The creation of national identity

Author(s):  
Hyangjin Lee
2021 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-118
Author(s):  
Yuval Tal

Abstract This article explores how, through discussions about immigrant assimilation in fin de siècle Algeria, French republicans contemplated and wrote into law the ethnic traits of French national identity. Republicans assumed that the North Mediterranean immigrants who settled in Algeria shared ethnic origins with French settlers and consequently asserted that France should work to “fuse” the two groups. Assertions about immigrants' ethnicity took different forms. In the colony they appeared either at the margins of colonial administrators' attacks against immigrant communal organization or in literary representations of French-Mediterranean fusion. In the metropole republican legislators portrayed immigrants as innately prone to becoming French and thus supported the 1889 nationality law that naturalized them. The passing of the 1889 law prompted the creation of an explicitly ethnorepublican assimilatory model. The model's proponents combined sociological and eugenicist principles to both socialize immigrants into the nation and promote the transfer of their Mediterranean “vigor” into French bodies. Cet article examine les efforts des intellectuels et des dirigeants républicains pour assimiler les immigrés européens en Algérie à la fin du dix-neuvième siècle. Il affirme que les identités communautaires et la prépondérance démographique des immigrés ont poussé l'élite républicaine à envisager leur capacité ethnique à s'assimiler à la société française, et montre que l'idée que les Français et les immigrés avaient la même origine ethnique a façonné les débats sur l'assimilation nationale et a influencé la formation des lois républicaines fondamentales. En Algérie, des affirmations à propos de l'identité ethnique des immigrés européens apparaissaient en marge des discussions politiques sur leur organisation communautaire et dans les romans des écrivains algérianistes. En métropole, des législateurs républicains supposaient que la « ressemblance ethnique » entre Français et immigrés assurait l'assimilation rapide de ces derniers et ils ont soutenu la loi de 1889 sur la nationalité qui les a naturalisés. A l'issue de la législation de 1889, une vision de fusionnement des colons français et des membres de la « race méditerranéenne » en Algérie s'est développée. Ses partisans ont combiné des principes sociologiques avec des principes eugéniques dans le but d'incorporer les immigrés européens dans la nation et de faire transporter leur « vigueur » dans les corps des Français.


Author(s):  
Nele Bemong

Between 1830 and 1850, practically out of nowhere there came into beinga truly 'Belgian' literature, written boch in Flemish and in French, but aimedat a single goal: the creation of a Belgian past and the conscruction of aBelgian national identity. The historical novel played a crucial role in thisconscruction and representation of a collective memory for the Belgian statejust out of the cradle. The prefaces to these historical novels are characterizedboth by the central role granted to the representacion of Flanders as the cradleof nineteenth-century Belgium, and by the organically and religiously inspiredimagery. Attempts were made to create an intimate genealogical relationshipwith the forefathers, in order to make the Belgian citizens feel closer to theirrich heritage. Through the activation of specific recollections from theimmense archive of the collective cultural memory, Belgian independencefound its legitimization both towards the international community andtowards the Belgian people.


Author(s):  
Alyson E. King

Edna Cress Staebler was a fairly typical young woman when she arrived at the University of Toronto in 1926. While attending the university, she explored the new ideas and norms of the interwar era. This article examines Staebler’s experiences within the context of modernity, the university and the creation of a Canadian nation. Staebler’s university years provided the foundations for her later career as a journalist and author during which she helped to create a modern Canadian national identity.


2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 678-687
Author(s):  
Vladimir Gennadyevich Kudryavtsev

The article is devoted to the study of places of worship in traditional Mari culture, which are in varying degrees of sacredness. They have so far preserved artifacts and symbols that form the cultural identity of the people. The Mari religion in the most complete local traditions preserves the system of pagan cults and rites. The trend towards the revival of pagan religion and the creation of religious organizations and communities is associated with a general upsurge in national identity. This became necessary in the context of national movements as a means of ethnic self-defense and a factor of ethnocultural revival. Original ethnocultural traditions and formative elements of folk architecture are relevant and important in the design of modern architectural complexes and the creation of small architectural forms in folk architecture, landscape design, and the formation of an ethnocultural environment. Further sacralization of places of worship will contribute to the preservation of natural monuments and the manifestation of artifacts and symbols of cultural identity.


Author(s):  
Liz Harvey-Kattou

This chapter delves into the psyche of Costa Rica’s identity, providing a historical and sociological analysis of the creation of the dominant – tico – identity from 1870 to the present day, framing these around theories of colonial discourse. Considering work by postcolonial scholars such as Benedict Anderson, Frantz Fanon, Homi Bhabha, Gayatri Spivak, and Judith Butler, it explores how the discourse of centre and ‘Other’ has been created within the nation. It then provides a historical account of ‘Otherness’ within the nation, detailing the existence and rights won by Afro-Costa Rican, feminist, and LGBTQ+ groups, detailing a framework of hybrid subalternity which will be used to consider the challenges put forward to dominant national identity in chapters two and three.


2013 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 58-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan Schlanger

AbstractFollowing some comments on the notion of ‘public’ intellectuals (can they be otherwise?), this brief paper focuses on the intellectual roles that could be played by archaeologists today. Exposure to the media, usually following some spectacular discovery, serves to confirm the romantico-empirical image of the discipline, but should also lead to an engagement with key public debates. Three such debates are indicated: the idea that ‘African man has yet to enter history’ as expressed by the former French president; the creation of a Maison de l'histoire de France under the tutelage of the Ministry of National Identity; and, across the Channel, the Localism Bill, which pushes decision making to an untenably low level while promoting a historically and archaeologically questionable view of local communities.


2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Serge Noiret

AbstractThis article traces the origins and development of public history in Italy, a field not anymore without this name today. Public history in Italy has its roots in historical institutions born in the nineteenth century and in the post WW2 first Italian Republic. The concept of “public use of history” (1993), the important role played by memory issues in post-war society, local and national identity issues, the birth of public archaeology (2015) before public history, the emergence of history festivals in the new millennium are all important moments shaping the history of the field and described in this essay. The foundation of the “Italian Association of Public History” (AIPH) in 2016/2017, and the promotion of an Italian Public History Manifesto (2018) together with the creation of Public History masters in universities, are all concrete signs of a vital development of the field in the Peninsula.


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