Cultural heritage and nationalism

This newspaper column from 2003 examines how Indians in Trinidad and Tobago are misled, guided by so many fears, the encouragement of feelings of victimhood, and smallness of vision. There is an important contribution for Indians to make to the building of this New World civilisation, which is still in its infancy and only half-made. What is needed is a vision, mission and leadership not griping about “discrimination”, but looking fearlessly to the future.

In this chapter, I provide an ethnographic account of how ‘heritage’ has been used in the nationalist and pro-independence movement in Catalonia. Catalan heritage has taken on new significance as a symbol of resistance and separate history in the strained relationship with Spain. The focus here is on sites of historic national memory, and the foods associated with these places. I will demonstrate how promoting these foodstuffs under official categories simultaneously allows local actors to assert political will, create heritage, and encourage tourism. This chapter will cover issues such as the role of ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’ in heritage creation and tourism, the heritage ‘label’ in Catalan cuisine, and heritage as national identity performance.

In this paper I would like to show briefly the specialties of Hungarian identity building in the post-communist period through the analysis of the institutionalization of the notion of cultural heritage. I suggest a simplified approach to this rather complex problem: first, a few ideas concerning the re-construction or reconsideration of the Hungarian national identity from the late 1980’s, second a critical analysis of the institutionalization of the cultural heritage around the millennium, and finally, some concluding statements about the most recent years of cultural heritage protection.

There is an established body of literature surveying the role of language policy in identity construction. This paper exposes an angle that has been understudied. It suggests that national song festivals may be seen as a tool of ‘implicit’ language policy in Estonia. Informed by expert interviews and ethnographic, this study explores the tensions arising from the dual function of the festival. On the one hand, it sustains the language as the central ethnic-national attribute of Estonians. On the other hand, the affective solidarity’ stemming from joint singing could support a stronger civic attachment to the language and state (by Russian-speaking minorities).

The paper explores the ambivalent nature of poems that are part and parcel of the kathak dance repertoire in the context of a changing system of dance patronage during the 19th and 20th centuries in North India. Through a textual analysis of selected ṭhumrī songs, the author investigates the use of śṛṅgāra rasa (erotic sentiment) in this poetic genre in relation to its original, secular function and its interpretation in religious idioms. The comparison of traditional ṭhumrī s with the compositions prevalent on the modern, classical dance stage shall underline a shift in the character of kathak performance (from romantic, sensual and intimate to devotional and impersonal). The attempts to locate ṭhumrī in the shastric framework and to 'purify' the content of these poems from the imprints of its lineage with tawā'if s culture is examined as part of the process of reinventing kathak in response to the tastes of a new class of patrons and performers and matching this art to the vision of Indian cultural heritage, propagated by nationalists.

With thanks and gratitude to the author for permission to post this important article.

Challenging the Myths of Art History: A Symposium in Honor of Linda Seidel,’ was held at Fordham University’s Lincoln Center Campus, February 13, 2011; co-sponsored by Center for Medieval Studies and Department of Art History and Music, Fordham University; Division of Humanities, University of Chicago; Department of Art, DePauw University. Thanks go to Anne F. Harris, Cecily J. Hilsdale, Dawn Odell, Elizabeth Rodini and Rebecca Zorach for organizing the event, comprised of twenty-two short communications by former students of Seidel and four longer papers by senior colleagues. This essay expands on my lecture for that occasion. In what follows, all translations are mine except where otherwise indicated.

Vivimos el siglo del nacionalismo y, paradójicamente, el del individualismo. El pensamiento sobre la colectividad y sobre el sujeto invade las reflexiones de las ciencias sociales de los últimos 100 años, principalmente luego del boom del psicoanálisis y del marxismo. Metodológicamente, la necesidad de que las ciencias sociales sean consideradas ciencias, en comparación con las ciencias naturales y su Método, ha generado una imposibilidad de pensar la realidad por fuera de sus aspectos racionales. La propuesta de este artículo es la de pensar el nacionalismo cívico, desde las experiencias de Cataluña y del Quebec, para hacer una propuesta teórico-metodológica que, en el cruce entre sociología, antropología, ciencias políticas e historia, nos permita pensar este fenómeno tan actual de una manera más profunda. El nacionalismo no es únicamente desarrollado por las instituciones políticas, sino que es, principalmente, una experiencia cotidiana, una forma de hacer y de pensar nuestra identidad: la nación se piensa, pero principalmente se vive, se baila, se siente.

This project aims to study the complex situation regarding the unstable and quite questionable state of 'identity' of Kashmir, especially in recent years. The socio-political condition of Kashmir resides in a state of liminality and uncertainty, which is showcased in this project. The paper delves deeper into this aspect by taking the novel The Half

Politics is a science of governance and an art of the possible. It requires good legal training, a fine tact for negotiation, and the courage for timely concessions. Many a political crisis would not end with violent confrontations if an experienced politician was available. Historians cannot replace politicians. Their role is to safeguard the cultural heritage, stick to the evidence, and prevent its manipulation and misuse. This implies quite an inflexibility of positions and can help to warn mis-adventurous politicians that their future will end into the dust bin of History.
The ideals and reality often differ. Politicians tend to have a relationship of ambivalence with History, implying a mutually beneficial trade-off: politicians need myth-making to win power and to stay in power. Some historians get carried by the political offer of scholarships, chairs and other types of funding.
The ambiguity of the relationship implies a politician’s understanding of historian’s role as myth-making, while professional and critical historians stand for the opposite, namely de-mythifying, or deconstructing stereotypes. Unfortunately, there is no lack of historians who succumb to political allurements and reduce history to political prostitution, replacing the role of an historian from a judge of relevant evidence to an advocate of a political ideology.

The physical space is an important element in the construction of a nation's primordial, exclusive identity, however, if it does not fit into the state's official nationalistic discourse, it can be contested and divisive. Pakistan also faced same paradox in terms of its ideological inclination towards an Islamic nationhood and its inheritance of a complex sacred geography and un-Islamic pre-partition heritage inside its territory. Therefore, to revamp spatiality and history to cater to its needs, the state implied a number of ideological and physical strategies to come to terms with such contested set of heritage, including national historiography, revision in curriculum, electronic and print media etc. In Pakistan, pre-partition buildings not only clashed with idea of an Islamic nation with a homogenous past, but also became 'lieux de memoire', 'sites of memories' of partition which are traumatic and painful. In order to erase those memories, a gradual process of deliberate 'forgetfulness' proved instrumental in bringing about a state of 'collective amnesia' which made state and citizens indifferent and apathetic towards these buildings. The process of 'retributive demolition' of pre-partition spaces complemented official project of nation building, leading to a spree of destruction , pushing them to the verge of extinction. I argue that, the demolition of pre-partition buildings is not only a phenomenon of urban expansion and development, rather it manifests complex and dynamic socio-political implications of nationhood, power, identity and questions of heritage preservation.

The 1950s were an extraordinary time of cultural development in Indonesia, in which writers, filmmakers, and painters explored possible "Indonesian" identities in their work, drawing on foreign as well as indigenous sources of inspiration in an atmosphere of freewheeling political debate. My project began in 2007 when I had the good fortune of being invited by Jenny Lindsay and Maya Liem to take part in two workshops on Indonesian culture in the 1950s. A book of essays from these wonderful gatherings will be published by the KITLV later this year under the title "Heirs to World Culture: Being Indonesian 1950-1965." After the conclusion of the second workshop, which was held in Jakarta in October 2009, I flew to Yogyakarta, met up with Jenny and another old friend, Alan Feinstein, and spent what I can only describe as one of the most pleasurable days of my life visiting art galleries in Yogya, the beautiful art collection at the rural home of the writer Ajip Rosidi (I particularly remember the landscapes by Rusli hung high on the wall [Rusli, 1919-2005]), and finally, late in the afternoon as you can see from the photo taken from Dr. Oei's house of his museum, the amazing collection of modern and contemporary Indonesian painting owned by Dr. Oei Hong Djien (Spanjaard2004). Dr. Oei is an extraordinary figure: heir to a successful tobacco business, anatomical pathologist, violinist, and for thirty years Indonesia's most discerning, if not its foremost, collector of modern and contemporary art. After an all-too-brief visit to this remarkable collection, I knew that I wanted to write something about modern

In this chapter, I provide an ethnographic account of how ‘heritage’ has been used in the nationalist and pro-independence movement in Catalonia. Catalan heritage has taken on new significance as a symbol of resistance and separate history in the strained relationship with Spain. The focus here is on sites of historic national memory, and the foods associated with these places. I will demonstrate how promoting these foodstuffs under official categories simultaneously allows local actors to assert political will, create heritage, and encourage tourism. This chapter will cover issues such as the role of ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’ in heritage creation and tourism, the heritage ‘label’ in Catalan cuisine, and heritage as national identity performance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59TckNXHesU

Dynamics of cultural appropriation:
Exoticism, conspicuous consumption, social prestige. Criticism of luxury by moralists and mercantilists.
Cultural hybridity: appropriation through Sarmatian life-style. Synthesis of oriental carpets with Polish-Lithuanian coats-of-arms. Portraits with carpets. Oriental carpets donated to churches, used in the religious ceremonies, depicted on the frescoes.
Imitation, adaptation and amalgamation: the manufacturing of “oriental” carpets in Poland-Lithuania.
Denial and oblivion in the Enlightenment. New exoticism: Chinoiserie.
Reinvention of tapis Polonaise as lost glory of the golden age.
Reinterpretation as cultural heritage.