Collective Identities: Race, Ethnicity, Nation NEGOTIATING IDENTITY AND PLACE IN 21ST CENTURY DUBLIN: EVIDENCE FROM NEWS PERIODICALS OWNED AND MANAGED BY AFRICANSAuthor(s): Abel Ugba Until recently, Ireland could not be
conceived of as an immigrant country although there were minority ethnic
groups, like the Jews, Travellers and Chinese, in the country. Although
official policies and attitudes have yet to acknowledge the on-going
dramatic transformation in the country's ethnic and cultural landscape,
the fact simply is that Ireland is now home to diverse immigrant and
ethnic groups. Prominent among these groups are African immigrant workers,
students, diplomats and refugees and asylum seekers. Many Africans in
Dublin, according to a recent survey I conducted, have indicated they
intend to make Ireland their home, even if a second home.
African-initiated churches and African-owned periodicals are two of the
main institutions through which Africans in Dublin are expressing this
desire. They are also the foci for the search for an identity and for
expressing that identity. This presentation examines two of such
publications by analysing their contents, policies and orientation. The
publishers/mangers will also be interviewed to elicit their views on the
peculiar history, management and aspirations of these media. The purpose
of my investigation and presentation is to demonstrate that these social
institutions are not only channels for social interaction and
communication but also the pointers to what Africans in Dublin are and
want to be. Author(s): Ada Cattaneo This study is based on two orders of
reflections about relationships between local people and newcomers in a
multicultural and multiethnic town as Milan is today. The former point
deals with stereotypes and their scientifically demonstrated influence on
behaviours, moods, believes, feelings, reactions, social representations.
The latter point underlines the importance of odours, flavour, perfumes,
fragrances, scents as a peculiar trait of ethnical identity coming from
both physical and psychological factors and from the particular products
and foods used following traditions and habits. The paper presents
findings of an explorative research made on a sample of Italian
inhabitants in Milan. It aims to portrait some semell-bias generally
adopted against members of the biggest migrants communities in the city.
Author(s):
Ángela López Each city has spaces for public use -
spaces which in the eyes of its inhabitants and visitors make up its
identity. The intensity with which these spaces are occupied at any given
time is in function of their purpose. In the long run, it is the purposes
to which these spaces are put that give them their nature, their meaning
and their symbolism. The study of the city of Zaragoza has among its
objectives, the identification of the more frequently used public spaces.
The public spaces chosen for this study are those which have a present-day
social relevance in addition to being part of the heritage of the city:
spaces which are alive, which fulfil social purposes. Some of these spaces
are identifying features of the city: the meaning they have acquired lends
them a special symbolism. This paper presents the spaces studied with a
methodological proposal of urbanistic-architectural categories of the
city. Author(s): Anna Kisla The team my scientific researches is
interethnic relations in Crimea's society: tendency of isolationism and
national tolerance. Scientific research by problems of ethnicity's
identity is very major aspect of studying interethnic relations. Results
of my research allow to draw paradox conclusion : a identity of ethnicity
is major reason of tendency isolationism. Especially it is obviously in
states which has time of transformation - Ukraine, Russia, Belarus,
Moldova. Ukraine has the region - Crimea's peninsula, which has the great
potential ethnic conflict, at first because there are intensive
representative Slav and Muslim ethnic, and second because there are deep
social order to the ethnic identity. It is famous fact, that a lot of
countries had ethnic problems, especially problems of isolationism -
Canada, France, Spain, Ukraine, Russia, England. I think a phenomenon of
isolationism has next reason - 1. Active ethnic identification is as a
requirement of selfrealisation, 2.The reaction a non-dominator nation to
process of globalisation, 3. Evolution's development as the factor of
provocation isolationism. There is a peculiarity : the isolationism be
repeated at certain stage of development humanity ( Evgenii Golovaha, Karl
W.Deutsch). But Ukraine has the super-problems of isolationism. Results of
sociological research of Institute Sociology ( the author - Panina N,
Golovaha E.) to show, that 48% of population of Ukraine has tendency to
isolationism ( figures had control). This is a catastrophe. What does my
country must to do? Author(s): Arseniy Svynarenko This article examines the effects of
ethnicity, class, and generation on the formation of national and regional
identities of young people in Russia. Specifically, the focus of this
article is on the young people in Karelia - the North-Western region of
Russia that has the longest land boarder with European Union and specific
local ethnic diversity. Article also presents comparisons with other
regions and the city of Moscow. Ethnic factors in this article refer to
influences of language and cultural self-identification on the interplay
between ethnic and civic identities. Class is taken as a generalising
category for such factors as enrolment in education, educational levels,
specifics of employment, and financial well-being of young people.
Influence of this group of factors on ethnic, national and cosmopolitan
identities is examined. The category of generation highlights the
specifics of contextual developments and events in the region and their
effects on the local ethnic and Russian national identity - differences
and similarities between the age cohorts are analysed. Specifically, these
contextual elements include the effects of ethnic and migrational policies
of the state on the intensity of assimilation and Russification of local
ethnic groups. Data from a large survey, combined with interviews and
statistical data demonstrate that there is an important rise of
actualisation of Russian national identity for young people in Karelia. In
this respect, there is also a significant difference between rural and
urban young people, and also young people living in the capital - Moscow.
Further more, the data shows that the Russian nationalism in this part of
Russia can't be directly associated with Russian ethnocentrism. This is a
principal differemce from nationalism in Ukraine and some of other former
soviet states. The core of the "we" group refers to broader
range of ethnicities living in Russia, that belong to Slavic group and
Eastern Orthodox religious tradition. The significant "other" is
represented, first of all, by the nations of other countries of former
Soviet Union and, secondly, by European nations. Class position has an
important influence of the preferences of local and global identities, and
on the national identity specifically. Generational differences are most
evident for ethnic, regional identities. Author(s): Belkis Ayhan
Tarhan This study is specifically concerned with the process Turkey has been witnessing since 1990s during which the attempts in the way of integration into the world market and, more recently, to the European Union have been characteristic in terms of determining the political, economic, and socio-cultural agenda in the country. This process denotes the special play of both the "global" and the "local" in the construction of the boundaries according to which the identities are imagined. It is evident that such play is by no means specific to Turkey but how it takes place in this particular case is important for Turkey is constructed (or, rather, constructs itself) as a "boundary" between West and East not only geographically but also socially, culturally, economically, and politically. To this extent, the concept of "boundary" is of special importance here since boundaries of various kinds are regarded not as constructs determined once! for all but rather as imaginary constructs that can only be understood in accordance with the changes in the very terms of the imagination. Thus, how the national identity/identities and its/their others are built in terms of these boundaries is explored on the basis of the examination of the examples of imagining the 'Turkishness'. However, the concept, 'identity' is also questioned in the present study for it tends to stabilize the cultures on the grounds of essentialized experiences rather than to point them as processes. Author(s): Carina Nocetti Olazábal En las múltiples definiciones sobre lo que
son los estilos de vida, entendida como variable explicadora de
comportamientos, parece interesante pensar al fenómeno más allá de la
pertinencia de los conceptos. Las ciencias sociales tienen dos
preocupaciones para saber de que se habla cuando nos referimos a los
estilos de vida. Por un lado cuestionar teóricamente su validez y por
otro medir empíricamente el concepto. Bajo el supuesto de conocer,
explicar y si fuera posible también predecir hechos sociales, se
presentan múltiples discusiones teóricas. Así se construye y
reconstruye permanentemente el significado. El objetivo de la ponencia es
analizar, a través de resultados de estudios de opinión pública, el
proceso de construcción del concepto. Author(s): Carla
De Tona The Italian diaspora in Ireland represent an exceptional case within the Irish diasporic history. Despite their successful accommodation, with their economic success in the catering activities, especially Fish and Chips shops, Italians remained an invisible 'othered' community. Italian migrant women have remained doubly invisible. In this paper I'd like to focus on those Italians who settled in Dublin during the 1950s and 1960s. For some of them, despite the successful activities, a period of over 15 years, passed before they were able to visit again their home villages, a gap which covered their adult age. I wan to suggest that the gap in time was filled with memories and that women were responsible for narrativization of the "collective annals of memory and re-memory" of their diasporic lives (Brah, 1996). Narrativization is here the process of mending together the cracks and breaks of migration and allowing fluid identies to be harmonized in a form of continuity. Thereby it becomes possible to see how women are not just trapped in traditional gender roles. Despite women confinement in the 'back kitchen', i.e. (not only metaphoric) private and bounded areas of expression, they covered important roles, managing successfully not only their personal lives but also the community sense of identity. This has a striking parallel with the history of the entire community of Italian immigrants in Dublin, which would support Anthias' argument for a need to understand gender roles in migrant communities, as a group reproduction in a selective way of the symbolic relations it lives within (Anthias 1998). Author(s):
Carmen Elboj and Julio Vargas Hace más de quinientos años que la
comunidad gitana está presente en Europa. Durante todo este período de
convivencia hemos dibujado una historia en común de la que apenas han
existido testimonios escritos. En los libros, los episodios de la
comunidad gitana aparecen aislados y desvinculados de la historia de
Europa, y de la de España. En esta comunicación presentaremos parte del
trabajo que se está llevando a cabo en el proyecto RTD europeo WORKALO:
The Creation of New Occupational Patterns for Cultural Minorities. La
propuesta de éste proyecto es, de esta manera identificar los factores
exclusores que impiden a los Gitanos entrar en el mercado regular de
trabajo, así como los factores transformadores que en el marco de la
Sociedad de la Información ayudan a superar estas barreras desarrollando
perfiles profesionales que promuevan el auto-empleo, la solidaridad
grupal, la transformación social de una población europea minoritaria
tradicionalmente excluida sin tener que renunciar a su propia identidad
como pueblo. Desde 1973 a 1995, tiene lugar la primera fase de esa
sociedad de la información con unas consecuencias que para Habermas
(1999) pueden describirse con el lenguaje del darwinismo social. El
conocimiento, como objeto básico de la nueva economía, transforma el
contenido mismo del trabajo, su distribución y su organización. A partir
de 1995, se inicia la segunda fase de la sociedad del conocimiento. La
Unión Europea y otras zonas del mundo se plantean el objetivo de
conseguir que la sociedad del conocimiento llegue a todas las personas que
habiten en estos territorios, sin hacer ninguna discriminación de género
o etnia. Si durante la primera fase de la Sociedad de la Información, la
mayoría de los estudios de la sociedad del conocimiento no incluían en
sus análisis las desigualdades que se estaban generando, excepto algunas
investigaciones que trabajaban con sectores excluidos (Flecha & al.,
1994), en la actualidad ya se contempla el riesgo de exclusión social que
sufren y pueden sufrir muchas personas y comunidades (Castells, 1997). En
la segunda fase de la Sociedad de la información, desde la Comisión
Europea (1995) se plantea la existencia de una fuerte desigualdad en el
acceso a la formación y al mercado de trabajo de determinados grupos
culturales y la posibilidad que ante esto la sociedad del conocimiento
ofrece para reducir esta tendencia. Las directrices que propone son el
acceso igualitario a la educación, de hombres y mujeres para asegurar que
grupos desaventajados como comunidades rurales, ancianos y ancianas,
minorías étnicas, comunidad gitana e inmigrantes tengan las mismas
oportunidades de acceso a las nuevas tecnologías y al aprendizaje para
que no se conviertan en ciudadanos de segunda clase. Por lo tanto es un
momento en el que la comunidad gitana y otros grupos pueden tener más
posibilidades de inclusión y de participación en el mercado de trabajo y
en la sociedad en general sin tener que renunciar a su propia identidad
como pueblo. Así mismo, se empiezan a contemplar la participación y la
voz de las personas de la comunidad gitana en estos estudios e
investigaciones, imprescindibles para empezar a plantear alternativas
inclusoras de diferentes identidades, como este mismo proyecto representa.
Author(s): Carmen Elboj
and Olga Serradell Los problemas y los nuevos retos ocasionados por una
sociedad cada vez más multicultural se están convirtiendo en una
cuestión de especial importancia debido a la realidad que representan. El
incremento de la movilidad migratoria entre los países pertenecientes a
la Unión Europea y entre éstos y terceros países, unido a la existencia
de minorías étnicas como la gitana, está aumentando la diversidad
social y cultural de nuestras sociedades a la vez que se agravian las
desigualdades y aumentan las actitudes racistas y xenófobas que no tienen
en cuenta los beneficios, la riqueza de esta diversidad cultural y social.
Los escenarios multiculturales, multiétnicos y multilingüísticos
resultantes demandan, de manera creciente, decisiones y alternativas que
comprendan enfoques sociales, culturales y educativos. En este contexto
actual de sociedad globalizada, informacional y multicultural, una nueva
ola de racismo está atravesando Europa. Al racismo moderno, propio de la
sociedad industrial y basado en la racionalidad instrumental hemos de
añadir el racismo postmoderno nacido en la informacional. Ambos tipos de
racismo coexisten en las actuales sociedades europeas y se complementan.
Mientras el racismo moderno se basa en la inferioridad de las razas, el
postmoderno incide en la idea de la diferencia entre etnias y culturas.
Importantes desarrollos políticos, intelectuales y educativos están
desplazando el énfasis desde el racismo moderno hacia el postmoderno. En
Europa existe una tradición de lucha antirracista contra el racismo
moderno, pero todavía no se han desarrollado suficientes elementos
intelectuales y culturales que sean capaces de luchar contra el racismo
postmoderno. Incluso hay ciertos conceptos usados en contra del racismo
moderno que promueven el racismo postmoderno. Éste es el caso de los
conceptos de la diferencia e identidad cuando se utilizan desligados del
de igualdad. El tradicional antirracismo moderno no es capaz de hacer
frente a la actual ofensiva xenófoba. Algunas categorías desarrolladas
por el antimodernismo pueden legitimizar el racismo postmoderno e incluso
su radicalización en una nueva clase de nazismo de la diferencia, basado
en las diferencias entre culturas, en lugar de la antigua idea de la
superioridad e inferioridad de las razas. Las teorías y prácticas
culturales generadas por la perspectiva dialógica y desde la racionalidad
comunicativa hacen frente a ambos racismos, el moderno y el postmoderno.
Author(s):
Cecilio Lapresta Rey, Ángel Huguet Canalís,Jordi Suïls Sobirà, Judit
Janés Carulla and Alexandra Monné Bellmunt En esta comunicación se pretende plantear
la relación existente entre la identidad cultural y la conciencia
lingüística en el Valle de Arán, comarca en la que encontramos un
contexto extraordinariamente peculiar. Este territorio se encuentra
situado en el extremo noroccidental de Catalunya, en la cara norte de los
Pirineos. La existencia de tres lenguas oficiales -el occitano-aranés, el
catalán y el castellano- hace de él un campo de análisis privilegiado
para el estudio de la identidad cultural de un colectivo cuya lengua
propia, aparte de ser minoritaria, se encuentra en una situación
minorizada. A partir de datos extraídos de un análisis que se está
realizando en el territorio desde la Universitat de Lleida, intentaremos
demostrar que, si bien a un nivel global de la población se tiene
bastante claro la importancia de la lengua propia en la configuración de
la identidad cultural de la comarca, existen diferentes discursos que nos
hacen replantear una posible la relación directa entre la conciencia
lingüística y identidad cultural. Al observar los discursos sociales que
sobre la aranesidad se desarrollan, observamos que la relación entre
conciencia lingüística e identidad cultural queda mediatizada por una
variable más significativa, que es el desarrollo de una afectividad hacia
el territorio. A partir del desarrollo de esta afectividad, la lengua
propia adquiere una importante valoración como un símbolo y valor
cultural propio y característico de la aranesidad, posibilitando así el
desarrollo de una significativa conciencia lingüística entre los
occitanófonos. Author(s): Christopher G.A. Bryant There are a number of contemporary
constructions of a Scottish nation and national identity including Celtic
Scotland, Scottish Scotland, British Scotland and Scotland in Europe - and
thus a number of ways of 'claiming' Scottishness (Hearn 2000). They differ
in their orientations to time (past and present) and place (home and
abroad), and in their comparative or contrasting conceptions of Britain
and Britons and, in particular, London and the south-east of England and
the English. The present currency and future prospects of these
alternatives are assessed in relation to political devolution and Scottish
autonomy (Paterson 1994) and the statelessness or otherwise of Scotland
(McCrone 1992 and 2001) and to changes in the demographies and economies
of both Scotland and Britain. Author(s): David Baringo Ezquerra El
artículo profundiza en algunas de las implicaciones que sobre el Noreste
de la Península Ibérica tienen las tesis del historiador francés E.
Todd relativas a las diferentes estructuras familiares europeas. Son
objeto de comparación y reflexión los territorios donde tradicionalmente
predominaron los sistemas familiares troncal completo (familia
jerárquica) y nuclear igualitario (familia igualitaria). En especial, sus
similitudes y diferencias, en la actualidad, a la hora de la definición
de sus identidades individuales y colectivas así como el trato con la
inmigración. La argumentación se sustenta en el análisis de fuentes
secundarias y en entrevistas realizadas por el autor sobre terreno. Author(s): Djurovic Bogdan The research on the relations among various
ethnic communities in Serbia conducted in the last few years pointed to a
relatively high level of socioehnic distance. After the interethnic
conflicts in the territory of the former Yugoslavia had stifled, it seemed
reasonable to expect such distance would become considerably lower.
However, the latest research results have not substantiated such
expectations. The outcome was quite the opposite.The use of a classical
instrument (Bogardus) has showed that Serbs, the majority nation, are not
willing to enter a marriage with Albanians in 81% of the cases, with
Boshniaks (Muslims)in 75%, Bulgarians 65%, Romanies 79%, Hungarians 56%,
and Vlachs 57%. When the biggest social distance was presupposed - that of
living in the same country - Serbs would not wish to see Albanians in the
same state in 70% of the cases, Boshniaks in 66%, Bulgarians in 68%,
Romanies in 57%, Hungarians in 63%, and Vlachs in 53% of the cases.Ethnic
distance, even xenophobia, is to be traced in the attitudes widely
accepted, for intance that "One can feel secure only in an ethnically
homogenuous environment" - complete or partial agreement with this
statement was given by 55% of the Serbs, 56% of the Boshniacs, 27% of the
Bulgarians, 41% of the Romanies and 52% of the Vlachs. As political,
economic and social stability depends on relatively stable interethnic and
mutial trust, one concludes that the process of recovery, democratization
and strengthening of civil society in Serbia is slowed down. Other
measurements from the research confirm the tendency mentioned above.
Populist and nationalist policies led until a few years ago in Serbia,
seen even today in a portion of the political spectrum, have become deeply
rooted in interethnic intolerance and consequent ethnic narcisism. The
statement that "their nation has qualities excelling it above other
nations" met total or partial agreement of 54% Serbs, 45% Albanians,
15% Boshniaks, 45%Bulgarians, 30% Romanies, and 50% Vlachs. Author(s): Elaine
Moriarty The past 10 years have been a time of
profound social change in Ireland - economic, social and cultural.
Consequently, the meaning of contemporary Irishness has become a site of
significant contestation and this contest has provided fertile material
for the construction of competing discourses. This paper seeks to examine
the centrality of processes of identity formation in the construction of
Irishness and Otherness, particularly the notion of 'new' identities
articulated through concepts of diaspora and hybridity. I will initially
outline a model of social ontology that recognises the dialectical
relationship between discourse and agency in the construction of identity.
I will engage in this theoretical exploration by focussing on a number of
key processes involved in the constitution of identities whether that be
individual subjectivity, ethnicity, nationality and associated processes
of othering and exclusion and inclusion. However, following the
dialectical model of social constitution, I will examine the intersections
of these processes of subjectivity with current hegemonic discourses
whether that be state driven multiculturalism, interculturalism or
equality and/or academic interventions through conceptual and discursive
construction. I will examine this model of identity formation by analysing
anti racism initaitives utilised by various actors in the 1990s and
consider some of the manifestations of such practices. Through engaging in
this theoretical and empirical exploration of the production of discourses
of Irishness and Otherness, I intend to demonstrate the role that
sociology can play in exposing some of the web of power in which
marginalised peoples, such as asylum seekers, refugees and Travellers,
find themselves struggling to negotiate their meaning and identity in
contemporary Ireland. Author(s): Elena Danilova The construction of new national identities
in post-communist countries is an important factor for national
consolidation, creation of citizenship, establishment of trust between the
state and individuals. The paper aims at exploring issues of national
identity in contemporary Russia as it reveals from results of 10 years
monitoring surveys and from drawing comparison on the basis of a
comparative survey of collective identities in Russia and Poland conducted
in 1998 and in 2002. Poland has a relatively homogeneous ethnic
composition and a historically high degree of national consolidation and
mobilisation while Russia is a multiethnic country with a long imperial
past going through trauma of losing its great power status. The
transformation of the national identity in Russia is a very complex
process and coincides with changing the very concept of national identity.
Paper examines a whole set of identities - ethnic, civil, local and with
the statehood. According to some commentators both in pre-revolutionary
and Soviet Russia there existed an imperial supernation with a core
consisting of ethnic Russians. The Soviet identity was a synthetic
identity which was supposed to suppress and substitute all other
collective identities and first and foremost the ethnic ones. Since 1992
as the data shows there is a split between civic, ethnic and cultural
components of national identity. On the one hand, one can observe the
revival of ethnic and local identities through rising the significance of
cultural attributes (land, language, locality, customs, religion). On the
other hand, - the rise of new civic identification that is with current
Russian state although it is not related to ethno-cultural elements and
does not fully compensate for the loss of Soviet identification. Nearly
half of Russian population are still aware of being the Soviets. All this
contrast with Polish model of consistent national identity rooted in
tradition and religion and providing basis for national consolidation. Author(s): Enzo Colombo and Giovanni Semi Living with and confronting diversity is
becoming a daily condition of every western city. This can creates anxiety
and a sense of insecurity and in some case - even when the borders of
diversity are less explicit - can create serious problems of rejection in
the form of racism and discrimination. But, it can also be associated with
a virtuous process of enrichment, reciprocal listening, understanding and
change. Looking at everyday confronting with otherness helps to reconsider
basic concepts of social science (i.e. culture, identity, difference and
hybridity) in order to avoid the parallel risks of reification and radical
subjectivity. Analysing everyday life and processes of relation with
diversity allows putting in evidence social processes and the never-ending
work of social construction of reality and sharing meanings. Starting from
Bakhtin concept of dialogic imagination and from contemporary discussion
on hybridity, diaspora and multiculturalism a critical iscussion of
identit and culture is presented in order to suggest an anti-essentialist
but deeply rooted in everyday life description of contemporary forms of
representation of and confrontation with difference. Author(s): Fredrik Hertzberg The aim of my paper is to show some aspects
of the ways in which street-level bureaucrats conceptualise and make sense
of a multiethnic society. The paper is a short version of my dissertation
in ethnology, whish is supposed to be completed and approved during the
fall semester of 2003. The study takes it point of departure in a
description of how employment officers in government-run employment
offices describe the problems and possibilities that youth of immigrant
descent face in the Swedish labour market. In this study, I focus on the
concepts and explanatory models they use in making sense of the behaviour
of those youth. I pay a certain attention to the explanatory value the
interviewees give to the concept of culture, and how they perceive the
relation between culture and agency, but also in how they oscillate
between different ways of describing the fact that the position of
immigrant youth in the labour market is worse, in comparison to other
persons in the same age. With an theoretical interest in anthropological
theory on ethnicity, but also in post-colonial studies, I aim to give an
theoretically informed description of the ways in which Otherness is
constructed as an deviation from perceived Swedish cultural norms and the
demands of the labour market, but also how Swedish-ness is marked and
constructed, as a more or less normative standard from which the anomaly
represented by the immigrants' deviates. Author(s): Harriet Silius Within postcolonial feminist theory the
questions of migration, colonialism and race have received considerable
attention. One strand of thought deals with women immigrants as shapers of
nation and culture and their negotiations between different intersections
in everyday life. Many authors have revealed the different effects of
Europe's colonial past on contemporary societies. The discussions on race
have pointed to whiteness as an important category. In Europe, intra group
differences between whites, however, has throughout history played
important roles (Jews, roma, gays and lesbians). Recent ethnic cleansing
in ex-Yugoslavia also highlight differences among whites. Recent research
on differences between women, for example considering class, race,
sexuality or generation have mainly focused on multiple discrimination of
women. Critical studies on men have also problematised unprivileged men.
Those who are successful and privileged have, however, seldom been
analysed with reference to migration and ethnicity. The paper deals with
an empirical analysis of the representation of Swedish-speaking Finnish
emigrants to Sweden in Swedish press. The immigrants to Sweden are
successful women and men with cultural capital who are known by the media
and the public. The aim of the paper is to show how ethnicity intersects
with gender. The focus is on agency and subjectivity. I analyse the
representations of Finland-Swedish ethnicity through some traditional
gendered dichotomies like war-peace, hierarchical-egalitarian,
culture-nature and modern-ancient. As a result, I found that in addition
to gendering, homogenisation and exotisation, are processes through which
ethnic difference is constructed. Author(s): Ignacio Irazuzta Desde hace aproximadamente dos décadas han proliferado en Argentina algunos trabajos que retoman la categorización étnica para nominar y caracterizar lo que tradicionalmente fueron "grupos de inmigrantes", las "colectividades". La apuesta implica cierta ruptura con las ideologías asimilacionistas, significativamente hegemónicas en el país a partir de una tradición sociológica enraizada en el discurso local del crisol de razas, a la vez que reedita la hipótesis de la estrecha relación de las ciencias sociales con el proceso de construcción de los estados nacionales. Sobre los antecedentes de la prolífica literatura de los estudios culturales, se pondrá especial énfasis en el actual proceso de mundialización, como tendencia que impulsa flujos globales capitales y de sentido, conformando así nuevos imaginarios sociales que contribuyen a la redefinición étnica de los grupos en cuestión. La misma insinúa el fenómeno de la reterritorialización de la identidad, desafiando los tradicionales patrones de objetivación de la pertenencia étnica, y creando unas "identidades híbridas" que sugieren nuevas pistas para pensar en las tesis sobre la ubicuidad de lo político en las sociedades contemporáneas. La ponencia explora algunos antecedentes históricos de la colectividad vasca de la ciudad de Buenos Aires y presenta algunos de los resultados de investigación que proveen la base sociológica para redefinir el concepto de etnicidad. Author(s):
Jose A. Cobas None of the classical theorists devoted
much attention to race and ethnicity. Emile Durkheim and Georg Simmel
exclude them from their writings and Karl Marx sees them as distractions
from the phenomenon of class. Max Weber addresses the issue of ethnicity,
leaving out race, but does so in a limited fashion. Ethnic markers receive
superficial attention in his writings. Other than commenting on their
arbitrariness, Weber is silent on ethnic markers. Contemporary theorists
adhere to this precedent. Fredrik Barth avers that ethnic markers are of
secondary importance to ethnic boundaries. My perspective disagrees with
Barth's conclusion. Racial markers are informative, principally because
they are tied to racial oppression and resistance. As a result of their
oppression of Blacks in the United States, Whites developed racial markers
to identify them: dark skin color, a permanent inferior nature, and an
"alienness" that distinguished them from White culture. Whites
applied these same markers about the same time to Native Americans, and
later to other oppressed groups. There is the view in the literature that
oppressed groups constitute empty vessels who absorb the ideas of the
dominant Whites. I argue that as part of their resistance, oppressed
groups developed racial markers with roots in their own cultures. Results
of a pilot study in general support this argument. Author(s): Kevin O'Brien Most commentators agree that Northern
Ireland is a deeply divided society. The major division has been
conceptualised in different ways as ethnic, religious, national, political
etc but whatever the designation commentators are able to identify two
communities in conflict. The different communities subscribe to different
national affiliations; one group identifying with the United Kingdom and
the other group with the Republic of Ireland. Both the UK and the Repubic
are members of the European Union and therefore participate in the debate
on European Integration. This paper examines the relationship between the
national identities of the conflicting groups in Northern Ireland and how
these are being challenged by the new concept of European citizenship. The
paper will report on an empirical study (number=340)of young people which
attempted to measure orientations towards the European Union. In general
young people are favourable towards Europe and the question arises whether
this might facilitate a resolution of the conflict in Northern Ireland by
transending local considerations. The paper offers some tentative
conclusions on this possibility. Author(s): Luis Enrique Alonso The crisis of labour and redistribution as
central social values and the crisis of citizenship run together because
so they run both elements in contemporary society, society held in the way
of fordist and keynesian national practices. Changes in social
stratification, and so also the breaking of employee groups, make that
classic collective actions - male labour movements in post-war-, face
unsolvable dilemmas and demands from the base, hard to assume. By the way,
the diverse work conditions -dispersed, diffused group of workers- drives
to the multiplication of micro-strategies and local actions, to a logic of
survival in difference. In this place is where the challenges for the
creation of a new model of citizenship is established, playing attention
to the rebuilding of welfare, to the dialogue with new social movements
and cultural initiatives and being sensitive with weak new social groups
appeared in the so called postmodern society. Author(s): Manuel Carlos Silva In articulation with other forms of
inequality ((under)class, gender, age), ethnicity represents one of the
main axis of social differentiation, cultural and political clash and
frequently of social exclusion. The tension lived by ethnical minorities
in Portugal between integration and exclusion contains contradictions that
reflect these of the native community of society self in front of the
former, because they want the integration of the ethnical minorities, but
at the same time react to subordinate and to confine them at the
occupation of certain geo-social space. If, at one side, the official
rhetoric proclaims the values of the plural democracy and the imperative
of integration and promotion of the ethnical minorities, at the other side
emerge in the Portuguese society resentments and phenomena of resistance
by members of majority's groups, above all when they feel themselves
threatened, vulnerable or precarious. These reactions incite, at their
turn, to the preservation, reviviescence and reinforcement of the cultural
identity of the ethnical minorities. In this text the question is
approached taking as case study a gypsies community in the northwest of
Portugal, that serves as illustrative example of the displaying argument.
In their inter-ethnical relations the members of the gypsies underclass
that, in the most part, not only have suffered of relative privation in a
context of poverty and social exclusion but also they have been charged by
relations sometimes one of co-presence and coexistence, sometimes another
of distance and exclusion, sometimes again by relations of affront and
hostility. Author(s): Marcelo Alario Ennes This work is based upon my PhD thesis which
studies the ethnic relations in Pereira Barreto, a city northeast of the
state of São Paulo, Brazil. In the light of Pierre Bordieu's conceptual
system for understanding the relations between the Japanese-Brazilian and
non-Japanese-Brazilian along the history of the city and the inhabitants'
history. The present research reveals that the social habits such as
associations, school experience, sports, celebrations and the symbolic
ones such as Unions, discipline, community are elements from a Japanese
ethos. They are the basis for the process of the immigrants' (re)placement
and their descendants as well those ones who had symbolic exchanges
(values related to family, working and wedding relationships), material
exchanges (taking part or not of charity and producing financial
associations) sentimental exchanges (friendship, date) and cultural
exchanges (idiom, cooking, celebration). Therefore all these above
mentioned are considered as social field. Analysing the groups of these
relations from a social-reflexive perspective allowed us to criticize the
concept of cultural assimilation as a process of unilateral absorption of
foreigners and their descendants in the structure of the brazilian
society. Consequently the relations between the Japanese-Brazilian and the
non Japanese Brazilian set new social habits which can be observed not
only by costumes, cooking, architecture, but also by some economical and
administrative impasse, as well as political shares affairs which
distinguishingly characterise the city nowadays. Author(s): María
Esther López The gypsies are a patriarchal community,
with a significant predominance of men over women, based on the raí or
lineage. The gipsy female is submitted to this structure of inequality
with regard to the gipsy male who excludes her from the public arena,
relegating her to the private domain of the house, and to the carrying out
of minor productive activities; she has limited access to formal education
and information. The gipsy woman has been prepared from her childhood to
assume the sacred role of wife and mother within the gypsy culture. This
paper analyses the social dynamics of this patriarchal structure which
emerges in the socialization process, paying particular attention to the
relationship between female and male and to the construction of a gender
(female) Author(s):
Mª Noemí López Pérez La comunicación que presentamos
desarrollará el proceso de su explicación y reflexión a propósito del
fenómeno denominado Globalización, mundialización, libre mercado,
neoliberalismo,... Dicho así, tan generosamente, parecería interminable
esta comunicación, por este motivo indagar cómo está afectando el
fenómeno de la globalización a nuestros propios elementos culturales
dentro de la escuela será el elemento central de esta comunicación, nos
ceñiremos a las consecuencias actuales de este fenómeno con ejemplos
más locales, como el tema de los contenidos propios en la escuela de la
Comunidad canaria como forma de resistencia a esta mundialización
totalitaria e irrespetuosa, que convierte todo lo local en exotismo. Sobre
todo, desde el punto de vista cultural, una mundialización que
desvertebra constantemente los procesos autónomos de construcción
identitaria, generando situaciones y actitudes inquietantes, cuestionando
la construcción de identidades colectivas solidarias; o sea, las
ultraperiféricas del consumismo absoluto como única salida ofertada por
el poder. También, nos cuestionaremos la omisión de uno de los agentes
educativos más determinante: el profesorado. La incertidumbre que ha
generado en el profesorado esta fase, también denominada por algunos como
postmoderna, es algo a lo que se debería prestar más atención, ya que
las dudas sobre a qué elementos prestar atención en el proceso de
aprendizaje no es un asunto baladí. No se ha reflexionado lo suficiente
sobre la situación del profesorado en esta realidad fluctuante. Por otro
lado, si bien es cierto que la tradición educativa dominante ha sido
culturalmente homogeneizadora y socialmente segregadora, hoy, con más
razones creemos que la homogeneización cultural es admitida, no desde la
reflexión, sino desde la inercia, la resignación y la sensación de
impotencia para modificar las cosas, por pequeñas que sean. Nos mueve a
presentar esta comunicación nuestra idea de que cuanto mayor sea el
conocimiento de la cultura propia, de los contenidos propios, mayor y más
respetuosa será la comunicación intercultural. Nos situamos claramente
en la línea de otorgar importancia a las estrategias pedagógicas que
reivindican el entorno inmediato para acercarse al mundo. Author(s): Paloma Bozman This paper
attempts to demonstrate how the official written signs in the city reflect
its self-image, and the process by which it constructs its identity. These
sign give information about what it includes and what it excludes with
regard to its own identity. The object is to learn something about how the
city explains itself to its inhabitants and visitors. For a message to be
understood, the emitter, the recipient and the message must be taken into
account. We travelled through the districts of the city and the city
centre, noting official signs (excluding traffic signs and advertisements)
and attempted to analyse their messages in terms of the above three
categories, at times noting the significant absence of Author(s):
Vesa Puuronen The paper describes the most important
ideals and symbols of young racist Finns, who define themself either
racists, skinheads or nationalsocialists. The core idea of all different
racist groups can be reduced in an statement given by an Finnish skinhead,
when he was asked about the main goals of his action. He stated that the
goal is "Clean white race". Racial cleanness and whiteness are
connected in the racist ideology in a way which partly derives from and is
based on the everyday practices and ways of thinking of common people in
almost all societies and cultures. These practices and ways of thinking
aim at separation of the dirt from the clean and avoidance of the dirt.
Strive for cleanness is essential dimension of identity in modern
societies. Racists' strive for cleanness is based on sophisticated
philosophical thinking which has been developed both in Asian and European
philosophical thought. The symbols of the racists' reflect their ideology
and are mainly inherited from the earlier fascist and racist movements.
The main symbols are e.g. swastika, the symbols which originally were
letters of medieval Scandinavian rune alphabet. The connections between
diiferent racist identities, the symbols and ideals of racist ideologies
will be discussed. Author(s): Sara Helman Since the 1980s many scholars have focused
on the promise that dialogue holds to get beyond essentializing
discourses. Based on the observation of a yearlong dialogue inter-group
encounter between two groups of Israeli citizens - Jewish and
Palestinians, this article shows that dialogic encounters between groups
in a situation of structural inequality and domination may solidify
essentialist discourses of culture and identity. The interpretative
analysis of specific moments of the inter-group dialogue shows that
throughout the dialogue process self and other essentializing strategies
recurred. The attempt of the Palestinian students to clear a space that
would enable them to talk about their status as second class citizens
while simultaneously presenting claims for equal access to citizenship was
met with declarations about "Arab' culture by the Jewish students. In
this process both groups, albeit for different reasons, reinforced their
monological conceptions of culture and identity. Author(s): Triin Vihalemm The paper discusses how the rapid switch
into English-based frames of reference mediated via global media networks
shape the local linguistic perceptions and the patterns of collective,
language-related identity construction. The focus is Estonia where the
historically formed cultural patterns of groups' self-establishment in
relation to 'others' and construction of collective identity have
predominantly been language-centred. Estonians have for a relatively long
period utilized the so-called ethnic minority identity construction
pattern. Several authors also support the thesis of (re)ethnization of
Russians living in Estonia and other titular republics of the former
Soviet Union. In Estonia the symbolic value of both Estonian and Russian
languages as a marker of group belonging and power assertion has been high
during the whole transition period. The paper analyses the inter-relations
between linguistic practices and collective self-identification of both
Estonians and Estonian Russians. It discusses if and how do the global
cultural flows (mainly anglo-american pop culture) and English as a
potential Lingua Franca shape the perceptions of the members of local
ethno-linguistic communities. It is also inquired how are these
perceptions are linked with ethno-cultural and other collective
identities. By exploring quantitative and qualitative data the paper
suggests that English-based global cultural flows make the historically
formed cultural patterns of groups' self-establishment in relation to
"others" more vague and ambivalent at the same time offering new
means to be utilized in order to maintain group's cultural
distinctiveness. Author(s):
Yumiko Nishimuta The aim of this study is to identify and
describe the Japanese student's experiences of university in Britain
through an interview process, looking at their experiences of racial
discrimination, racial awareness and their responses, coping strategies
that evolve during their years of study for the Japanese students. The
overall questions are: what experiences and understandings of race and
racism do Japanese students encounter in Britain, and how do they cope
with these experiences? And helping to understand these main questions:
How may this experience in Britain differ according to 'Gender',
'Pre-departure Expectation'? There are several issues that researcher must
address in order to elaborate these questions. There is very little
sociological literature on Japanese who come to study in Britain or other
Western societies. Japanese students in Britain are not typical
immigrants, since they came for a few years to study. Nor are they
'native' ethnic minorities who have historically experienced colonialism
and racial subordination.
|