“When finally…I stood on the Acropolis and cast my eyes around upon the landscape, a surprising thought suddenly entered my mind: ‘So all this really doesexist, just as we learned in school.’” So wrote Sigmund Freud, having experienced the Acropolis in the midst of modern-day Athens (“A Disturbance in Memory on the Acropolis,” in Collected Papers Volume 5, Hogarth, 1950[1936]). Freud’s reaction was typical of many Western elegies written to this 2,400-year-old landmark--in awe of the past, dismissive of or oblivious to the present. But how do residents of Athens and other modern Greeks live and experience the Acropolis as a material reality and as a site for imagination? What is the “local claim” of the Acropolis? In answering this question, Yalouri takes us on a fascinating tour through the politics of heritage and archaeology and struggles over the control of the circulation of objects and meanings in our contemporary world. This is a case study in the social life of things, tracing the Acropolis through ethnographic examination of people’s interactions with the ruin itself, its myriad representations, and the discourses surrounding it--“the way Greeks and the Acropolis are engaged in a dialectic process of objectification, forming, transforming, or reproducing each other” (p. 17).

In four chapters, Yalouri describes the Acropolis as condensing, contesting, consuming, and aestheticizing:

Condensing. Yalouri argues that the Acropolis functions as a multivocal dream-symbol of Greek national identity as that identity is experienced in space and time. Time itself, particularly in a “glorious history” that founds a nation-state, becomes a physical property, having weight and dimension. The Acropolis becomes the “national body,” grown, like a living object, out of the soil of Greece. Like a physical body, it suffers wounds and decay, as well as revitalizations. In all of these metaphorical imbrications, the Acropolis acts as a lieu de memoire, more expressive than language because of its very visibility, tangibility, and durability.

Contesting. Yalouri provides a fascinating account of the circulation of Greek antiquities beyond the borders of Greece, and of debates over traveling exhibitions and over Greek attempts to reclaim the Parthenon (Elgin) Marbles now housed in the British Museum. Thus the “global fame” of the Hellenic heritage, claimed by some in the West as a world heritage, must both circulate like a Kula shell to increase Greece’s fame and return to Greece to help reassemble the nation-state it embodies. The debate over the return of the Parthenon marbles becomes a microcosm of modern Greece’s attempt to “reterritorialize diasporic Hellenism” (p. 85), to reclaim the fame that has traveled beyond its borders and, in a sense, escaped its control. Thus, Greeks attempt to ensure that Greek heritage belongs “in the world, but to Greece” (p. 112).

Consuming. Here Yalouri explores questions of the commodification of cultural heritage: How can Greek antiquities be both cultural capital and at the same time remain unpolluted by associations with the marketplace? Drawing on Annette Weiner’s notion of “inalienable possessions,” Yalouri shows how Greeks believe that their heritage is a gift to the world; hence, any suggestion of market exchange of antiquities suggests replaceability, lack of uniqueness, which threatens group identity. Yalouri traces this discourse through reactions to the advertising campaigns of several corporations, including Coca-Cola’s depiction of the Parthenon with its columns in the shape of Coke bottles. Within this debate one finds subtle reflections and nonnationalist discourses on questions concerning the triumph of free-market values in the world more generally, as well as on the relationship between originals and copies.

Aestheticizing. Here Yalouri considers the experience of the sensory qualities of the Acropolis, as well as the aura of sacredness that surrounds it. She opposes official discourses, which stress the distance senses, particularly vision, with the everyday experience of the Acropolis through the more proximate senses. For the Greek state, the Acropolis becomes a sort of panopticon, separate from the city of Athens but always visible, looking down on the doings of the city’s inhabitants. Particularly interesting is the taboo against any multisensory appreciation of the Acropolis that might mix the profane and the sacred, best expressed in the visceral reaction of a British, classically trained friend of Yalouri’s who became visibly disturbed at the prospect of eating lunch in the proximity of the Acropolis.

Two additional aspects of Yalouri’s book deserve mention. One is her use of interviews with and essays by Greek schoolchildren exploring the meanings of the Acropolis. The children’s responses suggest both the early internalization of adult views and the ways that those who diverge from such views may be stigmatized. The second is Yalouri’s extensive use of illustrations--images of the Acropolis, newspaper clippings, and cartoons--which provide a valuable adjunct to the textual story and contribute to its overall readability. In short, this is a book that can be read and used at a number of levels. As a focused case study illustrating current approaches to material culture and the ways in which “material goods are converted into non-material fields of influence” (p. 193), it deserves a wide readership among scholars. It should also find its place in courses on material culture, as well as in Western civilization courses, where it would provide a useful corrective to the distancing effects of a long tradition of consuming the Hellenic.