Papers by Markus Balkenhol
Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 2021
Challenging dominant historical narratives that gloss over the history of colonialism and slavery... more Challenging dominant historical narratives that gloss over the history of colonialism and slavery, black collectives in the Netherlands are increasingly turning to the history of history writing (metahistory) by black radical thinkers. Counter histories in which transatlantic slavery features central, serve to situate ongoing practices of institutional racism and to articulate claims to citizenship and national memory. Placing different mobilizations of these histories in an international context, we identify two repertoires through which activists invoke them: iconicity and articulation. While both emphasise the importance of tradition, iconicity highlights the canonisation of persons and events and suggests that they can be drawn upon for inspiration in all times, and places. Traditions formed through articulation are brought into existence as part of the cultural-political work of mobilisation, when the mobilisation ends they may be reinterpreted and rearticulated to a new political context. These repertoires are not mutually exclusive and may even be mutually constitutive. However, this article shows different uses of alternative histories in the Netherlands and highlights the tensions between the two registers to understand ongoing formations of antiracist and anticolonial political subjectivities.
Slavernij in Oost en West, 2020
The Secular Sacred. Emotions of Belonging and the Perils of Nation and Religion, 2020
The statues of the confederate general Robert E. Lee in the United States, of Cecil Rhodes on the... more The statues of the confederate general Robert E. Lee in the United States, of Cecil Rhodes on the campus of the University of Cape Town, and of Mahatma Gandhi on the campus of the University of Ghana were all confronted with the question if they should be removed because they represent a racist history or racist ideas. In the Netherlands, the statue of Jan Pieterszoon Coen (1587-1629), founder of colonial Batavia and infamous for the killing of 15,000 Bandanese, has become a focal point in these debates. In his contribution, Balkenhol shows how the statue of Coen has become a secular sacred: as an image it both symbolizes secularized Dutchness and mediates Coen as an ancestral figure. He argues that looking at how processes of secularization and sacralization become entangled in conflicts about statues can provide a better understanding of how and why some statues act in such a polarizing way.
Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale, 2019
In this introduction to the special section on 'Doing Race in Europe' we take up the notion of ra... more In this introduction to the special section on 'Doing Race in Europe' we take up the notion of race as an 'absent presence' to deal with two related issues. First, we consider the historically contested position of race in the discipline of anthropology. Second, we think through the notion of an 'absent presence' conceptually and methodologically so as to develop a relational approach enabling us to analyse race in practice. We take as a point of departure the idea that we cannot know race in advance, and that we therefore need to study how it comes about, and how it is made and unmade in specific situations. We therefore call for renewed ethno-graphic attention to how race is made absent and present in multiple ways. This special section is the first joint publication of the EASA network for the anthropology of race and ethnicity (ARE). Race in Europe has been evocatively described as an 'absent presence' (M'charek et al. 2014)-buried, yet haunting; often un-named, yet effective; slippery and difficult to grasp, yet manifest in specific configurations. In the introduction to this special section, we take up this powerful image to address two related issues. First, we briefly consider the contested position of race as an absent presence in the discipline of anthropology in historical perspective. Second, we take up the notion of absent presence in theoretical and methodological terms, thereby advocating a relational approach that allows us to analyse race in practice. Most importantly, for us, the notion of absent presence indicates that we cannot know race (or any object of study for that matter) in advance, but rather need to study how it comes about, how it is made and unmade in specific constellations. To conceptualise race as an absent presence requires a renewed ethno-graphic attention to when and how it surfaces as well as to the multiple ways in which race is made relevant-or irrelevant (Hirschauer 2019). The vantage point from which our discussion emerges is Europe. On the one hand, our conversation marks the founding of the Anthropology of Race and Ethnicity Network (ARE) of the European Association of Social Anthropology. On the other hand, thinking race from Europe also means to draw attention to the specific role of locality and temporal-ity in racial formations, to take up Omi and Winant's (1994) evocative terminology. * So what about our first point, i.e. the legacy of race in (European) anthropology more broadly? Current calls for the decolonisation of academic canons and intellectual practice have brought renewed attention to the role of anthropology in the formation and stabilisation of race in colonial encounters. Structurally and epistemologically This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.
Beleid&Maatschappij, 2019
De beelden van de confederale generaal Robert E. Lee in de Verenigde Staten, het beeld van Cecil ... more De beelden van de confederale generaal Robert E. Lee in de Verenigde Staten, het beeld van Cecil Rhodes op de campus van de Universiteit van Cape Town en dat van Mahatma Ghandi op de campus van de Universiteit van Ghana hebben alle-maal te maken gekregen met de kwestie: moeten ze verdwijnen omdat ze verwij-zen naar racistische opvattingen? In de nasleep van deze soms gewelddadige controverses is het meest gehoorde argument voor het behoud van de standbeelden dat door het verwijderen geschie-denis uitgewist zou worden. De beweegredenen voor het behoud lopen daarbij uiteen. Sommigen willen trots kunnen zijn op wat zij als 'hun' geschiedenis erva-ren, anderen vinden juist dat het weghalen van de standbeelden het historisch besef in de weg staat; een manier om de geschiedenis 'wit te wassen'. Voor het verwijderen van standbeelden spreekt dat sommige mensen zich herinnerd voe-len aan een pijnlijke geschiedenis van onderdrukking en slavernij, en dat stand-beelden een eenzijdig, namelijk uitsluitend positief beeld van die geschiedenis zouden weergeven. De discussies rondom (stand)beelden, zo zal ik in dit artikel betogen, laten zien dat een bredere aandacht voor kolonialisme en het slavernijverleden niet per se leidt tot meer inzicht. In toenemende mate blijkt dat het probleem niet simpel-weg onkunde is, zoals bijvoorbeeld de afwezigheid van het slavernijverleden in schoolboeken. Het is niet een probleem dat met meer kennis alleen verholpen kan worden, maar het ligt dieper. 'Kennis', zo blijkt, is nooit objectief, maar wordt in belangrijke mate gevormd door het perspectief van waaruit op het verleden geke-ken wordt Beelden zijn een goede casus om dit te onderzoeken. Beelden vormen namelijk onze kijk op de wereld. In dit stuk betoog ik dat beelden een centraal element zijn in processen van groepsvorming in het heden, terwijl ze zijn gevormd door het verleden. Zo kan een ver verleden invloed hebben op maatschappelijke verhou-dingen van vandaag. * Dr. Markus Balkenhol werkt als sociaal en cultureel antropoloog aan kolonialisme, ras, burgerschap, cultureel erfgoed en religie. Zijn PhD-dissertatie gaat over het cultureel geheugen van de slavernij in Amsterdam-Zuidoost. Hij is als onderzoeker verbonden aan het Meertens Instituut. Recente artikelen van zijn hand zijn getiteld 'Zwarte Pieten, moskeebezoek en zoenende mannen. Katholiek activisme van Cultuur onder Vuur en de culturalisering van religie' en 'Iconic Objects. Making Diasporic Heritage, Blackness, and Whiteness in the Netherlands'. 294
Trajecta, 2019
In this article we want to sketch an example of how new alliances between secular and religious c... more In this article we want to sketch an example of how new alliances between secular and religious conservative actors and activists takes shape in contemporary Dutch society. To do so we focus on the case of a conservative catholic activist organization, Civitas Christiana, and its activist subsidiary, Cultuur Onder Vuur 'Culture Under Fire'. This organization has become a vocal player in several nationwide controversies about cultural heritage, religion, and sexuality. Our analysis of Civitas Christiana's activism shows how religious actors and explicitly secular actors and activists align themselves around issues of cultural heritage, diversity, and sexuality. We argue that these controversies provide new insight into shifts in the politics of secularism and religion in the Netherlands.
Religie & Samenleving, 2019
Sense and Essence. Heritage and the Cultural Production of the Real, 2018
Jahrbuch für Europäische Ethnologie, 2017
In: Biowetenschappen en Maatschappij 1 2017
Silence and the politics of compassion. Commemorating slavery in the Netherlands Looking at the c... more Silence and the politics of compassion. Commemorating slavery in the Netherlands Looking at the commemoration of slavery in the Netherlands, this article makes a twofold argument. First, my aim is to complicate the notions of historical silence, 'erasure' and 'secrecy' that have informed many post-and decolonial projects. I show that the violence and brutality of slavery are in some cases even showcased. The result is an often self-congratulatory image of a humanism that is often seen as 'typically' Dutch. At the same time, the national slavery memorial has shown that engaging in a politics of compassion can offer ground to refashion post-colonial futures. Here, humanism is neither accepted at face value nor discarded as damaged goods, but salvaged and held to its promise. Second, I analyse the politics of multiculturalism, and the related search for cultural essences in which 'culture' and 'nation' have turned into objects of love and anxiety. While analyses have rightly understood emotions such as compassion as neoliberal models of governance, I argue that such structures of feeling also have colonial roots. The highly affective politics of belonging and exclusion today can be more fully understood if their colonial roots are included in the analysis.
Duyvendak (2016) The nativist triangle. Sexuality, race, and religion in discourses on 'Dutchness... more Duyvendak (2016) The nativist triangle. Sexuality, race, and religion in discourses on 'Dutchness'. In: Duyvendak et al., The culturalization of citizenship. Autochthony and belonging in a globalizing world. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
De controverse rondom Zwarte Piet bestaat al lang maar zo emotioneel als nu was het nog nooit. Oo... more De controverse rondom Zwarte Piet bestaat al lang maar zo emotioneel als nu was het nog nooit. Ook eerder werd er kritiek geuit, en ook eerder was deze zeer zichtbaar. Nooit eerder echter was de reactie op kritiek zo woedend en ronduit racistisch. De vragen die daarom in dit artikel centraal staan zijn: waarom is de controverse juist nu zo emotioneel geladen en waarom hangt het juist nu zo sterk met ras en racisme samen? Ik zal betogen dat emoties een belangrijk ingrediënt zijn in processen van groepsvorming: een gevoel van 'wij' in relatie tot 'zij' is fundamenteel voor het functioneren van sociale grenzen. Dit gevoel, zo zal ik verder betogen, is juist nu zo sterk omdat het samenvalt met een meer algemene vrees in Nederland voor een verondersteld verlies van het eigene. De kern van het Nederlandse zelf, zo wordt gevreesd, zou bedreigd worden zowel van binnenuit als van buitenaf.
In this article, I argue that the commemoration of slavery should be seen as a process of emplace... more In this article, I argue that the commemoration of slavery should be seen as a process of emplacement. It refers to a specific politics of belonging in the Netherlands that is focused on autochthony and that carries strong notions of place. I discuss two strategies of emplacement that both engage in these politics of belonging. One is the search for roots in Africa, through which black Dutch negotiate their place in Netherlands as citizens. The other engages in the transformation of the Dutch memoryscape through formal commemorations and monuments. I understand both strategies as processes generating local subjects in Appadurai's sense, emphasizing that locality as a relationship of body and place is a fundamental ingredient in processes of political subjectification.
a Five Years Expedition against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam, an account of his five-year mili... more a Five Years Expedition against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam, an account of his five-year military service in Suriname. A 'decent looking man,' Stedman (1813: 116) reports, told him that:
Online publications by Markus Balkenhol
Lexical entry written during the CHCI project Religion, Secularism and Political Belonging (RelSe... more Lexical entry written during the CHCI project Religion, Secularism and Political Belonging (RelSec). Funded by the Mellon Foundation.
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Papers by Markus Balkenhol
Online publications by Markus Balkenhol