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democratic government of the right Democratic Party of Albania (Partia Demokratike e
Shqipërisë). In the period between 13th and 15th century, except for some areas such as
isolated mountainous places of northern Mirdita area and strategically important open coast of
Himarë/Himara area, most of the places throughout Albania were governed according to the
rules of the feudal system which was based on the existence of few large landowners, while
the majority of population were peasants (Jacques 1995: 164-177). In these areas
decollectivisation went smoothly, while in Mirdita (de Waal 1996: 169-193) and
Himarë/Himara area, this was not the case. Here the land used to be owned by small
proprietors whose successors nowadays object to the governmental distribution plans and
claim back the land of their fathers (Bollano et.al. 2006: 217-241).
According to the official population registration from 2005, the village of Dhërmi/Drimades
conjoins approximately 1.800 residents, one half of whom lives in the emigration in Greece or
elsewhere (mainly United States and Italy). Because of the massive emigration of youth,
mainly the elderly population (born before 1950) and only a couple of young families live in
the village of Dhërmi/Drimades. Besides them, the village is nowadays also inhabited by a
growing number of families and seasonal workers from other parts of Albania. They moved to
Dhërmi/Drimades after 1990. While most of the year the place is rather desolated, in summer
months it bustles with tourists, among whom prevail the emigrants originating from
Dhërmi/Drimades and other places throughout Albania. Tourists arriving from Vlorë and the
capital Tirana, from Kosovo and sometimes from other parts of Europe, however, can also be
seen.
Dynamic Processes of Construction and Reconfiguration of
Dhërmi/Drimades and Himarë/Himara Area
The previous section outlined peoples’ movements which beside different social, political and
economic relations and divisions refigured different locations (locatedness) of
Dhërmi/Drimades and its wider area. Within such a dynamical process (see Lefebvre 1974, de
Certeau 1984, Ingold 1993 and 2000, Gupta and Ferguson 2001) various “where’s” were
constructed (cf. Green 2005). The locations of Dhërmi/Drimades and Himarë/Himara were
defined in a relation to other places and people with whom local people got in contact during
their movements. People travelled across the whole area of Ottoman vilayet and later across
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