often nor did it get high scores. For the open questions in which those surveyed indicated their preferred choice of spatial components within a certain spatial framework, karst phenomena also appeared, mainly Postojna Cave, Skocjan Caves, and Cerknica Lake but occasionally even the »human fish« (the European cave salamander, Proteus anguinus), coded under the entry famous animals. Although the frequencies of the latter for question 22 b are certainly low, they are enough to be noticeable. A smaller frequency here can be attributed to the medium for which those surveyed were choosing the places - a postcard probably demands a picturesqueness and composition of scene which a karst cave cannot offer in an equal manner compared, for example, with Bled or Logarska dolina. However, they obviously do appear as a spatial component or place to which the national identity is linked, at least in the opinion of a certain group of people. This is confirmed by the answers to questions V439, V442, V448 that reveal differences in the conception of the concept relative to use. Karst phenomena and caves appear in all three lists of answers, that is, in all the three conceptions of the concept. Postojna Cave appears with frequencies of 3.3%, 9.6%, and 18.1%, and Skocjan Caves with frequencies of 0.0%, 0.8%, and 1.0%. Although among the answers to these questions karst phe- 9 The first written and pictorial descriptions of the Slovene space and its places, characteristics, and natural phenomena were compiled in Janez Vajkard Valvasor's Die Ehre des Herzogtums Krain (Glory ofthe Duchy of Carniola) of 1689. Valvasor (1641-1693) described only a part of the later Slovene ethnic territory at the height of the feudal period. His objective descriptions of the space are interwoven with the spirit of the age, the author's own imagination, and popular superstitions and beliefs. 150 nomena has low frequencies of 1.0%, 1.8%, and 0.5%, for the questions that offered a collection of spatial components, karst phenomena received a high choice and a high score as typical (see Figs. 10-12). In this high score and choice is probably hidden the significance that Postojna Cave has as a site of interest. Although it was not presented in the survey with a photograph, since surface phenomena were of primary importance for the survey, it obviously has a large enough role as a factor of spatial identity. In the classification groups and combinations, mountains also appears along with karst phenomena. Thus, a certain connection exists between them that is certainly significant. Although high mountains cover only a small part of Slovene territory, they are a very distinctive spatial phenomenon, doubtlessly picturesque and certainly attractive for attributing symbolic meaning. Many psychological investigations assert that »spatial symbolism arose and developed primarily through various learning processes, both individual and group, but on the basis of the disproportion between our environment and the human body itself« (Polič 1978: 356). It is a question ofthe symbolism of the physical environment affected by spatial polarities, above-below in this case. By themselves these differences do not tell much, but we can state that above is positive in terms of value (ibid.: 347). The group identification with mountains peaks can be explained as a logical consequence of their positive value as perceived in the spatial symbolism. It is therefore not surprising that the mountains acquired symbolic meaning and thereby became an component of the spatial identification of the social group we call the nation. Both for question 22 and questions V439, V442, and V448, mountains, hills, and highlands appear quite often, for the latter with the frequencies of 7.2%, 24.4%, and 9.5%. Gorenjska, the spatial conception that is undoubtedly connected to the mountains, appears with the respective frequencies of 20.8%, 17.9%, and 10.5%. The mountainous parts of Slovenia appear in a similar way: Julian Alps, Karavanke Mountains, Kamniške-Savinjske Alps, and the mountain valleys, most frequently Logarska dolina and Trenta Valley. Mountains as a component of the Slovene space is obviously significantly present in the social conception of the space and worthy of presenting Slovenia abroad. Similarly, in both classifications in groups and in looking for combinations, the spatial components »kozolci« and small churches on elevations appear together. We cannot say of either of these two components that it is exceptional in the space. Small churches on elevations or located in the middle of fields appear literally everywhere in the Slovene space, including beyond the borders of Slovenia, while there are no »kozolci« in certain areas (Primorska, Kočevska, Bela krajina, Prekmurje, and along Kolpa River). However, simultaneously both of them - small churches on elevations as a symbolic meaning component already according to their activity and »kozolci« as a utilitarian component - have recently increasingly acquired the symbolic meaning as »Slovene«, becoming representative not only of the Slovene space but of the concept »Slovene« in general. Their symbolic role possibly grew from spontaneous social movements, and this role was certainly encouraged by both political and tourist propaganda. The investigation of the propaganda material showed that »kozolci« began to appear fairly late in tourist pamphlets. Their typicality is witnessed by a host of tourist presentation books published between 1990 and 1995 where they appear on the cover pages. Together with mountains, these two components are already assuming the characteristics of the typical, just as things »Slovene« in space were presented by the well-known Slovene painter Maksim Gaspari (1883-1980).10 The symbolic meaning is eloquently witnessed also by the low choice and the very low score attained by the component individual trees. An individual tree in a field, beside a church, or in the middle of 10 Gaspari's work is important from two points of view. His art, based on the legacy of local folklore, was very popular among Slovenes. He painted scenes for postcards, and later - probably precisely because of its idyllic depictions of rural life - his work flourished widely on calendars, greeting cards, and similar products of mass culture. His work thus became available to a large audience and his interpretations spread among the popular masses, helping with their elements of spatial identification to build the myth of the spatial image of Slovenia. Gaspari also actively contributed to Slovene national propaganda and thus cooperated with his work in creating the Slovene ethnic identity. Because he was primarily a painter and because the basic subject of his work are scenes from rural life, he is important for creating the type of Slovene landscape that is anchored in the social consciousness. He always placed his figures against landscape background in which almost identical depictions of the Slovene landscape appear that art history critiques denote as »domestic« (Mikuž 1977). 151 a village is a frequent spatial phenomenon in Slovenia. Quite some time ago, the Slovenes also created a national symbol based on the motif of an individual tree, in particular the linden (lipa). A linden leaf appeared in connection with the Slovene »tabori« (mass meetings) held before World War II and later in the coat-of-arms of the People's and later the Socialist Republic of Slovenia. In 1986 and 1987, it was popularized as a symbol of the »country on the sunny side of the Alps« during apropaganda campaign by the Chamber of Commerce that was intended to promote tourist activity, attract foreign guests, and above all educate the domestic public to the benefits of tourism. I assume that those surveyed did not identify the linden tree with the expression »individual tree« and thus did not activate in their conception the symbolic meaning they otherwise attribute to this phenomenon. This assumption cannot be empirically proven more precisely with the results gathered, and it is indicated only by a comparison of the survey results with the frequency of appearance of this motif in the propaganda material. The survey questionnaire deliberately did not ask about the component linden tree, thus making a direct comparison impossible although the survey was aimed at discovering typical spatial phenomena. However, it is also true in this case that the spatial phenomenon and the botanical species are almost inseparably connected to each other. Is it possible to assume that those surveyed would have assessed the linden tree as a specific tree with a symbolic significance as more typical of Slovenia and chosen it more often from the lists? This assumption is partly confirmed by the results of the pilot survey. Those surveyed scored the individual spatial characteristics presented by a photograph on a five-step scale ranging from 1 (typical) to 5 (non-typical). TABLE 4: ABSOLUTE NUMBER OF CHOSEN SCORES FOR COMPONENTS PRESENTED WITH A PHOTOGRAPH, ACCORDING TO TYPICALITY (PILOT SURVEY). PREGLEDNICA 4: ABSOLUTNO ŠTEVILO IZBRANIH OCEN SESTAVIN, PREDSTAVLJENIH S FOTOGRAFIJO, PO TIPIČNOSTI (PILOTSKA ANKETA). component in photograph score 1 score 2 score 3 score 4 score 5 rapids 6 8 15 30 18 sea cliff 6 12 12 27 20 sinkhole 19 27 21 8 2 tree in a field 20 29 13 10 5 lake 11 28 17 16 5 »kozolci« 55 19 2 1 0 church on elevation 39 24 10 3 1 mountains 27 31 9 9 1 vineyards 15 45 15 2 0 village with church steeple 29 31 15 1 0 The method of combining into groups according to the similarity of the scores also shows that the photograph of the component tree in the field is ranked similarly to the photograph of the component sinkhole, and the same is also true for the photograph of the lake. In the main survey, the other two components, karst phenomena and lake, were ranked together and received high scores as being typical for Slovenia. We can conclude that the spatial phenomenon of a tree standing in the middle of a field is an important characteristic of the Slovene space, just as the linden tree is. The latter is recognized by people as a symbol on an abstract level; the spatial phenomenon, however, is recognized and assessed as typical in the photograph while people do not recognize it as such only on the basis of a verbal description. The assumption cannot be directly proven in our case, but it certainly would be possible to investigate these differences in more detail. From what we have described we can conclude that the landscape components most typical for Slovenia are mountains, karst phenomena (caves), vineyards-orchards, »kozolci«, and small churches on elevations. These are followed by sea with coast and lakes, while the least typical and least chosen as good representatives of Slovenia are the hedges between fields and individual trees. The scores for the places also confirm the existence of a mountain type as a Slovene identification component. The similarity between the high scores for the areas Trenta Valley, Lake Bohinj, and Logarska 152 dolina indicates the formation of a representative mountain type of Slovene landscape. The same is confirmed by the results of the method of classifying by groups. According to similarity, the closest to them are the places Bled and Mount Triglav, both parts of the mountain landscape (see Figs. 16 and 17). In an interesting way, the changing of the spatial conception throughout time periods in parallel with the changing of meaning is illustrated by the fact that the component fields-meadows (and also the component hedges between fields, although in this case the difference is not statistically proven) and the photograph of Cerknica Lake were chosen and scored higher by older people. This result indicates that in the conception of the younger generation whose work is no longer linked in such measure to agriculture the spatial expression of use has changed to a great extent, and that the interwoven world of fields and meadows with the particularities of its spatial structure is losing its identificational meaning. The case is similar for Cerknica Lake, since other places dominate in the media. 4.2.2. Landscape Types The locations those surveyed attributed to the photographs they thought had been taken in Slovenia also show the significance ofthe mountain type for the identification ofthe Slovene space. The answers become most revealing only in combination with the percentage of affirmative answers to the question of whether the photograph was taken in Slovenia. For the photograph showing Zgornje Jezersko representing the landscape unit Kamniške-Savinjske Alps (17), the percentage of convinced persons is very high (88.4%), the highest in comparison with the other photographs. Those surveyed attributed to it the following microlocations: Julian Alps, Mount Triglav and the Central Julian Alps, the upper Sava Dolinka Valley, the upper Soča Valley, the Trenta Valley (the most times overall), the Kamniške-Savinjske Alps, surroundings ofKamniška Bistrica, and Logarska dolina (second to the Trenta Valley in number of answers). In a few cases (less than 10), even the combination Trenta Valley, Logarska dolina appeared. The case is similar with the photograph of the Julian Alps that has the second highest percentage of affirmative answers to the aforementioned question (83.3%). Classifying answers in groups for the individual photographs shows the conclusion that some landscape units have a strongly marked identity, are clearly recognizable, and are not mistaken for others by those surveyed are, however, not necessarily chosen as »Slovene«, for example the True Primorska region. The second conclusion arrived at leads to the thought that some landscape units exhibit great similarity, such as the Julian Alps and the Kamniške-Savinjske Alps, and are mistaken one for another by those surveyed, although those surveyed are not in doubt when it comes to characterizing them as »Slovene«. Furthermore, they are only mistaken one for another and not for other units, which means that a similarly highly distinctive identity is common to them. The case is similar for the Central Flatlands and Prekmurje. Those surveyed mistook the two landscape types one for another, but we can conclude from the ratio between the answers ranked into one or the other group that in the majority of cases they had no doubt that the flatlands represented, Prekmurje just as mountains represented the Alps. Also quite recognizable was the unit from the Eastern Štajerska region that presents the Štajerska vini-cultural landscape type; however, those surveyed frequently classified it as Primorska or Dolenjska vinicultural areas. Such mistakes point out the similarities of landscape types that are strongly defined by specific use. The structure of vineyards and their spatial character do not provide enough exact information that the »average inhabitant of Slovenia« participating in the survey could recognize them and determine the geographical location of the scene in the photograph. Other landscape units, however, were recognized less precisely by those surveyed or were wholly mistaken for similar others. Their common features indicate the landscape type. Some were specified in more detail by manmade elements (small churches, settlements), but this did not reduce the number of »mistakes«. The distribution of answers relative to geographical areas of Slovenia leads to the conclusion that in the mentioned landscape units a landscape type exists that could be defined as 153 Photograph Landscape unit Type Components Julian Alps Karavanke Mountains Kamniške-Savinjske Alps mountains hills forest field, meadow Koroška Western subalpine hills Eastern subalpine hills small church on elev. hills forest field, meadow Eastern Štajerska region Southern subpanonnian region Gorjanci range with Bela Krajina True Primorska region vineyard (small church on elev.) hills forest field, meadow Grosuplje, Suha krajina hills field, meadow forest individual trees Kočevje Basin and Rog Pivka-Cerknica plateau Trnovo-Nanos plateau hills field, meadow forest individual trees Subdinaric Primorska region Subalpine Primorska region hills field, meadow individual trees Prekmurje Central Flatlands flat land field, meadow small forest (trees) Figure 19: Common features of similarly classified landscape scenes in the photographs. Slika 19: Skupne poteze podobno uvrščanih krajinskih prizorov na fotografijah. 6 »Slovene« since those surveyed attributed it with equal certainty to various regions of Slovenia. This is also the type that can be abstracted from the analysis of the propaganda material in which similar scenes appear frequently without being linked to a specific place in Slovenia. The presence of the type is also partly confirmed by the relatively high score for the »hypothetical type« photograph included among the photographs of places (see Fig. 15, photograph c). Based on the comparison of the photographs of landscape regions according to how many of those surveyed believed they were taken in Slovenia and on the determination of their common components, we discern similarities among the highly scored items that we can characterize as the »mountain type«; some are also quite reminiscent of the »hypothetical type«. Of assistance to the comparison are the pictographs developed as a means for discerning motifs from the pictorial content in 154 Photograph Landscape unit Type Taken in Slovenia (affirmative) 17 8 4 2 3 18 Kamniške-Savinjske Alps Julian Alps True Primorska region Koroška Southern subpannonian region Gorjanci range with Bela Krajina -ž 88.4% 83.8% 83.1% 82.4% 79.4% 79.0% Karavanke Mountains 78.7% 5 10 13 11 Central Flatlands Western subalpine hills Eastern subalpine hills Eastern Štajerska region 76.6% 75.9% 75.2% 74.5% Grosuplje, Suha krajina 71.6% 14 1 Prekmurje Pivka-Cerknica plateau 67.8% 67.5% 9 15 12 Kočevje Basin and Rog 62.5% Subdinaric Primorska region 59.4% Trnovo-Nanos plateau 57.8% 16 Subalpine Primorska region 55.0% Figure 20: Common features of landscape scenes in the photographs with similar percentages of affirmative answers to the question whether the photographs were taken in Slovenia. Slika 20: Skupne poteze krajinskih prizorov na fotografijah s podobnim odstotkom pritrdilnih odgovorov na vprašanje, ali so fotografije posnete v Sloveniji. the propaganda material (see Fig. 7). Highly scored are the photographs 17 and 8 that provided motifs of the mountain cultural landscape. These are followed by photographs 4, 3, and 18 which are comparable with motifs whose common components are vineyards and small churches on elevations, with the exception of photograph 2 in which there is no vineyard. Then follow two photographs of land- 155 7 6 scape types without manmade cultural components: photograph 7 is comparable with the motif of the mountain landscape and photograph 5 is comparable with the combination of the components forest and fields-meadows. Only then follow the photographs of the kind used in propaganda material, particularly in the most recent period 1991-1995: two photographs of hills with small churches on elevations (10 and 13), a photograph of vineyards without a church on a height (11), and a photograph of hilly land with »kozolci« (6). Although the »kozolci« in the photograph of the landscape type are not as exposed as in the photographs in the tourist propaganda material, they are nonetheless recognizable. At the bottom of the scale are ranked photographs 14, 1, 9, 12, and 16 showing the most frequent landscape scenes in the Slovene space: the interwoven world of fields and meadows surrounded by forest-covered hills with here and there a village (without a church steeple). From the results, we can conclude that there is a link between landscape types and the components in the propaganda material and those given by the aggregate of personal opinions of those surveyed on the questionnaire part of the research. In all conceptions about the Slovene space mountains and hilly land are foremost, in most cases in connection with some component of the cultural landscape: fields-meadows or vineyards, and even more frequently with small churches on elevations. The only noticeable difference between these two conceptions is the appearance of »kozolci«, which, on the other hand, can be attributed to the characteristics of the photographs in the survey on which the »kozolci« are nowhere distinctly emphasized or put in the foreground. 5. Conclusion The questionnaire survey determined and confirmed differences in the sizes of landscape units with which the »national« is identified: the regions, places, and individual features; moreover, it also confirmed the existence of a prototype, a motif that is no longer linked to a precisely specified place and thus loses the particularities of a concrete location. It is no longer linked to a specific geographic location and as such assumes the role of representative of the whole in the conception. The results also showed changes relative to the use: differences in the choice of places, areas, and types between the value - transmitting conception (»fatherland education«) and the conception for presentation abroad. As to »Slovene« identity, the results of the survey gave priority to the combination mountains, lakes, sea with coast, and vineyards ahead of the combination small churches on elevations and »kozolci«. It turned out that on the level of recognizing the national identity, small differences between landscapes can be disregarded and that it is primarily a question of the symbolic recognition of motifs. Thus, the mere frequency of appearance of a component in space is not a sufficient factor, just as exceptionality is not a sufficient factor - they must be enriched by ascribed meaning. The results given by all the three parts ofthe investigation, including the results ofthe questionnaire, must therefore be read in two ways: AS PHENOMENA - characteristics, samples AS EXPLANATION - circumstances, values In the Slovene national conception, landscapes certainly play an important role as carriers of identity. For this purpose, the geographical characteristics of the territory offered it some easily distinguished identification components, and it looked for others within its cultural and historical heritage. The results confirmed the original hypotheses about landscape components and patterns as carriers of the national spatial identity as well as that the forming of a conception involves the permanent interweaving of the relationship between physical and symbolic factors. Although we are aware of its diversity, once we cross the reference threshold of »Slovene«, we refer to Slovenia as a homogenous territory from the landscape point of view. As we have seen, the landscape type representing it is a kind of a spatial collage more than a homogenous conception. There 156 SLOVENJA Figure 21: Cover pages of some books published in Slovenia between 1991 and 1995. Slika 21: Naslovenice nekaterih knjig, ki so izšle pri nas od 1991 do 1995. is an ideal conception somewhat removed from reality with which we Slovenes as a group identify ourselves. It is probably a question of a cultural mythos through which the exceptionality of the Slovene space is confirmed. This links us to ourselves from the past (continuity) and at the same time distinguishes us from others, even from those who are similar (differentiation). Of course, this refers to the currently predominant conception. We have seen now one and then another significance layer come to the fore. In any case, there certainly is a gap between principles and prac- 157 tice: 50% of the population still lives in a predominantly rural space but not from it (only 6%), so in this sense they are also transforming it into a space that is attractive for living in accordance with their somewhat idealized view of the countryside. The new communication technologies offer almost everyone the advantages the modern way of life and work demands, thus making possible a very high quality of life in rural environments. Thus, the rural landscapes in Slovenia are slowly being transformed into a »modern Arcadia« (Marušič 1995: 31), tending toward a uniform environment in the physical and cultural sense. However, it is precisely from this that many spatial conflicts arise. The results from all three parts of the study have indisputably confirmed the introductory hypothesis that the national identity is not only tied to the territory defined by borders but to other spatial units as well. It is not only a matter of being attached to places to which special importance is attributed in the system of social values. The national identity is also tied to a certain social conception of space built from selected landscape types and individual spatial components. The deliberately chosen systematic cross-sections of the study show the chronological sequence of the formation of the conception and its verification in the conceptions of the modern public. Thus, it also discloses the mutual linkage of the tree parts of the study and their overall unity. The results also showed that neither the landscape types nor the individual landscape components in the sense of national identification are absolute categories but rather that their role within the social conception of the space is changing. The continuity of the nation's identification with space is certainly based primarily on certain »sacred places of the nation«. Thus, special landscape types and motifs appear in the continuity conception which at the same time determine differentiation with respect to others. In the Slovene space, it is primarily the mountain landscape type linked to the cultural (agrarian) landscape that is most often reflected in the image of populated mountain valleys. The second element of the social conception of the space is the domestic landscape with its typical components: fields-meadows, vineyards, »kozolci«, and small churches on elevations. The place most frequently chosen as representative is Bled, which combines the most typical characteristics of both. The domestic depictions as well as the individual events connected with periods of Slovene self-awareness prove that some landscape units adopted various contents relative to the social-political context. The small churches on elevations motif and the appertaining rural landscape could be ascribed the role of »floating signifier«, as defined by Velikonja (1996: 91), that can assume various symbolic meanings. It is obvious that the mentioned characteristics no longer have an inherent meaning on the national level but rather that their meaning depends on the symbolic network that determines their meaning context. Today they are a truly picturesque example of how a certain social group uses selected components of the national identification to link through them the concept of the »national« with its own value system. It could be said that the social conception is only partly in harmony with the »Slovene« spatial and landscape reality. For one thing, the mountain type of landscape is geographically limited to only some regions of Slovenia while in the conception it is generalized on the whole as being most representative of the Slovene space or the most »Slovene« landscape type. The generalization and unification in the conceptions is not surprising - the concept itself of establishing the national identity is based on searching for and emphasizing uniformity and homogeneity. Since due to its natural configuration the real Slovene space is always diverse in spite of certain economical and legal regulative mechanisms and social laws (such as the village to city and city to village migration) that lean toward uniformity, it is easy to understand that certain characteristics prevail over others in the conceptions of space. From the results, we can also conclude that due to the mentioned generalization mechanisms the national spatial conception is a kind of mythical construction. It does not originate simply from the physical reality of the space but rather primarily from the meanings attached to this reality. In any event, the conception of the Slovene man as a farmer attached to the soil dominates. Given the fact that Slovene territory has always been predominantly agrarian since the Industrial Revolution only slowly entered 158 SLOVENSKI KRŠĆANSKI DEMOKRATI SKD . VHMtU BQMÖ UQYtHlJ MSO. JfCf IMJMSMiHI Figure 22: Election poster from 1992 and an advertisement from 1994. Slika 22: Volilni plakat iz leta 1992 in oglas iz leta 1994. this part of Austria-Hungary and the fact that the old methods of agricultural production still dominate to a considerable extent (small farms, a fragmented property structure, small quantity production, dispersion, the existence of part-time farmers, etc.), this conception appears primarily as a spe- 159 Figure 23: Tourist posters from 1939, 1949, and 1978. Slika 23: Turistični plakati iz let 1939, 1949 in 1978. 160 ► fc ► » » * » cial identification concept. While the space is changing in accordance with changed technological and economic conditions, it is precisely this rural consciousness which obviously remains constant in relation to the space in Slovenia, as several investigations have shown (Gantar and Kos, 1988; Hočevar 1993). In this continuity within the media image, the only exception is the period following Word War II when the spirit of building a new society prevailed and the spirit of technology and progress became evident in the landscape conceptions, even on tourist posters. Industrialization was an external sign that Yugoslavia, of which Slovenia was a part at the time, was capable of overcoming economic backwardness and guaranteeing progress. The healthy and idyllic rural world as Gaspari depicted it was not then suitable for the »official« presentation of the country; furthermore, the spatial components that denoted the former social order were disappearing. However, in parallel with the pictorial material through which Slovenia presented itself in the framework of the new Yugoslavia, those places remained that ideologically acceptable positive factors and personalities linked to the national identity and the struggle for its existence. Although not always against it, Slovenia did not entirely consent to the »Yugoslav« concept: It still searched for and established its own identity within the multinational state. For this purpose, the geographic characteristics of its territory offered numerous easily discernible identification components, and it looked for others within its heritage. In this heritage was the rural idyll and the spatial components that guaranteed its existence. We considered where the mythical construct of the spatial conception originates, from which period and in what kind of social context it developed. If the social conception was based on the actual frequency of specific spatial components, their size, or their position, it would adapt to the actual changes in space. However, because the society creates it through perception and the systems of communication by which it is transferred, its changeability arises merely from changed social values. The differences also originate from the use that influences the perception, due to which members of a certain group recognize individual places (Canter 1970); however, only the differences within a concept are defined in this way. Here, of course, we are talking about the predominating conception, about the prototype. The results of the survey confirmed the changeability of the conception relative to its use, most obviously in the differences between the conception meant for the generational transmission of values and the presentational conception we employ in our relations with others, but this just additionally supports the thesis. The uses concealed in the social relationship to the space are manifold. At different times different layers of meaning come to the fore. In any case, within the concept of the national identity we can place an equal sign also between the territory and the nation, as Smith (1991) supposed. Just as territory - a nation's land as established by the law of the state -becomes a myth the moment anything real or imagined attempts to threaten its integrity (ibid.), the symbolic meaning of »the national« can be assumed by ordinary spatial components or individual places filled with new meanings (Daniels 1993). In this sense, the national and ethnic space overlap, although the national territory does not match the space on which Slovenes live.11 The conception that equalizes them is not entirely in accordance with the spatial reality of either. Is being squeezed between the Alps and the sea really an essential original characteristic of the Slovene space? We could maintain this only of the province of Carniola12 and this loses half of this definition without Primorska. In spite of the regional cultural and landscape differences between individual parts of Slovenia, one can still or yet again find in the media the opinion that at least in defining the spatial image of Slovenia, primacy goes to the »ancient« province of Carniola. In the period of the Linhart circle of intellectuals (1756-1795) and the Zedinjena Slovenija (»United Slovenia«) movement (1848) , the establishment of a national consciousness in relation to the »foreign« - then primarily German - was expressed by the efforts to achieve first linguistic and cultural unity and along with it, social and economic unity as well. All these efforts, however, were led from the viewpoint ofthe province of Carniola. The spatial conceptions connected to these efforts included spatial components of the Carniola landscape as »Slovene«, and these efforts toward national unity generalized and enthroned these elements across all the Slovene regions. 11 Slovene ethnic minorities live in Italy, Austria, and Hungary. 12 The economic and political unit within the Austro-Hungarian Empire that covered the central part of today's Slovenia. 161 Braudel (1988: 38) in his L'identite de la France characterizes France with the statement »France is variety« and critically assesses the creation of one image, one formula, one myth as a powerful but in the long term futile endeavour. The same could be said of Slovenia, where geographical diversity is objectively present and clearly visible in a much smaller space which in comparison barely corresponds to a single French region. In any case, the variety is not only apparent and marked or scoring but also corresponds to concrete reality. Nevertheless, although we are aware of its diversity, once we cross the reference threshold of »Slovene«, we refer to Slovenia as a homogenous unit. Whenever the perception of the space is linked to the conception of the national, the need for uniformity and one landscape type prevails, although it is actually more a kind of spatial collage than a homogenous conception. In spite of the awareness of the unity within the variety, this is possibly the very reason that the »domestic« type composed of the chosen characteristic can support the chosen »national« places linked in propaganda material to the concept »Slovene« and that it is possible to link the symbiosis of Mount Triglav, Bled, landscape scenes from the Slovene coast such as Piran, and karst phenomena such as Postojna Cave with the idyllic »Gaspari« landscape type. The mythical in this image outweighs the real. Of course, we also approach the unity of space with spatial data in landscape planning. As soon as we begin to generalize the data, we realize it is also possible on the basis of real geographical data to find similarities between individual units that are not necessarily neighbouring one another and do not always form a common landscape unit of a higher order (Jug 1985). Such similarities were also evident in the results of the survey carried out in the framework of the investigation. Among other things, similarities appeared between the landscapes of the Julian Alps and the Kamniške-Savinjske Alps, between flatland landscape types formed by fluvial deposits, and between vinicultural landscapes. In Slovenia the conception prevails of an idyllic countryside full of natural beauties and surrounded by a wreath of mountains. In most cases we also present ourselves abroad with such a picture; it is a picture we bring to the world market. Already the very concept of »natural beauty« must be understood in the metaphorical sense - the landscape scenes usually associated with this concept are far from being natural. Due to the accompanying pictures of landscape scenes, the slogan »back to nature« that appears in tourist brochures actually reads »back to the rural«, especially because of the link made with the minute pattern of fields. The impression fosters a »moment of identification nostalgia« (Harvey 1989: 378) bringing us back to the time of the fictional, idyllic image of the life of the Slovene peasant created by Romanticism, the peasant who »for the glory of God and Emperor« lived in »harmony« with nature in a filigreed cultural landscape. Is this a retreat from reality? Both from the image making and the space itself, we can discern efforts to revive the image created by the protagonists of the national revival in the 19th century at the first signs of the establishment of Slovene nationhood, an idyllic picture that with its nostalgic note hides the objective characteristics of the life of contemporary Slovene society.13 Meanwhile, the filigreed rural landscapes are being ever more rapidly devoured and transformed by the widespread individual home construction by the part of the Slovene population living in this to a considerable extent still rural space but not from it. Thus we face a discrepancy between the reality and the image, between what we are and what we would like to be and identify with inwardly and also show outwardly - an ideal identification component. The principles linked to the ideal conception of space do not match actual social practice. To put it in the language of myth, we are dealing here with a discrepancy between reality and truth, a discrepancy between the real development of the country and the ideological history of the landscape. This is probably a case of a cultural myth on which the exceptionality of the Slovene national space is based. The modern Slovene identity is also being created by the differentiation from the conception of the industrialized globalized Europe. Here is an oasis where you can return to nature - one 13 »Reviving the image« in the space itself is also fostered by certain regulations such as those about building according to models of traditional regional architecture. Political and economic propaganda which trades on patriotic emotions contributes most to reviving the image In the social consciousness, followed by tourist propaganda that follows world trends in creating such images, Slovene popular music, the souvenir industry, and others. 162 slogan from the tourist propaganda reads, »Back to nature on the sunny side of the Alps!«- and enjoy sun, health, and peace to your heart's content. The tourist propaganda in these slogans is also political since it presents to the world an idyllic »clean, beautiful, and healthy country« as shown by its homeliness and rural hospitality. This »cleanliness«, however, also has within it many negative connotations. Today, as Žagar (1992: 158) wittily analyzed the situation, »the passion for making statements and assessments on the Slovene identity distinctly permeates Slovene society«. In this game are trapped not only the diverse products of economic and tourist propaganda created by individuals and companies in various media but also official promotional materials. Political propaganda as well deliberately participates in establishing the imago sloveniae in pictures and words as it adroitly exploits the patriotic feelings of the always present populism. Here, however, we are dealing with a peculiar paradox: the nostalgic obsession with rural roots is a global and globalizational phenomenon. The local in this respect equals and opposes the global at the same time. The global connection lies in the fact that the domestic landscape type represents a model ofthe idealized past regardless of the geographic location ofthe physical space of the society involved in it and regardless of cultural differences; the model, as Ehrentraut (1996) recognizes it in the case of open-air museums, is also present in post-industrial societies such as Germany and Japan. The study illuminated several reasons and processes that made it possible to form such a conception of space in Slovenia. This socially established construct is composed of places, landscape types, and landscape characteristics to which the culture and society attached special meanings during their historical development. Such as it is, it presents the social value system and is also affected by it. The conception a society has about the space in which it lives affects the way it deals with it, as much on the level of the whole society as on the level of the individual. However, within the value system there are differences between the principle values and those by which we orient ourselves in practice as individuals or as a society. The ideal conception is undoubtedly also the result of the picture conveyed by the media and other ideological apparatuses. This is precisely the ideological apparatuses of the state, in particular the schools, could, provided their own awareness is high, contribute to a more realistic conception of the space. Such a case is described by Stahl (1993) in his presentation of the programs of an Israeli association for the preservation of nature devoted to the education of Oriental Jews who in accordance with Genesis view nature either as an economic resource or as a dangerous wilderness. The goal ofthese programs is to change their traditionalist conceptions. Also in Slovenia, the broadening of awareness of the real characteristics of space and of the values influenced by cultural and social history is today in any case more present than previously, particularly in tourist propaganda. The dynamics of the spatial conception also appear in the time dimension. However, the ideologically more closed political propaganda tends toward homogeneity in this field as well. Precisely for this reason, the manipulation of the spatial identity that occurs on the national level can be counterproductive. Creating an unrealistic image of space and becoming infatuated with it can blur the vision and blind us to serious problems in the environment. Therefore, it makes no sense to limit the spatial identity only to the components established as national symbols during periods of endeavours for nationhood. Knowledge about the processes of establishing the social conception of space is certainly useful information. The present study has taken an initial step in this direction; possibly further studies on the starting points it has established will be able to provide more precise answers to the questions landscape planning frequently asks itself: how to protect and preserve, if it is possible at all, the image of the cultural landscape in a time when the ways of using the land and the relationship to the space are changing fundamentally. Will this development indeed mean a loss of identity or will it bring qualitative change? The countryside - and not only in Slovenia - stands on the threshold of major changes, as much in the sense of social as of spatial restructuring: the laws of the European and world markets have already brought much faster changes than those we witnessed in the not so distant past. One of the basic characteristics of countryside communities is their inflexibility, the difficult acceptance of and even resistance toward adapting to external changes. In the spatial sense, the patterns of use in particular will change, especially those that in principle we establish as definitive for our space. Assuming the need for their preservation is demonstrated, even 163 Na sončni strani Alp Figure 24: Posters from the campaign to promote Slovenia as a uniform tourist country that along with its geographical location »On the Sunny Side of the Alps« also emphasize the emotionally appealing slogan »Slovenia, My Country«. 164 Slika 24: Plakati akcije za promocijo Slovenije kot enovite turistične dežele, ki jo je poleg geografske umestitve »Na sončni strani Alp«, poudarjalo tudi čustveno naravnano geslo »Slovenija, moja dežela«. 165 if only because of the principle of protecting our cultural and natural heritage, it will not be possible without substantial financial support from the state. Here it is very important to know the socially established value system - the system of principle definitions society forms in relation to the space in which it lives and their disharmony with the prevailing behaviour. In spite of the universal models for managing the physical environment, in this respect as well it will be possible to preserve the spatial identity. One of the hindering factors in Slovenia is certainly the physical space; other factors undoubtedly include cultural differences based on historical memory. Neither the real space nor the social conception of it are constant but depend upon the times - they emerge and complement each other in the course of constant change. From this we can conclude that any form of inclusion in world integration processes will not mean a loss of identity but rather only its qualitative change; so it is only seemingly threatened. As there is no single and absolute conception and as the value systems are open and not final, we must only avoid generalizing in such a way that the characteristics of one region or the value system of one social group is generalized to the whole, regardless of whether we act on the local or the global scale. 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Yale University Press, New Haven. Jug, M., 1995, Razvrščanje krajinskih območij Slovenije na osnovi digitaliziranih prostorskih podatkov. Dn. Biotehniška fakulteta, Ljubljana. Južnič, S., 1987, Antropologija. Fakulteta za družbene vede, Ljubljana. Južnič, S., 1993, Identiteta. Fakulteta za družbene vede, Ljubljana. Kardelj, E., 1970, Razvoj slovenskega narodnostnega vprašanja. Državna založba Slovenije, Ljubljana. Kos, J., 1979, Pregled slovenskega slovstva. Državna založba Slovenije, Ljubljana. Lenz-Romeiß, F., 1970, Die Stadt - Heimat oder Durchgangstation? Calwey Verlag, München. 166 Linhart, A., 1791, Poskus zgodovine Kranjske in drugih dežel južnih Slovanov Avstrije. Problemi 8 (1970) 1-92: 5-27. Marušič, J. et al., 1994, Regionalna razdelitev krajinskih tipov v Sloveniji. BF, Ljubljana. Mikuž, S., 1977, Maksim Gaspari - monografija. Mladinska knjiga, Ljubljana. Nora, P., 1984, Les lieux de Memoire. Gallimard, Paris. Pirjevec, D., 1970, Vprašanje naroda. Problemi 91-92: 1-19. Polič, M., 1978, Simbolizem prostora in prostorskih oblik. Dd. Filozofska fakulteta, Ljubljana. Prunk, J., 1986, Slovenski narodni programi. Društvo 2000, Ljubljana. Roth, I., Frisby, J., 1986, Perception and Representation: A Cognitive Approach.: Open University Press, Philadelphia. Rupel, M., 1969, Valvasorjevo berilo. Iz Slave Vojvodine Kranjske. Mladinska knjiga, Ljubljana. Rus, V., 1970, Razvojne posebnosti majhnega naroda. Problemi 91-92: 20-38. SSKJ, 1995, Slovar slovenskega knjižnega jezika. SAZU, DZS, Ljubljana. Smith, A., 1991, National Identity. University of Nevada Press. Stahl, A., 1993, Educating for a change in attitudes toward nature and environment. Environment and Behavior. 1: 3-21. Urbančič, I., 1970, O slovenstvu in filozofiji. Problemi 91-92, 58-73. Velikonja, M., 1996, Masade duha - razpotja sodobnih mitologij. Znanstveno in publicistično središče, Ljubljana. Vodopivec, P., 1996, Pogovor. Slovenska smer,. Cankarjeva založba, Ljubljana. Vrišer, I., 1976, Uvod v geografijo. Filozofska fakulteta, Ljubljana. Zube, E., ur., 1978, Studies in Landscape Perception. University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Zwitter, F., 1964, Slovenski politični preporod 19. stol. v okviru evropske nacionalne problematike. Sodobnost 12, 11-12. Ljubljana. Žagar, I., 1992, Jezikanja. Pasadena, Ljubljana. 6.1. Sources of Illustrations and Photographs Figure 1: M. Gaspari, before World War II. Fototeka NG (Ljubljana). Figure 3: Questionnaire SJM95/2, Center for the Research of Public Opinion, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana. Figure 4: Questionnaire SJM95/2, Center for the Research of Public Opinion, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana. Photographs in questionnaire: 1, 2, 5, 7, 10, 14, 17, 18 (D. Ogrin); 3, 4, 9, 12, 13, 15, 16, 20c (A. Kučan); 6 (Design biro Ljubljana); 11 (J. Marušič); 20a (S. Klemenc). Figure 5, Figure 6: Marušič, J. et al., Regionalna razdelitev krajinskih tipov v Sloveniji. Sklepno poročilo. BF, Institute of Landscape Architecture, Ljubljana, 1994. Database ofthe Ministry of Environment and Physical Planning, Office of Physical Planning. Figure 21: Slovenija iz zraka, Mladinska knjiga, 1995, photo S. Klemenc; Slovenia, Flint River Press, 1994, photo P. Pokorn; Lepa Slovenija, Mihelač 1994, photo J. Žnidaršič. Figure 22: 1994 advertisement, Mladina (Vol. 33, 1994): 31; 1992 SKD poster, Formart2 (1993) 6: 70. Figure 23: Gorjup, 1939; J. Trpin, 1949; J. Bavčer, 1978. National and University Library archives in Ljubljana. Figure 24: Studio marketing Delo (J. Bavčer), 1988-1990. CTEP archives. 7. Povzetek V slovenski nacionalni predstavi imajo krajine kot nosilke identitete gotovo pomembno mesto. V ta namen so ji zemljepisne značilnosti ozemlja nudile nekatere zlahka razločljive identifikacijske prvine; druge je iskala znotraj svojega kulturnega in zgodovinskega izročila. Rezultati tridelne raziskave so potrdili izhodiščne hipoteze o krajinskih prvinah in vzorcih kot nosilcih nacionalne prostorske 167 identitete; tudi v tem, da gre pri oblikovanju predstave za stalno prepletanje odnosa fizičnih in simbolnih dejavnikov. Raziskava se je problema lotila najprej z zgodovinskim pregledom evolucije slovenske narodnostne in kasneje tudi nacionalne identitete ter z iskanjem njunih navezav na kraje, obmocja ali posamezne prvine »domacega prostora«. Raziskala je, kako so doloceni deli prostora vstopali v družbeno zavest in pri tem obravnavala tudi krajinske upodobitve v književnih in slikarskih delih. Slednje je razkrilo, s cim so umetniki in drugi nosilci nacionalne ideje skušali izraziti slovenskost prostora. Drugi del je obsegal analizo propagandnih sklopov, usmerjeno v razbiranje znakov, s katerimi se je izražala slovenskost prostora v likovni govorici turisticne, politicne in ekonomske propagande v letih od 1945 do 1995. Tretji del, ki ga v clanku podrobneje predstavljamo, pa je sestavljala javnomnenjska anketa, ki je preverjala neposredno razpoznavnost teh znakov pri ljudeh. Znacilnosti skupne predstave je razbirala neposredno iz predstav posameznikov, tako da jim je s seznami prostorskih prvin in sestavljenimi krajinskimi vzorci na fotografijah predstavila stvarne znacilnosti prostora. V nasprotju z drugima dvema deloma raziskave je bila anketa preko prepoznavanja znacilnosti in pomena krajinskih enot, ki gradijo predstavo o Sloveniji v zaznavi in vrednotenju posameznikov, usmerjena v odkrivanje bolj skritih plasti navezanosti prebivalcev na prostor, v katerem živijo. Odkrivanju konceptualizacije enotne predstave o prostoru, ki jo opredeljuje pridevnik »slovenski«, so bili podvrženi tako vzorec anketiranih in izbor krajin kot odlocitev za medij, s katerim bodo krajine predstavljene, in izbiranje fizicnih razsežnosti krajinskih prizorov. Tako je bila usmerjena predvsem v ugotavljanje: • ali izpraševanci prepoznavajo dolocene poteze fizicnega prostora, ki bi jih lahko pripisali Sloveniji kot celoti in • katerim krajem oziroma obmocjem pripisujejo vecji pomen v predstavljanju Slovenije. Glede na predmet obdelave in zaradi cim vecje verodostojnosti je bilo smiselno izvesti javnomnenj-sko anketo. Reprezentativni vzorec je dolocil Center za raziskavo javnega mnenja in množicnih komunikacij pri Fakulteti za družbene vede Univerze v Ljubljani, ki je tudi izvajal anketo. Vprašanja o znacilnostih slovenskega prostora je prikljucil mednarodni raziskavi vrednot SJM95/2. Vzorec je obsegal 1050 vprašanih. Minimalna starost anketiranih je bila 18 let, zgornje starostne meje niso do-locili. Anketiranci so se razlikovali še po spolu, po stopnji dosežene izobrazbe in poklicu. V casu ankete so vsi imeli stalno bivališce v Sloveniji. Anketa je glede na število prebivalcev proporcionalno zajela anketirance v vseh krajih Slovenije. Tekla je v dveh delih. Najprej je na terenu potekala ustna anketa, tako da je izpraševalec vprašanja postavljal, izpraševanci pa so odgovarjali, kasneje pa so odgovarjali še na vprašalnik, poslan po pošti. V terensko anketo so bila med vprašanja o vrednotah vkljucena štiri vprašanja o znacilnostih prostora (Slika 3). V drugem, pisnem delu spraševanja so isti izbrani naknadno prejeli po pošti še vprašalnik z barvnimi fotografijami (Slika 4), ki so ga izpolnjevali sami in tudi vrnili po pošti. Ustni del ankete je vkljucil štiri vprašanja in sicer tri odprta in eno izbirno vprašanje. Vprašalnik, poslan po pošti, pa so sestavljala tudi vprašanja, vezana na fotografske predstavitve posameznih delov slovenskega prostora in dolocenih pomembnih krajev oziroma obmocij. Vprašanja so bila sestavljena tako, da so druga drugo dopolnjevala in si hkrati vzajemno služila kot kontrola - rezultati enega vprašanja naj bi pomagali pojasniti rezultate drugega. Pri sestavljanju ankete je bila pozornost v prvi vrsti usmerjena v to, kako najbolje opisati krajinski prostor Slovenije, ne da bi vprašanim vsiljevali svoje predstave. Zato vprašalnik ohranja v prvih dveh delih raziskave odkrite tri ravni velikostnih razredov krajinskih enot - kraj, motiv, prvino - in po njih sprašuje tako s fotografijo kot z besedo. Prostor opiše s skrbno izbranimi prostorskimi enotami, ki lahko delujejo kot posamezni in kot splošni pojavi, odvisno od konteksta konceptualizacije. 168 Anketa podaja skupek osebnejših mnenj o značilnostih slovenske krajine in namenoma ne presega individualnih predilekcij in predispozicij. Namen tega dela raziskave je bil namreč ugotoviti, ali morda v predstavah obstajajo razlike med posameznimi družbenimi skupinami glede na njihov socialni ustroj ali kraj bivanja, oziroma ali obstajajo razlike glede na namen predstavljanja - razlike med prostorsko predstavo, ki naj bi se prenašala med generacijami, nekakšno »domovinsko vzgojo« in med predstavo, kakršna je v rabi za vzpostavljanje in ohranjanje lastne podobe v odnosu do tujih. Rezultati so tako razkrili, kakšen je današnji položaj določenih krajev, krajin ali krajinskih tipov v vrednostnem sistemu na Slovenskem. Razkrili so prostorske prvine, ki se pojavljajo v identifikacijski vlogi in vpliv simbolnih vrednosti na izbor prostorskih enot in/ali posameznih značilnosti v koncept predstave o slovenskem prostoru kot celoti. Simbolni pomeni so prisotni na obeh ravneh vzpostavljanja identitete, tako na ravni kontinuitete kot na ravni diference. Očitne so tudi razlike med družbeno sprejeto predstavo o pomenu posameznih krajev, območij in prevladujočih značilnostih slovenskih krajin ter med bolj osebnimi pogledi. Rezultati pa so potrdili tudi, da obstajajo razlike v predstavi o prostoru glede na namen, s katerim jo prikličemo v zavest ter razlike med posameznimi skupinami znotraj družbe v tovrstnem dojemanju prostora. Povzamemo lahko, da se nacionalna identiteta navezuje na določeno krajinsko podobo, ki jo gradijo izbrani krajinski vzorci in posamezne prostorske sestavine. Prva značilnost podobe je, da je bistveno opredeljena z Alpami in morjem. Takoj za njima kot najpomembnejšima določilnicama se v tej predstavi pojavljajo jezera, zlasti Blejsko. V epitom slovenskega prostora posplošeni krajinski tip pa gradi hribovit svet z agrarnimi kulturnimi krajinami: njivsko-travniškim svetom in vinogradi, nujno pa vsebujejo tudi simbolna obeležja: cerkvice in kozolce. Taka predstava vsekakor izhaja iz dežele Kranjske - »gorate dežele Goratan«, kakor jo je označil Linhart in »iskreno katoliške«, kakor je ugotovil že Valvasor. Ob dejstvu, da hribovit, skrbno obdelan svet s cerkvicami na vzpetinah pokriva večino Slovenije, pa je gotovo tudi posledica prizadevanj vzpostavljanja narodne zavesti v odnosu do tujega, ki so se vodila s stališča Kranjske dežele. Kljub temu namreč, da se zavedamo raznolikosti, se, ko enkrat prestopimo referenčni prag »slovenstva«, obračamo na Slovenijo kot na krajinsko homogeno območje. Krajinski tip, ki jo pooseblja, pa je bolj kot homogena predstava nekakšen prostorski kolaž. Obstaja kot idealna predstava, odmaknjena od stvarnosti, s katero se kot skupina istovetimo. Pri tem gre verjetno za kulturni mit, s katerim se utrjuje izjemnost slovenskega prostora. Ta nas povezuje z nami od prej (kontinuiteta) obenem pa nas razločuje od drugih, tudi od podobnih. Spoznanja o procesih vzpostavljanja družbene predstave, o dejavnikih, ki nanjo vplivajo, in prvinah, ki jo gradijo, so v krajinskem načrtovanju temeljno izhodišče. Raziskava, katere del je predstavljen v tem članku, je v to smer naredila prvi korak; nadaljnje raziskave na njenih izhodiščih bi lahko podale natančnejše odgovore na vprašanja, ki jih ta šele odpira: kako varovati identiteto kulturne krajine v času, ko se bistveno spreminjajo načini rabe in odnos do prostora. 169