Identities in Transition

Edited by

Identities in Transition

At the Interface

Series Editors Dr Robert Fisher Dr Daniel Riha Advisory Board Dr Alejandro Cervantes-Carson Dr Peter Mario Kreuter Professor Margaret Chatterjee Martin McGoldrick Dr Wayne Cristaudo Revd Stephen Morris Mira Crouch Professor John Parry Dr Phil Fitzsimmons Paul Reynolds Professor Asa Kasher Professor Peter Twohig Owen Kelly Professor S Ram Vemuri Revd Dr Kenneth Wilson, O.B.E

An At the Interface research and publications project. http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/at-the-interface/ The Diversity and Recognition Hub ‘Interculturality’

2012

Identities in Transition

Edited by

Georgina Tsolidis

Inter-Disciplinary Press Oxford, United Kingdom

© Inter-Disciplinary Press 2012 http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/publishing/id-press/

The Inter-Disciplinary Press is part of Inter-Disciplinary.Net – a global network for research and publishing. The Inter-Disciplinary Press aims to promote and encourage the kind of work which is collaborative, innovative, imaginative, and which provides an exemplar for inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary publishing.

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ISBN: 978-1-84888-082-5 First published in the United Kingdom in eBook format in 2012. First Edition.

Table of Contents Introduction Georgina Tsolidis Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Culture: Critical Examinations Culture from the Point of View of Philosophical Anthropology Karol Chrobak

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Acknowledging and Limiting the Moral Significance of Cultural Praxis: Reflections on Cassirer’s Critical Philosophy of Culture Mehmet Ruhi Demiray

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Living Together: Questioning Assimilation and Integration Integrational Politics and Migrant Aspirations: Finding the Balance Ekaterina Bagreeva and German Mendzheritskiy

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Thinking about Intercultural Leadership: Are We Going Deep Enough to Bridge Cultural Differences? Alicia D. Crumpton

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Intercultural Dialogues Interculturality on a Diverse Australian Campus: Identity Formation Farida Fozdar

Part 4

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Transnational Identities: The European Experience Representations of European Cultural Identity in Mini-Europe Tuuli Lähdesmäki

Part 6

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Transnational Identities: Diaspora and Subject Formation Kurdish Diaspora: Creating New Contingencies in TransNational Space Ahmet Hamdi Akkaya

Part 5

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Remaking and Re-Inventing Identities Left-Wing Italian Jews from the 1960s to 1980s: A Fluid Identity Matteo Di Figlia

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Part 7

How Things Are Remade Georgian: Glocalization and the Assertion of ‘National’ among Georgian Youth Lia Tsuladze

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Disfigured Past: Unmasking the Meaning and Identity of Historic Architecture Jennifer Tran

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Educational Institutions and the Making of Identities Mirroring Absences: Spatiality and the Schooling of Minorities Georgina Tsolidis

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

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Migrants and Flexible Identities The (Im)migrant ‘Other’: Conventional and Challenging Representations of the Migrant Subject in Two Greek Plays Alexandra Simou

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Kyrgyz Feasts and Migrant Dreams: Embedding Remittances in Hybrid Social Networks Igor Rubinov

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Authenticity, Identity and Media Advertising Strategy for Teenagers in Taiwan Tatiana Lishchenko, Meng-Dar Shieh and Kuo-Hsiang Chen

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‘Martin was in the jungle alone, and the sun was sinking’: The Weather, Culture and Identity in Virginia Woolf’s The Years Verita Sriratana

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Reaching Out, Crossing the Cultural Divide Women on Purpose: A Model for Cross-Cultural, Interdisciplinary Collaborations Kim S. Berman and Jane A. Hassinger

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An Experimental Study of Russian and Swedish Value Systems V. Shabes, G. Bostedt, E. Troshchenkova, L. Ivarsson, U. Damber and T. Potapova

181

Introduction Georgina Tsolidis In March 2011 a g roup of scholars from a wide range of disciplines met in Prague to attend the Interculturalism, Meaning and Identity Conference 1 hosted by Inter-Disciplinary.Net. This collection provides an insight into the dynamism of those few days in Prague. For many of us, this was our first encounter with each other and with Interdisciplinary.Net. The conference organisers insisted that we prepare our full chapters in good time and this enabled us to read each other’s work prior to arriving at the conference. The conference included a r elatively small group of people who attended all the sessions and contributed in open, challenging and yet collegial ways. One of the most pleasing aspects of the conference was the organiser’s active discouragement of power point. This set the tone – fewer grabs of phrases whooshing onto a screen to the sound of bells or tinkling glass and instead more thought-through and thought-provoking chapters delivered in a spirit of dialogue. Interculturalism can be risky business. For many of us it conjures a view of culture that dwells on artifice – the way people eat, speak, dress and dance. While these can be significant markers of culture and difference, they nonetheless hover on the surface of a set of relations that speak to unequal power. In Australia and Canada for example, where immigration has been critical to nation building, the role of interculturalism has been linked to policies of assimilation. Schools have been encouraged to celebrate diversity by asking students to dress in the national costumes of their forebears, perform an ‘ethnic’ dance and donate an ‘ethnic’ dish. 2 There are ‘grown up’ versions of this approach to interculturalism whereby society continues to reward mainstream ways of knowing and being, whilst simultaneously celebrating minorities and their cultural contributions. This celebration of difference is taken to be evidence of tolerance, equal opportunity and meritocracy while structural manifestations of xenophobia and racism persist. 3 The conference did not shy away from these issues and instead brought to the fore new understandings of interculturalism that linked it to power and in turn, linked power to complex ways of constructing meaning. Engagement with these understandings was facilitated by interdisciplinarity and the fact that those who attended also brought with them layers of cultural insights established through birthright, place of residence or the locations from which they worked, studied and researched. This was a truly international conference that was a lived example of the issues under consideration. The conference and this collection illustrate a d eep respect for diversity – different disciplines, epistemologies, topics of research and sites researched. The intellectual spaces of departure and arrival are different. And like living cultural

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__________________________________________________________________ difference in its everyday sense, thinking and researching culture differently, is full of challenge and reward. Interculturalism, like other terms associated with living cultural difference, for example, multiculturalism or cosmopolitanism has no set meaning. Instead our understandings reflect time and place and contested discursive understandings of what is significant and strategic in a given context. We no longer live in times when intellectual traditions build meta-narratives that are teleological and developed through a series of graduated steps. In this sense, interculturalism is not the next conceptual stage after multiculturalism for example. Instead we have the freedom to move through various discursive terrains simultaneously drawing on an eclectic range of experiences and interpretations of these experiences that allow traditions to merge and in so doing inform each other. The so-called post-modern turn 4 has liberated us from disciplinary straightjackets and given us the opportunity for rhizomatic thought; thought that moves in all directions. 5 However we need to be mindful of the responsibility that comes with this freedom to think outside boxes made with rigid sides. A critical responsibility relates to social justice. This is profoundly important given that our times have been indelibly marked by the so-called war on terror and related to this, Islamophobia. Our times are also marked by a d eep suspicion of otherness that in some people’s minds takes the form of ‘strangers’ who cross borders in search of work, to flee hunger and war and to reach new opportunities. These ‘strangers’ are Roma moving through Europe, Latinos in the USA, so-called ‘boat people’ arriving in Australia or those from the Middle East and Africa resettling in Italy, Malta and France. The impulses of globalisation are configured differently through contradictory discourses that on t he one hand spruik the benefits of globalisation and the movement of capital, people and ideas; and on the other hand, reinscribe a sense of nation as bordered, in need of policing and protecting, lest the relationship between place, ethnicity and identity be ruptured. In this context it i s imperative that terms such as ‘interculturalism’, ‘multiculturalism’ and ‘cosmopolitanism’ be rendered meaningful through an understanding that they are underpinned by sets of unequal relations associated with factors such as race/ethnicity, gender, class and religion. These power relations mark how we live within, across and between north/south dynamics as these operate in a gloablised world. In this spirit whether we use ‘interculturalism’ or some other term, we need to remain mindful of how living cultural difference is not a benign exercise. It is more than being well travelled, bi or multilingual and knowing about other cultures and cuisines. It is more than a checklist for bourgeois notions of tolerance. It is also more than a utopian ideal to which we aspire. Instead interculturalism is looking for synergies that create engagement that is meaningful because the premise is that we can work creatively across cultural boundaries because we understand that whilst resources and opportunities may be unequally distributed this does not illustrate an hierarchy of civilisation.

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__________________________________________________________________ The conference programme allowed these issues to be explored at a range of levels. The programme began at a broad philosophical level with explorations of culture and subjectivity. The next set of presentations moved to deliberations on specific contexts and identifications. Institutional practices such as schooling and the media were considered subsequently. A set of chapters constituted an exploration of place and its impact on identity. Representations and their impact on identities through aesthesis were explored through very different engagements with art and literature. The final panel of speakers explored interculturalism in practice and provided an inspirational and grounded conclusion to our meeting. Many of the presentations were marked by international collaboration and in this and other ways; the meeting exemplified the issues being considered. How do scholars from a r ange of places, cultures and disciplinary backgrounds put their heads above the rigid walls of boxes that confine and instead make meaning enriched by difference? The chapters in this collection illustrate this potential. They are produced in English, which was the language of the conference and which was not the first language of many of the participants, including many of us who, while living and working in Anglophone countries hail from elsewhere. As editor I have tried to stay true to the authors’ voices rather than contribute to a sense that there is only one form of English. The chapters in this collection are grouped according to the organising themes of the conference. In the first section two authors provide philosophical engagements with the notion of culture, a core and often taken for granted concept. Chrobak frames his explanation of culture through the work of German philosophers of anthropology and argues that culture is produced through the dialectical interplay between the individual and their social context. Thus culture is a dynamic system that is negotiated at the micro level rather than something imposed from above. Because of this all individuals take responsibility for the creation of culture, albeit to different extents. Demiray tackles the relationship between cultural difference and justice and explores whether there can be a form of universalism that respects diversity. He examines the tension between relativism and universalism through the work of French philosopher Cassirer and concludes that a just form of universalism is possible. In the second section of the collection, authors explore integration. Bagreeva and Mendzheritskiy provide insights through a comparative study of Russian immigration to Germany and Norway. They are concerned with levels of satisfaction amongst immigrants in the context of the complex interplay between ‘push’ and ‘pull’ factors, different settlement policies and the character of the Russian diasporic community in each country. Crumpton shifts our focus through her exploration of leadership and cultural difference. She argues that in a globalised world, exercising leadership presumes a r ange of strategies for understanding culture. Intercultural leadership must create spaces within which visible difference and differences between world views that may not be obvious

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__________________________________________________________________ can be negotiated. Globalisation is marked by the transnational transfer of knowledge most obvious through international education. Fozdar explores interactions between culturally distinct students at an Australian university campus. A history of immigration as well as the internationalisation of higher education, means that students at Australian universities come from a wide range of cultural backgrounds. Fozdar’s exposition indicates that students can be reluctant to interact with those whose cultures they do not share rather than take up the opportunity for intercultural engagement. A significant number of chapters in this collection deal with identities and the processes whereby these are formed, reformed and represented. Understanding culture and understanding self are inextricable and it is the ‘new ethnicities’ (Hall 1996) that mark an increasingly borderless world. In the first of the chapters on identity, Akkaya explores the Kurds, who in so many ways exemplify the diaspora. This group has lived outside a nation state until the early 1990s when a form of self-government was established in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Akkaya explores the impact of access to such a homeland and concludes that there has been a shift away from a victim and ethno-national identity to one that is focused instead on trans-border citizenship. A number of authors consider identities in relation to the built environment. How do the buildings we cherish or our use of such spaces instruct on cultural identity? Lähdesmäki considers the creation of European identity as simulacrum, through her exploration of Mini Europe a theme park in Brussels that is supported by the European Parliament. This consists of models of major tourist attractions, which the author argues are selected because they are immediately identified as European. Because they are well known that become shared markers whilst simultaneously reinscribing an exclusive representation of what is European. Tran’s chapter is also concerned with buildings chosen as significant. Her focus is on the preservation of historical homesteads in Western Australia. She argues that the buildings chosen and the way these are presented to the public, speaks to the elements of history taken up to illustrate particular views of national identity. Classrooms are the focus of Tsolidis’ chapter. She argues that spaces in mainstream schools, which are used by minority communities to teach heritage language and culture, also instruct on the status of ethnic minority cultures more broadly, through reinforcing hegemonic power relations. Sriratana is concerned with place in a v ery different way. In her chapter she explores the role of the weather in Woolf’s novel, The Years. Using Bhabha’s concept of colonial ambivalence she argues that weather, like identity, escapes essentalisation and in so doing challenges any fixity between identity, regionality and nationhood. Di Figlia and Tsuladze explore the re-making of identities in relation to two very different communities. The first of these chapters examines the left-wing Jewish community in Italy. Through life histories the author explores how individuals shifted strong left-wing identities developed in the 1960s to those

Georgina Tsolidis

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__________________________________________________________________ aligned with Israel by the 1980s. This development was fuelled by a number of issues including responses to the war against Lebanon. Tsuladze describes a similar reinscription of identity in relation to Georgian youth. In this case, these young people are reworking traditional and modern cultural motifs and in so doing merging the local (‘Russian’ Georgian) with the global (‘English’ Georgian). A sense of flexible identification is taken up by Simou in her exploration of the migrant subject through two Greek plays. In one play a binary is established between the migrant other and the national, which consolidates a s tereotypical vision of the migrant as perpetual victim. The second play provides a more nuanced vision of the migrant through a portrayal that focuses on their agency. The impact of migration on a community is explored through a different dynamic by Rubinov. He examines how remittances from abroad consolidate transnational networks through local Kyrgyz communities. This funding is channelled through communal festivities and gift exchange to rework local cultural practices and identities. The impact of the transnational on local identity is also explored by Lishchenko. Shieh and Chen, in their chapter, examine Taiwanese teenagers and the variable impact of advertising that stresses their Asianness relative to that which focuses on western values. They conclude that in order for advertising strategies to be successful, they may need to include both elements. The final two chapters in the collection are based on cross-cultural collaborations and are lived examples of academic work crossing borders. Berman and Hassinger explore working as feminists with South African women through an AIDS intervention project. This papermaking project is primarily a project of economic self-determination. The academic work of documenting the women’s stories is secondary but nonetheless provides powerful insights into interdisciplinary and intercultural ways of seeing and understanding. Using an altogether different epistemological basis, Shabes, Costedt, Troshchenkova, Ivarsson, Damber and Potapova explore the possibility of producing a method that increases intercultural communication. This team of Russian and Swedish academics explore the value systems of each country through a large-scale experimental study which also provides insights into young people’s values in both countries.

Notes 1

http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/at-the-interface/diversity-recognition/intercul turalism/conference-programme-abstracts-and-papers/session-1-culture-critical-ex aminations/. 2 G. Tsolidis, ‘Australian Multicultural Education: Revisiting and Resuscitating’, The Education of Diverse Populations: A Global Perspective, Springer, Netherlands, pp. 209-225.

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G. Hage, White Nation: Fantasies of White Supremacy in a Multicultural Society, Routledge, New York, 2000. 4 F. Jameson, Postmodernism, or The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, Duke University Press, Durham, 1999. 5 G. Deleuze and F. Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1987.

Bibliography Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F., A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 1987. Hage, G., White Nation: Fantasies of White Supremacy in a Multicultural Society. Routledge, New York, 2000. Jameson, F., Postmodernism, or The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. Duke University Press, Durham, 1999.

Part 1 Culture: Critical Examinations

Culture from the Point of View of Philosophical Anthropology Karol Chrobak Abstract In my chapter I analyse and develop the concept of culture that has been elaborated on by German philosophical anthropology. The concept of culture proposed by the group of philosophers is strictly connected with the holistic understanding of man as at the same time a biological and a spiritual being. Everything that belongs to the phenomenon of man has to be considered in this double context. According to these philosophical anthropologists, all human achievements result from a very particular position of man towards the world. Having in mind primarily the morphological aspect of human existence, Arnold Gehlen defines man as an ‘undetermined being’. Helmuth Plessner in turn characterises man as an ‘eccentric being’. Both authors pay special attention to the human ability to grasp boundaries of one’s own body and to consider oneself as a being detached from their surrounding environment. These particular abilities put man in the face of the open world. The openness is equivocal: on the one hand it offers a huge number of possibilities for action but on the other hand it d eprives man of the animal confidence of action and forces them to make every decision at their own risk. In order to improve this uncertain position man is coerced into elaborating various cognitive and pragmatic tools (institutions). At the creation of these tools the crucial role is the ability to take another perspective, which enriches interaction with both the cognitive and normative dimensions. The exchange of perspectives wouldn’t be possible if a particular external point of view wasn’t assumed. The point of view is considered to be a dialectical interplay between the individual and social perspective. The duality of structure, first described in the context of human anthropological structure, appears to be the pivotal aspect of culture and social reality alike. In the light of this duality, culture turns out to be a dynamic system that is continuously negotiated and adapted to changing social conditions. Culture is driven by interactions as a result of which rules are absorbed, reproduced and modified. Such a model does not offer any opportunity for steering culture from above. Instead, it burdens every individual action with the responsibility for cultural evolution. Key Words: Man, distance, undetermined being, institution, society, culture, responsibility. ***** 1. Holistic Approach To understand what a human being is, philosophy refers to a vast array of oppositions, the function of which is to precisely identify the phenomenon that is

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Culture from the Point of View of Philosophical Anthropology

__________________________________________________________________ being described. The belief of Spinoza that Omnis determinatio est negatio refers to the same logic of explanation. Any attempt to describe an object corresponds to distinguishing it from everything else. Every attribution of a feature to a thing is accompanied by a negation of possession by the thing of an opposite feature. It seems that every step toward better understanding of any phenomenon, toward its more and more precise and faithful description, always takes place at the cost of a higher and higher barrier that separates it from the rest of the being. Is it not the case of St. Augustine’s conception of man who is presented as a poor soul incarcerated in the prison of the body? The Cartesian vision of man is almost the same: by some kind of miracle a thinking mind is connected with the heartless mechanism of the body. The oppositions that were introduced to philosophy centuries ago still haunt. The mind-body problem or the problem of reconciling man’s moral freedom with nature’s determining laws seems still far from being solved. The only way to avoid these antinomies is to resign from considering man by means of oppositions. But such an approach must result in a very particular description of man. What such a presentation can get an account of is only the open space of possibilities that the human being is faced with. Therefore, it would be a hopeless and endless effort to try to understand man through considering their various historical appearances. The only method that remains is to look at the phenomenon of man from the other side somehow and instead of results of human creativity, grasp its conditions. Since one of the most characteristic manifestations of man is the reflection on their own identity, the anthropological question about conditions of human existence becomes the question about the possibility of philosophical anthropology itself. When considering the possibility of philosophical anthropology, we should focus primarily on the possibility of asking the question about oneself. Who is man, who is able to grasp themselves as a problem? They are a distanced being who at the same time is able to consider themselves a s ubject who asks and an object who is being asked about. The origin of the distance between both poles of question is not logical or psychological but much more profound, namely anthropological. Therefore, instead of studying various oppositions by means of which philosophy tried to answer the question of man, I will draw back to the very source of the question, to its anthropological foundation. 2. Man: Distanced Being The explanation of the specificity of human distance is the focus of interest of German philosophical anthropology. Though the philosophers belonging to the ‘school’ considers the same question, each of them tackles them differently. While Arnold Gehlen describes the distance first of all in the biological sense, Helmuth Plessner emphasises its phenomenological aspect. Both, however, in general share the same conception of man.

Karol Chrobak

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__________________________________________________________________ Gehlen begins his analysis with the critical assessment of man’s morphological constitution. He characterises man as an undetermined being because in comparison to animals they seem to be devoid of sharp senses, of the sufficient means of defense and attack and of the full protection against the environment. 1 The fact of staying alive of such a deficient being must be considered a paradox. According to Gehlen, the solution to the paradox shall give us access to the riddle of human uniqueness. In order to better realise what human biological deprivation really consists of it is useful to redefine it by means of the categories of ‘environment’ and ‘adaptation’. In case of each animal we can find out an exact correspondence between its needs and desires and the possibility of achieving their fulfillment. In case of human beings, however, it is not possible to find such a biological correspondence. Since man is not adapted to any particular environment they can be characterised as an indefinite being. But the biological indefiniteness doesn’t mean that man is unadapted to the world. It means rather that the human form of adaptation goes beyond the biological formation and takes a more internalised form. The biological indefiniteness consisting in the fact that to man no particular environment is ascribed finds its reflection in the cognitive status of the human being. Since human beings lack inborn behavior patterns that would precisely determine their conduct, they are devoid of instinctive orientation in the world. But this deficiency allows man to cognise the world within a much broader scope than is actually needed in a biological sense. It constitutes an important advantage that comes to light in the human ability to shape the world according to actual needs and desires. Therefore, it seems that the problem of the indefiniteness of man as a biological being can be solved by the same being in virtue of the same indefiniteness in this case, however, manifesting itself on the cognitive level. The plasticity of human cognition consists in the possibility of applying various cognitive schemes to the same (or relatively the same) set of impulses. This conception presupposes that (1) man is faced with relatively unorganized sensual data and that (2) human cognition takes an active part in their organizing. The first presupposition results from the thesis about man’s absence of specialisation. Since specialisation consists in fitting an organism to a particular environment, its lack leads to a world-open position (Weltoffenheit). The position on the one hand can be characterised negatively by the presence of the tremendous burden of overwhelming stimulation but on the other hand positively by the opportunity for acquiring various experiences that can be later used in the struggle for survival. The second presupposition refers to Gehlen’s crucial thesis claiming that ‘a being with such a [undetermined] physical constitution is viable only as an acting being’. 2 Since action is the element that mediates between various dimensions of human existence it constitutes the fundament of the philosophy of man. There are

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__________________________________________________________________ two aspects of action I would like to put special emphasis on: the epistemological and the anthropological one. In order to survive man organises the diversity of the open world into a familiar reality by means of a system of categories. This well known and predictable reality constitutes a co mpensation for the lack of a safe environment. The process of categorising of the world succeeds along with its physical mastering. Both constitute inseparable parts of the same cognitive and pragmatic unity. (…) [I]t is vitally important – writes Gehlen – to expose the common root of knowledge and ac tion, for orientation in the world and the control of actions are the primary laws of human life. 3 Therefore there are as many different categorisations of the world as ways of the physical dealing with it. This thesis leads to the important conclusion that man as the only being lives in the plurality of realities the function of which is to parcel and precise the open world. This problem has been widely discussed by Ernst Cassirer and Ludwig Wittgenstein. What is worth mentioning, they both emphasise that the various categorisations of the world should be understood as forms of activity. What such a co mplex of cognitive and pragmatic rules is may be shown by social institutions. According to Gehlen by means of institutions man compensates their natural deficiencies. Since human beings lack appropriate instincts they need to find them out on their own. Therefore the function of institutions is the same as of instincts: to stabilise human behavior making it reliable and predictable. By the same token they improve the practical orientation in the world. But the origin of these artificial ‘instincts’ is very different. It is not the biological constitution of an organism but communicative interactions that join people together causing them to constitute one social organism. Within it ‘our individual needs are intertwined with the universal practical necessities society demands’ 4 so that the clear distinction between an individual and community disappears. I return to this question later considering the phenomenon of duality of social structure. When looking at the anthropological sense of action, another important characteristic of man comes into view. The concept of action assumes that an agent consciously applies specific means to achieve a particular goal. Since I act always as an embodied self I’m able to objectify myself. According to Helmuth Plessner this ability is the most characteristic trait of man. He characterises it by means of the category of eccentric positionality (exzentrische Positionalität). Human beings, like other animals, possess a conscious centre of behavior. But only man is aware of it and is able to distance themselves from the centre. Citing Plessner:

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__________________________________________________________________ While the animal’s life is centric, the human life is eccentric not being able, however, to overcome its centricity. 5 The ability of self-objectification enables man to look at physical as well as psychical aspects of their existence. First they realise this duality by experiencing their own body as a physical object (Körper) and as a feeling subject (Leib) alike. The ability of grasping both aspects of human corporality presupposes an external point of view (Blickpunkt) that makes it possible to transcend them both. This point being located neither in the objective world of nature nor in the internal world of subjectivity is – metaphorically speaking – nowhere. Thus, it can’t be determined as a particular kind of thing. It is rather a function that is being realised in the hiatus that is in the gap that spreads out between the physical and psychical aspect of human existence. Since the external point of self-reflection is a pure function it can’t be individuated as ‘mine’ or ‘yours’. Instead, it has to be considered an anthropological universal. This particular perspective being shared by all men constitutes the point of convergence around which a common sphere of norms and values can emerge. The particular spiritual space Plessner calls Mitwelt (common world) and identifies it with social reality. 3. Man: Social Being From Plessner’s anthropology, one important conclusion can be drawn. Namely, that the social character of man’s existence is already contained in their anthropological structure. Human sociality does not result from any extrinsic factor (e.g. from the need of protection) but is anticipated in the particular organisation of human subjectivity. Gehlen shares this view, too. According to him the openness at interaction manifests itself already in the relation between a subject and an object. It is namely a necessary condition of objectivity of things. The objectivity gradually emerges in the process of communicative experience that consists in manipulating a thing as well as in imagining the whole action from the angle of the thing. This particular ability corresponds to the phenomenon that G.H. Mead called ‘taking the role of the other’. An example of this phenomenon is the following situation: a child standing behind a plastic red curtain calls to mother: ‘Mammy, look, I’m red’. In this interaction the functioning of Plessner’s virtual point of view can be clearly observed. The child is namely at the same time in their body (when expressing the sentence) and in the ‘body’ of their mother (when considering themselves from her point of view). Therefore, this case of social interaction should be understood as the substitution of the previous schemes: ‘body-soul’, ‘Iobject’ by the new one: ‘I-You’. But we should bear in mind that in spite of changing variables the anthropological principle remains still the same and that it expresses exactly the same fundamental ability to form a distance. The point of view through which it is possible to observe both I and You is continuously being shaped by values, norms and meanings. The longer one lives in

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__________________________________________________________________ a community the more determined their point of view becomes. For example the expression: ‘Look how generous I am’ requires the same duality of perspectives I’ve pointed out in the previous case of the child but beside it introduces another important factor: an ethical judgment. It is formulated on the ground of a whole nexus of values and norms that by default are considered to be shared by members of a given community. The virtual point that constitutes the ‘third’ pole of the social interaction turns out to be a space filled with values and norms that obtain within a particular community. This space Plessner calls ‘pure We or Spirit’ (reine Wir oder Geist). 6 It is not simple to describe this particular space. On the one hand it is dependent because it emerges from individual actions and interactions. But on the other hand it is autonomous because it is not possible to change it just by force of an individual decision. Since the ‘pure We’ spreads between an individual and the social structure it is obvious that it manifests itself differently depending on which perspective it is seen from. Therefore, it is futile to try to ‘stabilise’ it by closing it within one of these perspectives. Instead, it is important to understand this particular entity in the context of its original duality. The concept of ‘duality of structure’, introduced by Anthony Giddens, focuses exactly on this bipolarity of ‘pure We’. Giddens writes: According to the notion of the duality of structure, the structural properties of social systems are both medium and outcome of the practices they recursively organize. Structure is not ‘external’ to individuals (…) it i s in a certain sense more ‘internal’ than exterior to their activities (…). 7 Since the duality of structure primarily expresses itself in human actions it proves that what we call ‘society’ and ‘culture’ lies much closer to us than it would seem at first sight. By drawing attention to the importance of the individual action for the process of shaping the social and cultural reality we return to man and their actual responsibility. 4. Conclusion: Man’s Responsibility for Culture The duality of social structure follows from the fundamental duality of human nature. Therefore, it is not possible to describe adequately any phenomenon of man’s life if this duality is not taken into account. It concerns primarily the question of responsibility. Cassirer in the essay Naturalistic and H umanistic Philosophies of Culture discusses different theories of culture that joins one ambition: to find out universal laws of culture development. All of them – Hegel’s idealism, Taine’s positivism and Spengler’s fatalism – consider society and culture a mechanism that works independently of anyone’s intervention. They treat the human being like ‘a mere marionette of the omnipotent, self-moving idea’ 8 and

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__________________________________________________________________ thereby refuse them any freedom and responsibility. If we don’t consent to this unrealistic conception of man that in no point fits to our everyday experience we have to agree to the unavoidable duality that pervades every aspect of human existence. In light of this duality man as an undetermined being is all the time forced to determine themselves. But since it is possible only through action this process of self-determination spreads also over the external physical and social world. The frontier between ‘me’ and ‘world’, ‘me’ and ‘you’, ‘me’ and ‘we’ becomes blurred. An individual fuses with the institutions, identities, values that constitute their cultural environment. But the influence is mutual: the selfresponsibility finds its counterpart in the responsibility for the world that lies in our action’s reach. It is not equal for everybody but nobody can be freed from the burden of the responsibility. Since man – because of their natural openness – can betray this responsibility all institutions, values, and principles are always vulnerable. But this is the price of human creativity and the reason why it is worth talking about culture at all.

Notes 1

Cf. A. Gehlen, Man: His Nature and Place in the World, C. McMillan and K. Pillmer (eds), Columbia University Press, New York, 1988, p. 4. 2 Ibid., p. 16. 3 Ibid., p. 34. 4 Ibid., p. 152. 5 H. Plessner, Die Stufen des Organischen und der Mensch. Einleitung in die Philosophische Anthropologie, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York, 1975, pp. 291-292. 6 Ibid. 7 A. Giddens, The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration, Polity Press, 1986, p. 25. 8 E. Cassirer, ‘Naturalistic and Humanistic Philosophies of Culture’, The Logic of Humanities, C.S. Haw (ed), Yale University Press, p. 19.

Bibliography Cassirer, E., The Logic of Humanities. Haw, C.S. (ed), Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967. —, The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, Vol. III: The Phenomenology of Knowledge. Trans. Manheim, R., Yale University Press, New Haven, 1957. Gehlen, A., Man: His Nature and Place in the World. McMillan, C. and Pillmer, K. (eds), Columbia University Press, New York, 1988.

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__________________________________________________________________ Giddens, A., The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration. Polity Press, 1986. Lorenz, K., Behind the Mirror: A Search for a N atural History of Human Knowledge. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York and London, 1973. Plessner, H., Die Stufen des Organischen und de r Mensch. Einleitung in die Philosophische Anthropologie. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York, 1975. Popper, K., Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach. Oxford University Press, 1972. Scheler, M., The Human Place in the Cosmos. Trans. Frings, K.S., Northwestern University Press, 2009. Searle, J., The Construction of Social Reality. Free Press, 1997. Wittgenstein, L., Philosophical Investigations. Trans. Anscombe, G.E.M., Blackwell Publishers, 1997. Karol Chrobak, Ph.D., Warsaw University of Life Sciences, Poland. Contact: [email protected].

Acknowledging and Limiting the Moral Significance of Cultural Praxis: Reflections on Cassirer’s Critical Philosophy of Culture Mehmet Ruhi Demiray Abstract One of the most remarkable theoretical objections to the idea of human rights is the argument of cultural relativism. Cultural relativism is grounded upon ‘culturalism’, which suggests that culture is constitutive for the whole sphere of social and political reality in the sense that all categories with which we signify our reality (e.g. true and false, or good and evil, or right and wrong, or beautiful and ugly) are functions of our cultural formation. Hence, the argument of cultural relativism contends that the universalistic idea of human rights is crucially blind to the fact of cultural construction of human reality. What is more, cultural-relativism insists that the foregoing idea is perilous, since it becomes an alibi for suppression of particular cultural traditions by not recognizing their moral significances. Conceding that there might be ‘universalisms’ vulnerable to such criticisms, I think that cultural-relativism is untenable to the extent that it s uggests an immediate justification (i.e. a justification without further ado) for any cultural practice. In this chapter, I argue that Ernst Cassirer’s philosophy of culture points to a form of universalism which is supportive of cultural differentiation within and across human societies. First, I sketch how he develops a philosophical vision of human reality as cultural construction on the basis of the concept of symbol. Second, I explicate Cassirer’s conception of culture, which he defines as ‘a never-ending process of world-creation and of self-liberation of mankind’. Then, I underline certain tenets of the subtle form of moral universalism, which is inherent in Cassirer’s philosophy of culture. I conclulde by noting that Cassirer’s critical philosophy might be suggestive for the resolution of the contemporary debate between human-rights-universalism and cultural-relativism, due to the fact that it is capable of explaining both the moral significance of cultural praxis and the limits of such significance. Key Words: Cassirer, symbol, universalism, cultural relativism and cultural rights. ***** 1. Symbol as the Key to the Human Cultural Reality A good point of entry for Cassirer’s philosophy of culture is his distinction between the category of ‘life’ and that of ‘form’. 1 The former designates an ‘eternal flux’ of sensuous material, while the latter designates ‘the world as an order’ which is constructed out of the evanescent material of ‘life’ by formative human activity. In his view, this world is the cultural world of human beings. Cultural world is identical to the whole world we have. By constructing a world

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Acknowledging and Limiting the Moral Significance of Cultural Praxis

__________________________________________________________________ out of shapeless and mute flux, man draws, at the same time, the boundaries of his actual and possible existence in a way no entity beyond these boundaries may be accessed into by him. Within these boundaries lay all aspects or spheres of human life including myth, language, religion, art, history, and science. These are different cultural forms which constitute ‘different spheres of objectivity’ or ‘different structures of meaning’. They have distinct and sometimes incompatible structural principles. Yet, symbolic-relation between man and his ‘world’ underlies all of these forms. Thus, for Cassirer, only an awareness of this symbolic character of man’s relation with his world can provide us with a true understanding of the nature of cultural phenomena, which is in fact identical to human reality as such. Cassirer formulates the concept of symbol as follows: [The symbol-concept] encompasses phenomena in which the sensuous is meaning, in which a sensuous particularization and embodiment, incarnation of a meaning. 2

the totality of those in any way filled with content represents a a manifestation and

The most essential point in this conception is that, for Cassirer, a symbolicrelation is not a simple representative relation (in which one thing is taken as a token for another) but a constitutive representation within an order of meaning which establishes its referents as well as its signs. 3 In a symbolic-relation, two moments of the symbol (that of sensuous vehicle and that of meaning) are so intrinsically suffused by each other that these two moments are almost invisible to the actor operating within the special cultural form in which symbolic relation is embedded. Underscoring this ‘correlativity of the moments of a symbolic relation’, 4 Cassirer argues that the function of a symbol is not to announce but to bring about its object and make human beings conceive this object: The special symbolic forms are not imitations, but organs of reality, since it is solely by their agency that anything real becomes an object for intellectual apprehension and as such is made visible to us. The question as to what reality is apart from these forms, and what are its independent attributes, becomes irrelevant here. 5 To make a b etter sense of Cassirer’s symbol-concept, let’s consider some possible symbolizations of ‘a drawing on a rock’: within a mythical form, it may be a taboo separating my sphere of life from the dangerous sphere of the unknown; within a religious form, the script of a supreme being; within the form of art, an artistic expression of a certain feeling such as loneliness; within a natural-scientific form, a r emnant of a ch emical element such as calcium-carbonate; within a

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__________________________________________________________________ mathematical form, a perfect triangle with equal edges; and etc… You may always find alternative interpretations of the same ‘drawing on a rock’. However, you cannot have a naked vision of the drawing as a pure entity. In any form of making sense of sensuous material, symbolization as objectification, i.e. an activity of providing sensuous vehicles with a meaning, is necessary. That is, there can be no such thing as a ‘thing’ which has not already been symbolically processed by the cultural actor. This is why Cassirer argues that symbolic forms are the organs of reality. In his An Essay on Man, Cassirer elaborates symbol-concept as the foundation stone of a philosophical anthropology. Pointing out the fact that our sensory contact with the world is always-already reworked into something meaningful by us, the symbol-concept reveals the mediated character of our relation to the world. In this way, it also reveals the paradox inherent in the human existence: Man as an animal symbolicum is that being that has access to the reality and to his own self only by distancing himself from ‘what immediately exits’. 6 In other words, man makes/constructs his world in the very activity of giving a structure to what is immediately nothing more than fluctuating sense impressions. The world thereby constructed encompasses the whole human existence including a dimension of the possibility (i.e. an order of will) as well as a dimension of actuality (i.e. an order of representation). 2. A Dramatic Conception of Culture as a Never-Ending Process of SelfLiberation Cassirer suggests that once we grasp the essential role of symbolizing-activity in the construction of any objective sphere of meaning, we will then gain the insight that all cultural phenomena consist in the ‘modification of a universal grammar’ into different forms. That is, we will recognize that any cultural praxis is a specific instance of ‘world-structuring’ via symbolizing-activity, exhibiting the human struggle for liberation from the confines of an immediate and passive existence depended on pr e-given sensuous material. Cassirer emphasizes that precisely because it is a mark of human spontaneity or freedom, symbolizingactivity should lead to various directions and principles. As a result of such necessary diversification, we come across with a multiplicity of cultural forms, i.e., the modifications of a universal grammar. In accounting for the relations between symbolic forms, Cassirer presents an intricate argument. On the one hand, he argues that each symbolic form is a ‘selfsufficient’ structure of meaning with its own immanent laws so that none of them is reducible to another. On the other hand, as Cassirer’s analysis proceeds from the older symbolic forms (such as myth and primitive religion) to the newer ones (such as science and art), these forms turn out to be the historical stages of our progress towards self-liberation. 7 This will be well illustrated, if we compare the basic tenets of Cassirer’s accounts of myth (which is the oldest symbolic form) and of

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__________________________________________________________________ science/rational knowledge (which is the newest form). In the mythical form, symbol is misconceived ‘as a property of the thing’. 8 Hence, humankind is almost completely unaware of his creative power. In the scientific/rational form, humankind becomes aware of the fact that symbolization-activity as the fount of any order of meaning is the very mark of the human power to constitute her own world. Hence, from myth-intensive period to science-intensive period, history of humankind is a process of the increasing spiritualization (de-reification) of culture, which culminates in a stage in which man becomes aware of his creative activity over his world. One may then argue that Cassirer combines a synchronic perspective with a diachronic perspective. From a synchronic perspective, cultural forms are considered to be equally consistent and self-sufficient edifices of the form-creating ability of human species. Yet, from a d iachronic perspective, elaborated by a philosophy of history that is sensitive to the dialectics inherent in cultural forms, culture is also the form-breaking power of humankind. By focusing on the conflicts within and between symbolic forms constituting man’s cultural universe, the latter approach provides us with the insight that what may seem, at first sight, as a completely structured edifice is indeed a world in the process of construction. Hence culture is a dialectical interplay of the form-creating power and the formbreaking power. In line with this, Cassirer sharply criticizes the vitalist (Nietzschean) conceptions of culture which reduce cultural forms into inert masses of works or almost thing-like entities. He emphasizes that culture is both ergon (product) and energia (production). 9 This means that culture reflects the dialectical unity of the law of self-preservation (stability) and the law of renewal (creativity), which requires cultural praxis of individual subject as the mediator between these two opposites. Hence, human culture is not a t ragedy as our unbreakable fate, but a drama in which we always have a role to play. On the other hand, Cassirer also stands out against what he considers as the absolutist (Hegelian) philosophies of culture. Like Hegel, he emphasizes that culture is a dialectical unity, ‘a harmony in contrariety’. 10 Yet, the true problem is how we are to interpret this ‘harmony in contrariety’. On the one hand, Hegelian absolutism suggests that philosophy reveals the substantial unity of culture as ‘a harmony unconsciously established by the interplay of contrarieties’. On the other hand, for Cassirer’s critical philosophy of culture, this unity is always ‘a harmony to be established’, that is, a task (of cultural activity) rather than a substance. For Cassirer, a standpoint of the absolute truth whereby tensions or contradictions between specific cultural forms and epochs are completely overcome is neither possible nor desirable. It is not possible because philosophy as the act of reflection upon symbolic forms cannot lead to ‘an absolute truth’ (i.e. a ‘supra-symbolical real’), but only to a reflexive and integral attitude towards culture. Second, a complete resolution of controversies between cultural forms and epochs would

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__________________________________________________________________ mean not the establishment of the unity of culture but the abolishment of culture (which is energia as well as ergon), since the non-existence of ‘a really (suprasymbolical) real’ is the very condition of the possibility of our freedom, and thus of our symbolizing-activity. In simple terms, for Cassirer, culture is the human way of existence. The plurality of cultural forms and particular instances these forms take across different times and societies are nothing but modifications of the universal phenomena called culture. Hence, culture is never a pre-given substance, but always an infinite task to be performed by every generation. This task lies in humankind’s construction of her own world in a way which brings about her progressive selfliberation from ‘what is pre-given’. 3. Universalism and Cultural Specificity Now, I think that a subtle form of moral universalism is inherent to Cassirer’s understanding of culture as the work (ergon) of human formative-power (energia). This subtle form of universalism, which may be called a universalism sensitive to cultural specificity, might provide significant insights to the contemporary debate between universalism and cultural-relativism. In my view, Cassirer’s moral universalism has four basic tenets. First, Cassirer sees morality not as a particular symbolic form among others. Rather, the moral standpoint is embedded in all symbolic forms and their particular instances. This is indeed why the moral standpoint is universal. Such a ‘universal’ as proposed by Cassirer is not a substance standing out of ‘the particular’. Rather, it is the immanent-founding principle of all particular forms and instances of culture. ‘The universal’ is basically the fact that ‘symbolic-relation’ constitutes the essence of human existence, and this marks, in turn, the fact that humankind’s mode of existence is a non-predetermined one, which should be self-determined by them. Second, Cassirer’s universalism does not amount to a prescription of a certain essence or nature upon human beings. It is rather a non-essentialist universalism emphasizing the radical openness and creativity of humankind in the construction of herself as well as her ‘world’. Culture is indeed the very process of self-creation or self-formation. Precisely because of this, it can never be a fully completed achievement, which would suggest a closed universe for the members inheriting that achievement. Human world as cultural world is, by definition, always open to modification by symbolizing activities of new-comers. Otherwise, human being as animal symbolicum would turn out to be a social automaton. Third, Cassirer’s universalism does not only permit but also encourages cultural differentiation. For him, culture is like a universal grammar which should present itself in spatio-temporal modifications. Such modifications are the inevitable consequences of the fact that humankind has a non-predetermined mode of existence which consists in the process of self-formation. However, as a fourth

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__________________________________________________________________ tenet, Cassirer’s universalism also delimits the scope of such modifications. Culture is the totality of forms that human beings have given to their lives, and thus should reflect their self-determining creative activity. In cases whereby certain ritualistic practices and images are imposed upon individuals, that is, in cases whereby individuals are prescribed to non-reflexively follow a pre-established form of life as an immutable nature of their own, we are faced with not cultural forms, but ‘de-culturalization’ or ‘de-humanization’. Hence, one can recapitulate that, for Cassirer, despite the striking diversity of human existence, there is a constant which is definitive of the function of culture as such. This is the fact that human existence is a process of self-creation, whose telos is the progressive self-liberation of human being from what is immediately given to her. This ‘functional-universal’ provides the standpoint from which we are to judge the moral significance of particular human practices, because it gives us the distinction between ‘what is genuinely cultural’ and ‘what is not’. Such a philosophical perspective on culture has considerable implications for the current debate on cultural rights or the right to culture. From Cassirer’s standpoint, cultural rights are conceivable as individuals’ rights to follow, dismiss or revise their own cultural heritages in accordance with their own wills. Hence, Cassirer’s philosophy acknowledges the right to culture, but also makes it conditional to personal freedom. This means that a category of ‘cultural rights’ counter-weighing the category of human rights would be a contradiction in terms. Although it is not a must that every culture or every symbolic form should contain the concept of human rights, they all have to somehow be the expression of human self-forming activity, which these rights aim at maintaining and promoting. With such proviso, different cultural formations within and across human societies are not closed-particularistic edifices defying the possibility of universalism, but they all are singular instances whereby the universal, that is, the fact of human existence as self-formation, is realized.

Notes 1

See, Cassirer, Philosophy of Symbolic Forms IV, trans. J.M. Krois, J.M. Krois and D.P. Verene (eds), Yale UP, New Haven, 1996, pp. 3-33. 2 Cassirer, Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, Volume 3: The Phenomenology of Knowledge, trans. R. Manheim, Yale UP, New Haven, 1957, p. 93. 3 Cassirer, An Essay On Man: An Introduction To A Philosophy of Human Culture, Yale UP, New Haven, 1944, pp. 27-41. 4 C. Hamburg, ‘Cassirer’s Conception of Philosophy’, The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer, P.A. Schilpp (ed), Tudor PC, New York, p. 84. 5 Cassirer, Language and Myth, trans. S.K. Langer, Dover, New York, 1953, p. 8.

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__________________________________________________________________ 6

F. Vandenberghe, ‘From Structuralism to Culturalism: Ernst Cassirer’s Philosophy of Symbolic Form’, European Journal of Social Theory, Vol. 4, No. 4, 2001, p. 486. 7 See R. Hartman, ‘Cassirer’s Philosophy of Symbolic Forms’, The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer, P.A. Schilpp (ed), Tudor PC, New York, p. 298; and Vandenberghe, op. cit., p. 490. 8 Cassirer, An Essay On Man, op. cit., pp. 36-37. 9 J. Habermas, ‘The Liberating Power of Symbols: Ernst Cassirer’s Humanistic Legacy and the Warburg Library’, The Liberating Power of Symbols: Philosophical Essays, trans. P. Dews, MIT UP, Cambridge, 2001, p. 14. 10 Cassirer, The Logic of Humanities, trans. C. Smith-Howe, Yale UP, London, 1961, p. 228.

Bibliography Bayer, T.I., Cassirer’s Metaphysics of Symbolic Forms: A Philosophical Commentary. Yale UP, New Haven, 2001. Cassirer, E., An Essay On Man: An Introduction To A Philosophy of Human Culture. Yale UP, New Haven, 1944. ––, Language and Myth. Trans. Langer, S.K., Dover, New York, 1953. ––, Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, 3 Vols. Trans. Manheim R., Yale UP, New Haven, 1953-1957. ––, The Logic of Humanities. Trans. Smith-Howe, C., Yale UP, London, 1961. ––, The Myth of the State. Yale UP, New Haven, 1974. ––, Philosophy of Symbolic Forms: Volume 4: The Metaphysics of Symbolic Forms. Krois, J.M. and Verene, D.P. (eds), Yale UP, New Haven, 1996. Habermas, J., ‘The Liberating Power of Symbols: Ernst Cassirer’s Humanistic Legacy and the Warburg Library’. The Liberating Power of Symbols: Philosophical Essays. MIT UP, Cambridge, 2001. Hamburg, C., ‘Cassirer’s Conception of Philosophy’. The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer. Tudor PC, New York, 1949.

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__________________________________________________________________ Hartman, R., ‘Cassirer’s Philosophy of Symbolic Forms’. The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer. Tudor PC, New York, 1949. Kassab, E.S., ‘Phenomenologies of Culture and Ethics: Ernst Cassirer, Alfred Schutz and the Tasks of a Philosophy of Culture’. Human Studies. Vol. 25, No. 1, 2002, pp. 55-88. Lindahl, H., ‘Democracy and the Symbolic Constitution of Society’. Ratio Juris. Vol. 11, No. 1, 1998, pp. 12-37. Vandenberghe, F., ‘From Structuralism to Culturalism: Ernst Cassirer’s Philosophy of Symbolic Form’. European Journal of Social Theory. Vol. 4, No. 4, 2001, pp. 479-497. Mehmet Ruhi Demiray is a scholar of political philosophy, currently working at Kocaeli University. He is particularly focused on the theoretical foundations of the idea of human rights and the question of legitimate political power. He is the author of the book titled An Integral View of Law, the State, and Human Rights: Comparing Hans Kelsen’s Positivism, Carl Schmitt’s Realism and Otfried Höffe’s Rationalism.

Part 2 Living Together: Questioning Assimilation and Integration

Integrational Politics and Migrant Aspirations: Finding the Balance Ekaterina Bagreeva and German Mendzheritskiy Abstract In the era of globalisation, when new forms of migration emerge, finding the balance between integrational politics and migrant aspirations is crucial for the functioning of a multi-cultural society. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, a large flow of Russian-speaking migrants moved to countries in Western Europe. These aspects of this migration process were among the foci of a multi-disciplinary comparative study. It was conducted by a group of researchers in Germany and Norway. The pilot project was completed in 2008-2009 using quantitative and qualitative methods and including 190 Russian-speaking migrants in Germany and 62 in Norway. One of the purposes of the research was to discover the existing relation between the aspirations of Russian-speaking migrants in Norway and Germany, and the integration politics of the host countries. The key questions related to the following: 1) integration politics: a) enforcement of host culture, b) freedom to preserve migrant cultures; 2) individual aspirations: a) desire to assimilate, b) wish to maintain one’s culture. In order to clarify these issues, the following questions were analysed. If Russian-speaking migrants have a tendency to preserve their culture when moving to Western countries do they achieve this by speaking the native language;, keeping contact with members of their own culture; reading books and watching television in their native languages; maintaining relations with relatives in the native country; spending holidays travelling to the native country; and maintaining the cultural community? On the other hand, integrational politics in Germany and Norway were surveyed, including the structure and functioning of the institutions responsible for executing national migrant policies, and the contents of integration programs such as language and cultural introduction courses. Key Words: integration.

Migration,

Germany,

Norway,

Russian-speaking

migrants,

***** In the era of globalisation, when new forms of migration emerge, finding the balance between integration policies and migrant aspirations is crucial for the wellfunctioning of a multi-cultural society. Aspiring for this balance is also justified by the many different conflicts between accepting societies and migrants. Examples of such conflicts include the recent waves of violence in France (in districts where migrants experience compact living conditions), as well as problems with interactions between migrant communities and local populations in other European

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Integrational Politics and Migrant Aspirations

__________________________________________________________________ countries. These difficulties clearly indicate that any balance which once may have existed has recently either become disturbed, or the misbalance has grown more obvious. As a result of conflicts between accepting societies and migrants, integration of migrants and related policies have escalated as a ‘hot topic’ in the mass media in both Germany and Norway. However, even though the policies themselves are being discussed, the situation regarding, and indeed the idea of, a balance between societies and migrants – the main items of our report –are not frequently discussed. The sociologist Gudmund Haernes, speaking at a conference on March 2, 2011, provided his interpretation of public debate on this topic, Haernes, a f ormer Secretary of the Labour Party of Norway (the current party in power in Norway), said that ‘the solution to the successful functioning of the state is the interdependency between migrants and the indigenous population’. 1 In other words, understanding the balance between opportunities, expectations, aspirations and how these are implemented by the state, is paramount for a successful cohabitation of migrants and the local society. The question of balance between society and migrant communities does not appear as a clear basis for discussions. Some fundamental questions seem to be unanswered in related discussions. What is integration in reality? What can be defined as successful integration? What are the migrant expectations of the society and vice versa? What goals do migrants have when entering a n ew society? It is perhaps simplistic to assume that if there is no violence involving migrant communities or their representatives integration has been a success. On the contrary, estimations of whether integration has been a success or a failure must be based on reproducible, unambiguous and objective criteria. Furthermore, both sides of the emerging debate should be considered: the collective demands of society towards the migrant, as well as the personal requirements and aspirations of the migrant. When considering definitions of integration and evaluating integration success, it is necessary also to keep in mind the dynamic properties of migrant groups themselves. In addition to sound empirical research on migration, two classical models assist in explaining the balance between migrants and the host society. These assist the analysis of the practical situation for Russian speaking migrants in Germany and Norway. These are the models of Berry 2 and Esser. 3 The Berry model may be used to clarify the balance between integration politics and migrant aspirations. In this model, Berry distinguishes between several strategies for acculturation of the individual in a new culture and society. Depending on the intentions of both the society and the individual, such strategies may be; assimilation, integration, separation and marginalisation. The consequence of each of these strategies for the two parties involved may be found using the model. The model also allows exploration of harmony or disharmony between the migrant and the host society. 4

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__________________________________________________________________ The model by Harmut Esser describes four different types of integration; structural, cultural, social, and identificational integration. Structural integration implies that the migrants have access to the main institutions of the economy of the country of residence. Cultural (cognitive) integration covers the concept of language possession. Social integration means that the migrants are being included in private spheres of the society, such as becoming friends with incumbent members of the society etc. Identificational integration is the migrants’ feeling of belonging to a new society which is constructed from the 3 pr evious types of integration. 5 Furthermore, the Annual Report for 2010 of ‘Sachverständigenrat Deutsche Stiftungen für Migration und Integration’ notes that social freedom in a h ost society requires an understanding of integration as presenting equal opportunities for migrants and the native population in all the main activities of the society. 6 Integration can only be ‘freely’ chosen and successfully pursued by nondominant groups when the dominant society is open and inclusive in its orientation towards cultural diversity. Thus, a mutual accommodation is required for integration to be attained, involving the acceptance by both groups that their members live as culturally distinct people. 7 Migrants’ expectations and aspirations are increasingly significant to the migration policies of receiving societies. One of the strongest waves of migration in Europe occurred at the end of the 20-th century, and is still influencing the situation related to migration on the continent. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, a large flow of Russian-speaking migrants moved to countries in Western Europe. The resulting process of migrant adaptation from the countries of the former Soviet Union has beem researched by a group of researchers from Germany and Norway. A mixed-methods pilot project was completed in 2008-2009. Identical questionnaires were completed by 190 Russian-speaking migrants in Germany and 62 in Norway. Additionally, deep interviews with experts, leaders and employees of migrant NGOs were conducted between 2008- 2010. 12 such interviews were conducted in Germany and 6 in Norway. While migration to Germany was not new, an increasing number of citizens from the former Soviet Union migrated to this country in the late 20th and early 21st century. Today, there is a large Russian-speaking community in Germany, and Russian-speaking migrants are now one of the two largest foreign-language minorities in the country. The total number of immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Germany currently exceeds 2.5 million. These migrants make up one of the two major groups of migrants; ‘ethnic Germans and their families’ and ‘Jewish immigrants and their families’. According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Germany (Bundesministerium des Innern, Bundesamt für Migration und F lüchtlinge), more than two million

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__________________________________________________________________ people (2.100.013) came to Germany from the former Soviet Unionfrom 1990 to 2009 and acquired the status of ethnic Germans with their families. 8 Jewish immigrants and their families represent the second large group of Russian-speaking immigrants who moved to Germany from 1993 t o 2009. According to the German authorities responsible for integration of migrants, this group of migrants currently numbers a total of 203.215 people. 9 In addition to these large groups of Russian-speaking migrants, it is necessary to include a number of citizens from the former Soviet Union living in Germany as a result of joint marriages with the local population, or various kinds of employment or academic migration. When considering another ‘western’ country – Norway, marriage with the local population, academic, and labor migration were the main motives for migration from the former Soviet Union. The opening of borders and direct links with Norway started a wave of migration from Russia. However, restricted immigration policies pursued by the Norwegian authorities resulted in only a limited number of Russian-speaking migrants entering the country. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Norway (Utenriksdepartementet), there are 14.723 immigrants from Russia, as well as persons born in Norway to parents of immigrants currently residing in the country. 10 The vast majority of these people moved to Norway in the period from 1995 to 2008, and the main reason for migration from Russia was family reunion, labour and academic migration. However, more and more students, researchers and trainees are coming to Norway from Eastern Europe. In 2003, only eight percent of all foreign students in Norway were Russian, but by 2010, Russian-speaking students represented the largest group of foreigners studying in Norway. Research in Germany and Norway was conducted to considerthe balance between integration politics and migrant aspirations. The data acquired was considered in relation to, relevant theories, as well as public research material and policy definitions. While clear definitions adhering to the principles mentioned initially regarding successful migration processes were found to be scarce, one of the results from the research was to identify migrants’ goals for migrating to the respective countries. Analysing the data obtained from the research, we can conclude that the main motivation, level of satisfaction with the migration, and the level of personal activity differs among Russian-speaking migrants in Germany and Norway. In particular, most migrants in Germany were well aware of the broad social support they could expect to receive from the government, and, furthermore, relied on help from family members and members of the Russian-speaking community living in this country. On the other hand, the migrants to Norway expected a significantly lower level of support from government, NGOs and any Russian-speaking community already in this country.


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__________________________________________________________________ Thus, due to the differences in ‘push’ and ‘pull’ factors, migrants to Germany relied more heavily on the assistance and support from the receiving country in order to improve their quality of life, rather than manifesting their own active position. Those who migrated to Norway were, to a lesser extent, informed about the possibilities that the State would support migrants. Consequently, these migrants relied mainly on their own resources throughout the migration process. At the same time, respondents from Germany whose main motivation was ‘avoiding misfortune’ and ‘obtaining security and material well-being’ demonstrated a relatively passive attitude. As a r esult, these migrants generally expressed a significantly lower level of satisfaction with their lives compared to those who moved to Norway. Most migrants to Norway were motivated by a d esire to achieve success, consciously striving towards career growth and high social status, and thus, taking an active position towards life. Consequently, the highest level of satisfaction with the quality of life was observed among respondents from this country. This, in our opinion, suggests a connection between the level of personal activity to ensure their livlihoods, expectations, and the level of satisfaction with their quality of life. Therefore, it seems that a high level of personal activity combined with a low level of expectation, may provide the migrant with a higher level of satisfaction with their quality of life, when considering the process of adaptation to a n ew society.And on the contrary; a low level of personal activity combined with a high level of expectations, reduces the degree of satisfaction with quality of life. In respect to expectations and personal activity, the difference between Norway and Germany was extremely significant. As one of the German experts who participated in the interviews stated: ‘In Germany they expected to move to socialism, but landed in capitalism’. In other words, the social guaranties in Germany are to some extent provoking a passive attitude by migrants, but for a foreigner to find the place in German society, it is necessary for that person to be better than the native population. And, if there is already enough money for living, why try to improve one self? Consequently, it would seem that there is a misbalance between the migrant attitude and social assistance in Germany. When considering Norway, the opposite attitudes seemed to dominate. While social assistance should be adequate for a s imilar attitude to develop as that exhibited by migrants in Germany, some differences exist. In relation to community support, the research indicated that the Russian-speaking diaspora in Norway had a diffused and unorganised character which prevented a significant cultural bonding between Russian-speaking migrants. This, combined with the fact that people migrating to Norway, had clear goals for self realisation through success in their endeavors, seems to be instrumental in them evaluating their quality of life more highly compared to their comrades in Germany. Consequently, it seems as though the balance between the migrant attitude and social assistance

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__________________________________________________________________ provided for and used by the Russian-speaking migrants in Norway is better aligned, at least compared to Germany. On the basis of the findings of this empirical research and the models by Berry 11 and Esser 12 towards the definition of social freedom, we offer the following hypotheses. We note however, that these may be somewhat hampered by the lack of clear parameters defining the success of migration from the point of view of the receiving societ. Furthermore, the presence of a strong migrant community or lack thereof, seems to be instrumental in defining the choices available to the migrant, and, possibly, the ease or difficulty with which the migrant may implement individual decisions regarding one’s future. While the Russian-speaking migrant population in Germany constitutes about 3% of the country’s population, the same ratio in Norway is roughly 0.3%. This difference appears to be sufficient to suggest that this population group in Germany could be instrumental in enforcing boundaries, making a s eparation strategy significantly easier to accept than the alternatives in the adaptation process for new migrants. Similarly, the relatively small and diffuse Russian-speaking migrant population in Norway seems to facilitate more of a bridging strategy for the same migrant processes in Norway. The results regarding the use of native language seem to be inconclusive when considered in relation to the size of the migrant population; a large group of migrants are in fact speaking Russian at home as their language of domestic communication (72.9% in Germany and 61.4% in Norway), while less than a quarter of the migrants are using both languages at home (Russian and German/Norwegian), with 23.2% in Germany, and 17.5% in Norway. At the same time, many migrants frequently watch Russian TV (52.2% in Germany and 37.7% in Norway), and prefer spending their free time with their compatriots (54.9% in Germany, and 36.8% in Norway). They also participate in work related to different associations and clubs of Russian speaking migrants (regularly and when there is something interesting; 38.5% in Germany and 43.6% in Norway). In our opinion, a more important aspect of the migrants’ perception of their quality of life is related to the motivation for moving to the respective country. When moving to Norway, the goal was to achieve success. In order to do t his, migrants considered a bridging strategy towards the local society an important step to make. On the other hand, migrants to Germany frequently had in mind the idea that ‘we are coming home’, or at least coming home to the motherland of their ancestors. Even though this emotion was in some instances reciprocated, the largest groups of respondents in Germany felt like they were coming to a host rather than home culture, relative to what they had anticipated. In this case, it does not seem unrealistic to assume the individual would feel forced into a boundary strategy in the adaptation process. That is why, in order to find the balance between integrational policies and migrant aspirations, it is necessary to consider all aspects of such politics of the


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__________________________________________________________________ country in question – the parameters defining the level of success of the migration process, any problems encountered, as well as any particular benefits identified. In addition to these issues, any migrant groups present should be considered on similar terms. This includes a range of considerations related to migrant groups being active in the host country; their size, position, role, and, possibly most importantly, their goals for migration to this country. Consequently, even conditions affecting the presence and well-functioning of migrant groups such as incentives and support given, must be included as an integral part of the migrant policies of the host country.

Notes 1

G. Haernes ‘Epilogue’, New Battles on M igration, Job Markets and Welfare: Right Wing Trends in Europe?, Report at the FAFO Conference 2011, Oslo, March 2011. 2 J.W. Berry et al., Cross-Cultural Psychology: Research and Applications, 2nd Edition, Cambridge University Press, 2002, pp. 353-355. 3 A. Toprak, Integrationsunwillige Muslime? Ein Milieubericht, Lambertus Verlag, 2010, p. 161. 4 Berry et al., op. cit., pp. 353-355. 5 Toprak, op. cit., p. 161. 6 Sachverständigenrat Deutsche Stiftungen für Migration und Integration, Einwanderungsgesellschaft 2010: Jahresgutachten 2010 Integrationsbarometer, Berlin, 2010, p. 13. 7 J.W. Berry, ‘Immigration, Acculturation, and Adaptation’, Applied Psychology: An International Review, Vol. 46, No 1, 1997, p. 10. 8 Bundesministerium des Inneren, Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge, Migrationsbericht des Bundesamtes für Migration und Flüchtlinge im Auftrag der Bundesregierung, Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge, Berlin, 2009, p. 56. 9 Ibid., p. 102. 10 ‘Immigration to Norway’, Wikipedia, Last modified February 11, 2011, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_Norway. 11 Berry et al., Cross-Cultural Psychology, pp. 353-355. 12 Toprak, op. cit., p. 161.

Bibliography Berry, J.W., Poortinga, Y.H., Segall, M.H. and Dasen, P.R., Cross-Cultural Psychology: Research and Applications. Cambridge University Press, 2002. Berry, J.W. ‘Immigration, Acculturation, and Adaptation’. Applied Psychology: An International Review. Vol. 46, No. 1, 1997, pp. 5-68.

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__________________________________________________________________ Bundesministerium des Inneren, Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge, Migrationsbericht des Bundesamtes für Migration und Flüchtlinge im Auftrag der Bundesregierung. Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge. Berlin, 2009. ‘Immigration to Norway’. Wikipedia. Last modified February 11, 2011. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_Norway. Sachverständigenrat Deutsche Stiftungen für Migration und Integration, Einwanderungsgesellschaft 2010: Jahresgutachten 2010 Integrationsbarometer. Berlin, 2010. Toprak, A., Integrationsunwillige Muslime? Ein Milieubericht. Lambertus, Verlag, 2010. Ekaterina Bagreeva, Lecturer at the Department of State-Legal and Criminological Disciplines of the Russian Economic University of G. V. Plekhanov (Russia, Moscow). German Mendzheritskiy, Researcher at the Faculty of Applied Social Sciences of the University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Dortmund (Germany, Dortmund).

Thinking about Intercultural Leadership: Are We Going Deep Enough to Bridge Cultural Differences? Alicia D. Crumpton Abstract Leadership studies is an interdisciplinary approach to exploring individual and collective behaviours within social groups, organisations, and society. In response to globalisation and changes related to technology, social networking, and information availability, leadership scholars put forth cross-cultural literacy and inter-cultural leadership as a goal of leadership. A leadership challenge becomes one of understanding, building bridges, and learning to communicate and work together in a plural, diverse group. A critical examination of the relationship between culture and worldviews with regard to strategies presented in leadership studies literature relative to understanding culture and global and inter-cultural leadership is presented in this chapter. Three aspects of culture are discussed; cultural definition, cultural intelligence, and leadership attributes and strategies followed by a discussion of the importance of understanding both culture and worldview. Leadership studies is grappling with what it means to be an intercultural leader hampered somewhat by historical conceptions of leadership strongly tied to a specific person, mechanization, and efficiency, effectiveness and productivity. Tasks such as visioning, strategising, goal and objective setting, work performance, productivity, and partnering are valid and necessary within an organisation. However, to bridge cultures requires due consideration for the visible culture and the non-visible worldview with positive practices supportive of the transitional spaces. Key Words: Leadership, culture, worldviews. ***** 1. Introduction In the 2000s, much attention has been paid to globalisation, culture, and intercultural leadership. A number of authors have written about cultural intelligence and global leadership emphasising the importance of cross-cultural understanding. 1 The Global Leadership and Organizational Behaviour (GLOBE) study provided detailed descriptions and understanding of unique and shared leadership practices within and across cultures within 62 countries. 2 Thomas Friedman coined the terms the world is flat and Globalization 3.0 describing the period after 2000. 3 Friedman noted, ‘flatness [describes] how more people can plug, play, compete, connect, and collaborate.’ 4 Given this, it seems logical that leadership studies’ scholars would have an interest in culture, global and intercultural leadership. But something seems awry for the literature seems to

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Thinking about Intercultural Leadership

__________________________________________________________________ present a v iew where if the leader gains knowledge about a cu lture and its difference then he/she can lead effectively. Contrast this with Samuel Huntington’s prediction of a pending ‘clash of civilisations’ where differing cultural factors such as history, language, tradition, and religion result in a myriad of views. 5 If cross cultural literacy becomes a goal of leadership, then a leadership challenge becomes one of understanding, building bridges, and learning to communicate and work together in a plural, diverse group. ‘How,’ Drath asked; ‘can people who make sense of . . . the world from differing worldviews’ work together?’ 6 How indeed? The purpose of this chapter is to critically examine the relationship between culture and worldviews with regard to strategies presented in leadership studies literature relative to understanding culture and global and inter-cultural leadership. 2. Leadership Studies Emphasis on Culture Leadership studies is an interdisciplinary approach to exploring individual and collective behaviours within social groups, organisations, and society. If one were to review discussions of leadership, one would find many definitions. It seems like leadership as a p henomenon is hard to define although we seem to know it when we see or experience it. For this discussion, leadership is defined as ‘a process whereby an individual influences [another individual or] a group to achieve a common goal.’ 7 Currently, there is a tension between classical leadership theories and leadership behaviours needed in the world as it presents itself. Goldsmith et al., in their book on global leadership noted, ‘The leadership models of the past provide little guidance for the business context of the future.’ 8 Within the literature discussing inter-cultural or global leadership, three elements are presented; cultural definition and dimensions, cultural intelligence, and leadership attributes and strategies. A. Culture Definition and Dimensions As with leadership, culture is defined in a myriad of ways including: The integrated system of learned patterns of behaviour, ideas and products characteristic of society. 9 The learned beliefs, values, rules, norms, symbols, and traditions. . . common to a group of people. 10 A dynamic phenomenon that surrounds us at all times, being constantly enacted and created by our interactions with others and shaped by leadership behaviour, and a set of structures, routines, rules, and norms that guide and constrain behaviour.’ 11

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__________________________________________________________________ A collective programming of the mind, it m anifests itself not only in values, but in more superficial ways: in symbols, heroes, and rituals. Culture is not the same as identity. 12 Shared beliefs, values, and assumptions of a group of people who learn from one another and teach others that their behaviours, attitudes, and perspectives are the correct ways to think, act, and feel. 13 From these definitions, culture is multi-faceted with the following characteristics: (a) learned patterns of behaviours; (b) shared by and common to a group; (c) beliefs, values, rules, norms, symbols, traditions, artefacts, and tools; and (d) ideas about the world. Explicit behaviours, artefacts, and products represent individual and collective actions or what is done. This is the outermost aspect of our behaviours, that which is seen and witnessed by others. Behaviours emerging from cultural values and norms display themselves without our thinking about them or even necessarily being able to articulate what those values or norms are explicitly. Our behaviours become habitual and provide meaning in the way they enable us to make sense of the world. We quickly assess what the situation is and what behaviours are required given that situation. When describing explicit behaviours we are likely to hear phrases like; this is the way we do things or we’ve always done it like this to describe the rationale for any given behaviours. Norms and values represent shared agreements for desirable behaviours. Hofstede described values as ‘the desired or desirable.’ 14 Shared norms and values serve to distinguish between ‘should’ and ‘ought’ telegraphing to others what it means to conform or fit in to the social group. Beliefs are basic assumptions about the nature of truth. These beliefs are learned, deeply ingrained, often explicitly unknown and unquestioned. Beliefs influence how we perceive and categorise using labels such as: (a) evil versus good; (b) dirty versus clean; (c) dangerous versus safe; (d) decent versus indecent; (e) ugly versus beautiful; (f) unnatural versus natural; (g) abnormal versus normal; (h) paradoxical versus logical; (i) irrational versus rational; or (j) moral versus immoral The phrase, ‘cultural dimensions’, was first introduced by Hofstede as a basis for describing various facets of a particular culture. The five proposed dimensions; uncertainty avoidance, individualism, power distance, long term orientation, and masculinity, 15 are often used to compare and contrast between two or more cultures. 16 The rationale for this comparison is that through self awareness and understanding our own culture in relation to that of others, leadership can be more effective devising organisational strategies and interacting with different people within our own culture or in other cultures.

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__________________________________________________________________ The Global Leadership and Organizational Behaviour Effectiveness (GLOBE) research program drew upon Hofstede’s cultural dimensions in a large scale project designed to increase our understanding of cross-cultural interactions and the impact of culture on leadership effectiveness. A broad body of research was conducted among 17,000 leaders in more than 950 or ganizations, representing 62 di fferent cultures. The outcomes of this study included: (a) countries organized into clusters based on how they scored on each cultural dimension (Confucian Asia, Southern Asia, Latin America, Nordic Europe, Anglo, Germanic Europe, Latin Europe, SubSaharan Africa, Eastern Europe and Middle East; (b) indicators of how differences in cultures were related to differences in leadership. Specifically, GLOBE identified six global leadership behaviours; charismatic/value based, team oriented, participative, humane oriented, autonomous, and self protective. 17 Each cluster was associated with their desired or preferred leadership behaviours. This study provided many valuable insights into the relationship and expressions of culture and preferred leadership in differing contexts. B. Cultural Intelligence The study of intelligence and its relationship to leadership behaviours has emerged within the field of leadership studies. Riggio asked, ‘What is the connection between intelligence and leadership?’ 18 While research exploring the role of leadership and intelligence began in the 1920s and 1930s, intelligence and leadership studies research seemed to emerge and converge with the issuance of such books as Frames of Mind and Emotional Intelligence, followed by a multitude of other explorations into the topic: swarm intelligence; multiple intelligences and leadership; primal leadership; spiritual; executive intelligence; social intelligence; and cultural intelligence. 19 Findings from Riggio et al., on multiple intelligences suggested, in part, that possession of multiple forms of intelligence is important for effective leadership with implications for both the selection and training of future leaders. Intelligence, according to Riggio et al, represents ‘complex constellations of abilities. . . the type of characteristics that may make leaders effective in a range of leadership situations because they involve abilities to adapt to a variety of social and interpersonal situations.’ 20 Further, our capacity to adapt is derived from our ability to understand ourselves and others in terms of cultural conditioning. 21 Effective and adaptive leadership behaviours are hallmarks of intelligences with our capacity to lead and how we lead emerging out of our intelligences. Cultural intelligence and its application to leadership were proposed by David Livermore and Mai Moua. Livermore’s model is based on multiple intelligences research and is rooted in the empirical work of Christopher Early, Soon Ang, and Linn Van Dyne who created a 20 item Cultural Intelligence Scale that has been validated to measure Cultural Intelligence Quotient (CQ) across cultures. According to Livermore, a distinction of his approach is that cultural intelligence ‘stems from inward transformation rather than from information or worse yet, from

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__________________________________________________________________ artificial political correctness.’ 22 Livermore defines a CQ as ‘the ability to effectively reach across the chasm of cultural differences in ways that are loving and respectful.’ 23 Moua suggested that cultural intelligence ‘help[s] to facilitate awareness for, and understanding of, cultural frames. . . . the changes we see in societies and around the globe necessitate a new and different paradigm for how we come to think about culture.’ 24 Both Livermore and Moua draw on Hofstede’s cultural dimensions to identify underlying values driving behaviours relative to cultural intelligence. Also, both identify a four-phase model for cultural intelligence that includes knowledge acquisition, interpretation, reflection and perseverance, and new behaviours and actions. 25 C. Leadership Characteristics Terms like multi-cultural leadership, geo-leadership, intercultural leadership, global leadership, etc. all speak of our attempts to describe and label differing ways of leading. Moodian proclaimed, ‘Leadership success may be unattainable without intercultural competence.’ 26 Some have indicated that global business acumen along within a global mindset and competencies are warranted. 27 Whether labelled inter-cultural leadership or global mindset, a p icture emerges of specific characteristics of self, relational focus and abilities. 28 Within this picture, a leader is a reflective practitioner, visionary, and culturally sensitive. An inter-cultural leader is one who id people focuses, effectively communicates, and collaborates. Finally, their abilities enable them to be change agents, strategic, and culturally astute, all of which translate into effective performance. 3. Discussion In thinking about culture relative to leadership, are we going deep enough to bridge cultural differences? I propose that we are not given the positives and negatives associated with focusing solely on culture. While there is an increased body of knowledge about cultural practices, the primary use of country as the organizing schema may reinforce ethnocentric behaviours and binary distinctions. Knowledge of cultural dimensions may increase understanding and situational awareness. However, the application of cultural dimensions often focuses on personal interaction and observable behaviours rather than underlying values and beliefs. An emphasis on self-awareness, knowledge about one’s culture, and understanding how beliefs translate into action are positive. But self-awareness may not transform beliefs or attitudes. Emphasizing communication is positive, however, it may lead to an oversimplification of the hermeneutical challenges in interpretation and understanding of meaning. An emphasis on a l eader’s assessment of the situation, identifying strategies, change management and action are good; however, an over emphasis on the role of a leader ignores the co-creative nature of leadership. Finally, The motivations behind understanding cultural dimensions with an exclusive focus on traditional business drivers of effectiveness,

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__________________________________________________________________ efficiency and productivity seems transactional and ignores other possible motivations such as true understanding, mutual respect, human development, and social responsibility. An often used metaphor in discussing culture is that of the iceberg where there is the visible, a transitional space between the visible and the not-visible. Visible above the water line is that which we know and talk about. The visible is often the domain of leadership studies related to defining culture, cultural dimensions, cultural intelligence, and leadership traits and strategies. This is positive but it takes us only so far in understanding the whole picture. The not-visible is where the mass of the iceberg resides representing the deeply held beliefs and values; this is most associated with worldview. The following definition of worldview is proposed: Worldview is a framework, a set of fundamental beliefs through which individuals and groups view the world, derive purpose and meaning, and experience certitude. These beliefs about reality derived from ultimate questions may be conscious or unconscious; consistent or inconsistent; true, partially true or false. Regardless, our behaviours and actions derive from our worldview, the foundation on which we live, find meaning, and interpret our experiences. Worldviews are dialectically cocreated in relational existence with others and can be transformed, but may be resistant. 29 Worldview is always connected to and situated within culture for we never escape our social or historical situation. The non-visible aspects of the iceberg or worldview are foundational and critical in our understanding of leadership. Valk et al., noted: ‘Leadership also requires an awareness of the larger picture – of paradigms that direct us, beliefs that sustain us, values that guide us and principals that motivate us.’ 30 Focusing solely on cultural dimensions and how those dimensions are enacted misses the depth of worldview in identity formation, sense of self, and responses to perceived threats to our worldview that occur within the transitional space. Within the transitional space is where the potential for clashes, alluded to by Huntington, occur. Our worldview, sense of self, and behaviours are oriented to the social norms, and constraints of our broader social situation and group membership. Our reality is an interpretation shared with others that is both meaningful and coherent. 31 This interpretation tends to become reified or made concrete such that a p erson or group begins to see their reality as the way things are and more importantly, the way things should be. Our interpretive nature in concert with our tendency towards categorization and boundary setting leads us to describe some as fitting in and others as not. To describe someone or a group as

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__________________________________________________________________ fitting in is a judgment that carries with it a n implication of rightness, appropriateness, and normal. Normals are defined ‘as those who do n ot depart negatively from the particular expectations of the situation.’ 32 Stereotypes, prejudices, and discriminatory behaviours arise out of categorization and boundary setting. Disruptions potentially occur in response to an exposure, event, or situation where an individual or group finds themselves confronted with difference where difference is anything outside their definition of normal. Worldviews offer ‘assurance that the world we live in is not simply chaotic and dangerous but also orderly.’ 33 When a p erson or group perceives a t hreat to their sense of self or worldview, they may experience a high degree of anxiety and chaos and be highly motivated to ‘defend both of these against anything that might undermine them.’ 34 Hence, there is a tendency for people to engage in binary, polarized thinking such as you’re either with us or against us where difference is perceived as not fitting in, going against the status quo and even a threat to self. How do we lead within a pluralistic and diverse setting with multiple worldviews and differing cultural contexts? Leadership studies is grappling with what it means to be an inter-cultural leader hampered somewhat by historical conceptions of leadership with its strong tie to a specific person, mechanization, and efficiency, effectiveness and productivity. Tasks such as visioning, strategizing, goal and objective setting, work performance, productivity, and partnering are valid and necessary within an organization. However, to bridge cultures requires due consideration for the visible culture and the non-visible worldview with positive practices supportive of the transitional spaces. Leadership as usual may not be that helpful, instead, we need to re-orient and re-envision leadership towards the following five practices: Commit to reflection upon and increasing awareness of our own worldview. Mutually acknowledge and respect one another. Seek understanding rather than agreement focusing on striving to see the world through another’s eyes. Hold differing worldviews in truth, respect and equality. Embrace the necessity of relational dialogue.

Notes 1

E. Cohen, Leadership without Borders: Successful Strategies From World-Class Leaders, John Wiley Sons, Hoboken, New Jersey, 2007; M. Goldsmith, et al., Global Leadership: The Next Generation, Prentice Hall, Englewood, New Jersey, 2003; R.D. Hames, The Five Literacies of Global Leadership: What Authentic Leaders Know and Y ou Need to Find Out, Jossey-Bass, Hoboken, New Jersey, 2007; P.R. Harris, R.T. Moran and S.V. Moran, Managing Cultural Differences: Global Leadership Strategies for the 21st Century, Elsevier, Boston, 2004; D.A. Livermore, Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage Our Multicultural World, Baker, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2009; M. Moua, Culturally Intelligent Leadership, Business Expert Press, New York, 2010; A. Trompenaars and

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__________________________________________________________________ E.Voerman, Servant-Leadership across Cultures: Harnessing the Strengths of the World’s Most Powerful Management Philosophy, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2009; E.S. Wibbeke, Global Business Leadership, Elsevier, Oxford, 2009. 2 J.S. Chhokar, et al., Culture and Leadership across the World: The GLOBE Book of In-Depth Studies of 25 So cieties, Erlbaum, Mahwah, New Jersey, 2007; R.J. House and Global Leadership and Organizational Behaviour Effectiveness Research Program, Culture, Leadership and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Societies, Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, 2004. 3 T.L. Friedman, The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, Picador, New York, 2007. 4 Ibid., p. x. 5 S.P. Huntington, ‘The Clash of Civilizations?’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 72/3, 1993, pp. 22-49. 6 W.H. Drath, The Deep Blue Sea: Rethinking the Source of Leadership, JosseyBass, San Francisco, 2001, p. 125. 7 P.G. Northouse, Leadership: Theory and Practice, Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, 2010, p. 3. 8 Goldsmith, et al., loc. cit. 9 P.G. Hiebert, Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change, Baker, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2008. 10 Northouse, op. cit., p. 336. 11 E.H. Schein, Organizational Culture and L eadership, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 2004, p. 1. 12 G.H. Hofstede, Culture’s Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviours, Institutions and Organizations across Nations, Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, 2001, pp. 1 and 10. 13 Moua, op. cit., p. xv. 14 Hofstede, op. cit., p. 1. 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 17 R.J. House and M. Javidan, ‘Overview of GLOBE’, Culture, Leadership, and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Soc ieties, Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, pp. 9-28 18 R.E. Riggio, ‘Multiple Intelligences and Leadership: An Overview’, Multiple Intelligences and Leadership, Erlbaum, Mahwah, New Jersey, 2002, p. 1. 19 H. Gardner, Frames Of Mind: The Theory Of Multiple Intelligences, BasicBooks, New York, 1993; D. Goleman, Emotional Intelligence, Bantam Books, New York, 1995; E. Bonabeau and C. Meyer, ‘Swarm Intelligence: A Whole New Way to Think About Business’, Harvard Business Review, 2001, pp. 106-114; Riggio, et al., loc. cit.; E. Goleman, R.E. Boyatzis and A. McKee, Primal Leadership: Realizing the Power of Emotional Intelligence, Harvard Business

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__________________________________________________________________ School, Boston, 2002; D. Zohar, and I.N. Marshall, Spiritual Intelligence: The Ultimate Intelligence, Bloomsbury, London, 2000; J. Menkes, Executive Intelligence: What All Great Leaders Have, Collins, New York, 2005; D. Goleman, Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships, Bantam Books, New York, 2006; Livermore, loc. cit.; Moua, loc. cit. 20 Riggio et al., op. cit., p. 3. 21 L.R. Offermann and L.U. Phan, ‘Culturally Intelligent Leadership for a Diverse World’, Multiple Intelligences and L eadership, Erlbaum, Mahwah, New Jersey, 2002, p. 198. 22 Livermore, op. cit., p. 12. 23 Ibid., p. 13. 24 Moua, op. cit., p. xi. 25 Livermore, op. cit., pp. 47, 48; Moua, op. cit., pp. 61-61. 26 M.A. Moodian, Contemporary Leadership and I ntercultural Competence: Exploring the Cross-Cultural Dynamics within Organizations, Sage, Los Angeles, 2009, p. 3. 27 Cohen, loc. cit.; Marquardt and Berger, op. cit., pp. 17-18. 28 This summary was developed based on a review of references already cited plus L.A. Samovar, R.E. Porter and E.R. McDaniel, Intercultural Communication: A Reader, Wadsworth Cengage Learning, Boston, 2009 and L.A. Samovar, R.E. Porter and E.R. McDaniel, Communication between Cultures, Cengage Learning, Boston, 2010. 29 A.D. Crumpton, An Exploration of the Concept of Worldview within Leadership Studies Literature, Paper given at International Leadership Association 12th Annual Global Conference, Leadership 2.0: Time for Action, Prague, Czech Republic, October, 2010. 30 J. Valk, et al., ‘Worldviews and Leadership: Thinking and Acting the Bigger Picture’, Journal of Leadership Studies, (submitted), 2010, p. 2. 31 P.L. Berger and T. Luckmann, The Social Construction Of Reality: A Treatise In The Sociology Of Knowledge, Penguin, London, 1967, p. 19. 32 R. Goffman, Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity, PrenticeHall, Englewood, New Jersey, 1963, p. 5. 33 E. Webb, Worldview and Mind: Religious Thought and P sychological Development, University of Missouri Press, Columbia, Missouri, 2009, p. 72. 34 Ibid., p. 72.

Bibliography Berger, P.L. and Luckmann, T., The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. Penguin, London, 1967.

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__________________________________________________________________ Bonabeau, E. and Meyer, C., ‘Swarm Intelligence: A Whole New Way to Think About Business’. Harvard Business Review. 2001, pp. 106-114. Chhokar, J.S., et al., Culture and Leadership across the World: The GLOBE Book of In-Depth Studies of 25 Societies. Erlbaum, Mahwah, New Jersey, 2007. Cohen, E., Leadership without Borders: Successful Strategies from World-Class Leaders. John Wiley Sons, Hoboken, New Jersey, 2007. Crumpton, A.D., An Exploration of the Concept of Worldview within Leadership Studies Literature. Paper given at International Leadership Association 12th Annual Global Conference, Leadership 2.0: Time for Action, Prague, Czech Republic, October, 2010. Drath, W.H., The Deep Blue Sea: Rethinking the Source of Leadership. JosseyBass, San Francisco, 2001. Friedman, T.L., The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century. Picador, New York, 2007. Gardner, H., Frames Of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. BasicBooks, New York, 1993. Goffman, R., Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. Prentice-Hall, Englewood, New Jersey, 1963. Goldsmith, M., et al., Global Leadership: The Next Generation. Prentice Hall, Englewood, New Jersey, 2003. Goleman, D., Emotional Intelligence. Bantam Books, New York, 1995. Goleman, D., Boyatzis, R.E. and McKee, A., Primal Leadership: Realizing the Power of Emotional Intelligence. Harvard Business School, Boston, 2002. Goleman, D., Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships. Bantam Books, New York, 2006. Hames R.D., The Five Literacies of Global Leadership: What Authentic Leaders Know and You Need to Find Out. Jossey-Bass, Hoboken, New Jersey, 2007.

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__________________________________________________________________ Harris, P.R., Moran, R.T. and Moran, S.V., Managing Cultural Differences: Global Leadership Strategies for the 21st Century. Elsevier, Boston, 2004. Hiebert, P.G., Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change. Baker, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2008. Hofstede, G.H., Culture’s Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviours, Institutions, and Organizations across Nations. Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, 2001. House, R.J. and Global Leadership and Organizational Behaviour Effectiveness Research Program, Culture, Leadership, and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Societies. Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, 2004. House, R.J. and Javidan, M., ‘Overview of GLOBE’. Culture, Leadership, and Organizations: The GLOBE Study of 62 Societies. Sage, Thousand Oaks, California. Huntington, S.P., ‘The Clash of Civilizations?’. Foreign Affairs. Vol. 72/3, 1993, pp. 22-49. Livermore, D.A., Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage Our Multicultural World. Baker, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2009. Marquardt, M.J. and Berger, N.O., Global Leaders for the Twenty First Century. State University of New York Press, Albany, New York, 2000. Menkes, J., Executive Intelligence: What All Great Leaders Have. Collins, New York, 2005. Moodian, M.A., Contemporary Leadership and Intercultural Competence: Exploring the Cross-Cultural Dynamics within Organizations. Sage, Los Angeles, 2009. Moua, M., Culturally Intelligent Leadership. Business Expert Press, New York, 2010. Northouse, P.G., Leadership: Theory and Practice. Sage, Thousand Oaks, California, 2010.

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__________________________________________________________________ Offermann, L.R. and Phan, L.U., ‘Culturally Intelligent Leadership for a Diverse World’. Multiple Intelligences and L eadership. Erlbaum, Mahwah, New Jersey, 2002. Riggio, R.E., ‘Multiple Intelligences and Leadership: An Overview’. Multiple Intelligences and Leadership. Erlbaum, Mahwah, New Jersey, 2002. Samovar, L.A., Porter, R.E. and McDaniel, E.R., Intercultural Communication: A Reader. Wadsworth Cengage Learning, Boston, 2009. Samovar, L.A., Porter, R.E. and McDaniel, E.R., Communication between Cultures. Cengage Learning, Boston, 2010 Schein, E.H., Organizational Culture and Leadership. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 2004. Trompenaars, A. and Voerman, E., Servant-Leadership across Cultures: Harnessing the Strengths of the World’s Most Powerful Management Philosophy. McGraw-Hill, New York, 2009. Valk, J., et al., ‘Worldviews and Leadership: Thinking and Acting the Bigger Picture’. Journal of Leadership Studies. (submitted), 2010. Webb, E., Worldview and Mind: Religious Thought and Psychological Development. University of Missouri Press, Columbia, Missouri, 2009. Wibbeke, E.S., Global Business Leadership. Elsevier, Oxford, 2009. Zohar, D. and Marshall, I.N., SQ: Spiritual Intelligence, the Ultimate Intelligence. Bloomsbury, London, 2000. Alicia D. Crumpton is currently the Director of the Centre for Global Studies at Johnson Bible College. The Centre is a collaborative effort between 7 sister colleges to develop an online PhD in Leadership Studies. Her research interests include: leadership studies program structure, format, and curriculum; ways of knowing and decision making; worldview, religion and spirituality; transformative practices such as reflection and dialogue; lived experiences of women and working/lower class people particularly social and cultural factors influencing their lives; social networks, social capital, and sustainable communities; and strategic planning and change management.

Part 3 Intercultural Dialogues

Interculturality on a Diverse Australian Campus: Identity and Interaction Farida Fozdar Abstract Australian universities are sites of considerable cultural diversity, due to large numbers of international students studying together with domestic students of diverse backgrounds. While this should provide an opportunity for intercultural interactions and the nurturing of cosmopolitan identities, more often than not, these opportunities are not embraced. This chapter explores results of an ARC (Australian Research Council) funded study of orientations to intercultural interactions among first year students starting university. Data are drawn from a survey (n= 745) and a s eries of in-depth interviews. The findings indicate some ambivalence among the students, including a general positivity towards the idea of interaction, but reticence to make personal efforts to make the most of these opportunities. The chapter is an examination of the relationship between identity and orientations to making the most of opportunities available, looking particularly at those who positively negotiate hybrid identity positions to engage with those who could be seen as ‘culturally Other’. Implications for both ‘internationalised’ campuses, and ‘interculturality’ more broadly, are also discussed. Key Words: Cultural diversity, tertiary cosmopolitanism, intercultural interaction.

education,

internationalisation,

***** 1. Introduction Australia has the world’s second most internationalised higher education system in the world - 25% of students come from overseas, joining an already diverse domestic student population (over 40% of Australia’s population were born overseas or have at least one parent born overseas). As well as the mainstream Australian population, campuses are shared by students from a wide range of ethnic backgrounds including Chinese, Indian, Vietnamese, Malaysian, Singaporean, Indonesian, Saudi Arabian, and from various European and other Western nations such as Canada and the US. Local students from what are known as the ‘new communities’ derived from refugee intakes from Africa, the Middle East and Asia are also joining the already diverse student populations. This creates unique opportunities for intercultural interaction, and the development of intercultural confidence. However, such opportunities are often not taken up.

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Interculturality on a Diverse Australian Campus

__________________________________________________________________ 2. Background The benefits and challenges of cultural diversity in higher education are well documented. 1 Cross cultural interactions provide opportunities for local and international students to develop awareness of the cultural construction of knowledge and alternate knowledges, as well as alternate learning styles; to benefit from opportunities to counter prejudices and stereotypes; to develop intercultural competence and confidence, providing a useful form of social and cultural capital (relevant generally and professionally); and to develop more cosmopolitan identities and an ‘international outlook’. 2 These are important in a global context where the cosmopolitan identity is increasingly salient. 3 Intercultural learning in higher education environments is best facilitated through collaborative learning activities using mixed groups. 4 However academic and time pressures, identity and communication issues, cultural-emotional connectedness, negative stereotypes, ethnocentrism and apathy, inhibit cross cultural interactions and therefore learning opportunities. 5 Students prefer homogeneity in both learning and social environments; and there is a decline in students’ attitudes towards mixed group projects over time. 6 In-group bias is also widely present in students’ informal, out-of-class, social activities, even when there have been opportunities for interactions as part of their university studies – i.e. oncampus mixing does not result in off-campus mixing. 7 The result is a l ack of intercultural interactions among culturally diverse student groups, and a sense of isolation, loneliness and exclusion, particularly among international students. 8 The current chapter reports preliminary findings from an Australian Research Council Discovery funded research program (undertaken with Professor Simone Volet) that examines the potential of diversity, specifically the process by which intercultural interactions and confidence emerge and can be fostered, rather than adding to the literature on how that process is inhibited. The project is collecting data on the process by which intercultural confidence emerges in diverse learning communities; the significance of both formal and informal contexts for intercultural development; the inclusion of emerging cultural groups (African and Muslim heritage); and has an ‘action’ orientation, including developing learning activities embedded within students’ professional study programs in preparation for cultural dimensions of work. The study uses contact theory and social identity theory, and applies a number of conceptual tools. One is the developmental model of intercultural sensitivity (DMIS). 9 This well studied model sees positive intercultural interactions as more likely to occur between people at a ‘higher’ stage of development of intercultural competence, who take an ethno-relative stance, compared to those at a ‘ lower’ stage, who take an ethnocentric orientation. While the linear sequential assumption of the model may be challenged, the notion of a developmental process is a useful tool to assist understanding of the movement towards more positive orientations. It is likely students will orient towards opportunities for intercultural interactions in

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__________________________________________________________________ formal and informal environments in different ways depending on a number of influencing factors, including previous experience, perceptions of cost and benefit, and political climate. We have also incorporated aspects of the multicultural personality questionnaire (MPQ) 10 that measures five dimensions relevant to positive intercultural interactions: cultural empathy, open mindedness, social initiatives, emotional stability and flexibility. The study also develops the notion of intercultural confidence. For intercultural learning opportunities to yield positive outcomes, students must develop a sense of intercultural confidence, rather than simply competence – students must feel confident in their ability to negotiate across cultural diversity. This is part of a process of ‘tertiary socialisation’ (as distinct from primary and secondary) according to Alred and Byram 11 which involves the development of both affective capacity and cognitive skills which constitute a form of cultural capital that is particularly useful not just in everyday life but in professional situations that call for intercultural interaction. We would argue that such confidence is a characteristic of the cosmopolitan identity. Each of these conceptual tools has been incorporated into the design of the research instruments, and will feature in the interventions developed to assist academics teaching such students to better exploit the benefits of culturally diverse campuses. 3. Results The first stage of data collection (Feb, 2010) focussed on first year students in their first weeks of enrolment. Second and subsequent stages will determine how students’ perceptions and expectations change over time. The preliminary data discussed in this chapter come from a sample of 745 such students drawn from first year Business, Community Development, Media Culture Communication, Engineering, Environment Science; computing; IT; Education; Nursing; and learning support classes, at a single ‘red brick’ university. Classes surveyed were selected to provide a r ange of sciences and arts; to focus on courses that have larger proportions of ‘local diverse’ and international students; and to focus on students engaged in courses with a cl ear career pathway into a p rofession. The questionnaire explored dimensions of students entry profile including history of intercultural interactions; perceived personal social and cultural identity; sense of interdependence; disposition towards cross-cultural experiences; expectations of peer interactions in class/outside class in first semester; goals; intercultural confidence; conceptions of learning; and orientations to group work. A number of interviews were also undertaken but space does not allow for an extensive analysis of these. Some preliminary comments will be made however.

46


__________________________________________________________________ Table 1: Orientations to cultural understanding and interaction (n=745; data expressed in percentages) Not Very very How important is it for you to 4.8 17 38 38.4 interact with other students outside class? In your opinion, how important is 3.5 12.8 28.2 54.5 cultural understanding in your course of study? In your opinion, how important is 1.2 4.7 25.5 67.4 cultural understanding for effective professional practice in your future career? How important is it to you to 4.7 21.9 43.4 27.2 interact with people with cultural backgrounds different from your own? How confident are you in 2.6 16.1 47.2 31.9 interacting with people with cultural backgrounds different from your own? Encouraging students from diverse 0.8 2 56 37.9 backgrounds to mix for group learning activities is an excellent idea. Teachers should systematically mix 3.9 24.2 51.3 17.4 students from different cultural backgrounds for group learning activities

Mean 3.12 3.35 3.61

2.96

3.11

3.35

2.85

Table 1 indicates that while cultural understanding is very important to students in both their study and professional practice, interacting with those who are culturally different is somewhat less important. Students’ levels of confidence in their ability to interact across cultures are reasonably high, indicating that they feel capable of studying and mixing with others in a diverse environment. In terms of ensuring diversity by mixing students for learning activities, students overwhelmingly see this as a positive thing, but are more ambivalent about being obliged to work in mixed groups. Students were also asked: How often do you think you will try to mix with students with cultural backgrounds different from your own for the following

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__________________________________________________________________ activities? The results (see Table 2) form a s ort of ‘Bogardus Social Distance Scale’ for campus environments. Table 2: Orientations to cross-cultural mixing in different environments (n=745; data expressed in percentages) Not Very Mean very Group assignments when students 2.3 13.3 53.2 28.9 3.11 can form their own group Studying outside class (informal 7.2 28.7 44.8 16.9 2.73 study groups) Over coffee or lunch on campus 6.8 25.5 45.4 19.9 2.8 To go out, e.g. to the movies, other 16.4 30.7 34.9 16 2.52 social activities To share accommodation 49 18.8 19.1 10.5 1.9 The question asked students about the degree to which they will actively seek out opportunities for interaction, and the results indicate a steady decrease in such inclination as we move from in-class mixing to more informal opportunities such as informal study, on-campus socialising, off-campus socialising and sharing accommodation. Thus while students see interacting with those who are culturally different from them as relatively important, they will not go out of their way to pursue such opportunities. We also asked all students, regardless of background, how important their cultural identity is to them. The results are provided in Table 3. Table 3: Importance of cultural identity (n=745; data expressed in percentages) Not Very Mean very How important is your cultural 8.9 21.7 34.6 30.1 2.9 identity to you? Cultural identity seems important for many students, with only a third selecting the lower two points on a four point scale, and a third selecting each of the two positive options. We have not yet analysed these results in detail in relation to the students’ actual self-chosen identity. However, it i s interesting to consider the variety of responses received to the open-ended question inviting students to identify their ‘cultural identity/ies’. We received many interesting responses (answers quoted verbatim). Some were standard, identifying country of origin such as: Indonesian; Nigerian; Lebanese etc. Others were hybrid: english, sth african and Australian; Australian and Indian; russian/Australian; Australian born in India; Malaysian Chinese. Some used broader categories: anglo saxon; Asian;


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__________________________________________________________________ Oceanic. But a l arge number used complex mixed categories or extended explanations to refer to their ‘cultural’ identities, as the following list attests. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13.

2nd gen Australia; anglo-celtic; working class; female; gen x Australian but born Italian - strong links Sth Italy traditions (Sicilian and Calabrese) Australian exposed to other cultures I'm Australian but have no real cultural identity beside having a BBQ with friends Still deciding citizen of the world Confused More than Ceylonese, which is Sri Lankan Indian, I like to believe that being born and brought up in a multicultural society has led me to being less ignorant about diff societies and cultures PS3 Fanboy Westernised Bangladeshi, global citizenship, Singaporean White, middle cass, male, gay, with a disability Country scone kids Asian with large western influence, whilst maintaining asian values

In terms of the spread of different identities selected, a key feature is the proportion of the sample who selected a multiple Australian identity. Table 4. Cultural identity category Cultural identity category Frequency (percentage of total sample) Australian only 102 (18.6) Australian plus other 258 (47.2) Asian 27 (4.9) MELAA 17 (3.1) European/North American 50 (9.1) Pacific 7 (1.3) Other 86 (15.7) We are beginning to analyse the ways in which these identities (which include aspects of racial, cultural, gendered, class, sexuality, and other dimensions) may affect orientation to intercultural interactions, as identity, often taken for granted in the literature and study designs for research on cross cultural interactions, is fundamental to how students relate to each other, and present themselves.

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__________________________________________________________________ Preliminary analysis reveals there was a significant difference between cultural identity and the degree to which interacting with people culturally different from oneself was rated as important. Follow-up tests reveal that those in the ‘Australian only’ category were significantly less likely to rate that interacting with people with cultural backgrounds different from their own as important when compared to those in the ‘Australian plus other’; Asian; MELAA (Middle Eastern Latin American and African); and European/North American categories. Those in the ‘Australian only’ category’ were also significantly less likely to think that mixing students was a good idea compared to those in the ‘Australian plus other’ category. There were also effects related to renting and mixing with others. Thus the Australians-only identity appears to be related to a lower inclination to mix in a number of social situations, and less recognition of the value of cross cultural interactions. Students clearly recognise the complexity of ethnic identity. These dimensions have been followed up in a series of interviews allowing students the opportunity to talk about their identities and how they see these as related to their orientation to intercultural interactions on and off campus. The general positivity to cross cultural interactions was acknowledged to be somewhat difficult in practice. Students ranged from those who saw high levels of diversity on campus, saw this as positive, and sought to engage across cultures, to those who saw little, and were not inclined to seek out such interaction. 12 The practicalities of mixing are summarised by a co mmunity development student talking about mixed group work: I was happy to be working with a multi-culturally mixed group because it’s interesting to get other perspectives. But as we went on it got a lot harder. …It really challenged my thoughts as well. I always viewed myself as very accepting and non-racist. I still am, but I found that multi-cultural thing really hard to overcome. It was hard to communicate. I was worried about making them feel insulted if I told them what was wrong. 4. Conclusion Students’ willingness to engage with cultural diversity as part of their university studies is vital in countries with diverse populations such as Australia. Such experiences may influence their success in the workplace, especially in professional occupations that demand well developed communication and interpersonal skills to deal with culturally diverse clients. But such skills are also vital in terms of making a positive contribution to building an inclusive society. The preliminary data outlined suggests first year students hold generally positive orientations to diversity, but that they are less willing to make actual efforts to use the opportunities provided by the diverse campuses of which they are a part. This

50


__________________________________________________________________ reflects studies of Australians’ orientations to diversity generally 13 which demonstrate a rather ambivalent orientation to engagement with cultural diversity. It is clear that universities have both a significant opportunity and a number of challenges ahead in terms of encouraging students to make the most of the diversity available on (and off) their campuses.

Notes 1

C. Asmar, ‘Internationalising Students: Reassessing Diasporic and Local Student Difference’, Studies in Higher Education, Vol. 30(3), 2005, pp. 291-309; H. Spencer-Oatey and P. Franklin, Intercultural Interaction: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Intercultural Communication, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, UK, 2009. 2 C. Montgomery, ‘A Decade of Internationalisation: Has it Influenced Students’ Views of Cross-Cultural Group Work at University?’ Journal of Studies in International Education, Vol. 13(2), 2009, pp. 256-270. 3 Z. Skrbis and I. Woodward, ‘The Ambivalence of Ordinary Cosmopolitanism: Investigating the Limits of Cosmopolitan Openness’, The Sociological Review, 55(4), 2007, pp. 730-747; G. Kendall, I. Woodward and Z. Skrbis, The Sociology of Cosmopolitanism, Palgrave, London, 2009. 4 P. Dillenbourg (ed), Collaborative Learning: Cognitive and Computational Approaches, Elsevier, Oxford, UK, 1999; P. Dunstan, ‘Cultural Diversity for Life: A Case Study from Australia’, Journal of Studies in International Education, Vol. 7(1), 2003, pp. 64-76; J. Ryan and S. Hellmundt, ‘Maximising International Students Cultural Capital’, Teaching International Students: Improving Learning for All, J. Carroll and J. Ryan (eds), Routledge, London, 2005, pp. 13-16. 5 S. Volet and G. Ang, ‘Culturally Mixed Groups on International Campuses: An Opportunity for Intercultural Learning’, Higher Education Research and Development, Vol. 17(1), 1998, pp. 5-23; D. Smart, S. Volet and G. Ang, Fostering Social Cohesion at University: Bridging the Cultural Divide, Australian Education International, Canberra, 2000; C. Leung, ‘The Psychological Adaptation of Overseas and Migrant Student in Australia’, International Journal of Psychology, Vol. 36(4), 2001, pp. 251-259; K. Kimmel and S. Volet, ‘Significance of Context in Students’ (Meta)Cognitions Related to Group Work: A Multilayered, Multidimensional and Cultural Approach’, Learning and Instruction, doi:10.1016j.learninstruc.2009.05.004, 2010. 6 M. Summers and S. Volet, ‘Students’ Attitudes Towards Culturally Mixed Groups on I nternational Campuses: Impact of Participation in Diverse and NonDiverse Groups’, Studies in Higher Education, Vol. 33(4), 2008, pp. 357-370. 7 Kimmel and Volet, loc. cit.

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__________________________________________________________________ 8

E. Sawir, S. Marginson, A. Deumert, C. Nyland and G. Ramia, ‘Loneliness and International Students: An Australian Study’, Journal of Studies in International Education, Vol. 12(2), 2008, pp. 148-180. 9 M. Hammer, M. Bennett and R. Wiseman, ‘The Intercultural Development Inventory: A Measure of Intercultural Sensitivity’, International Journal of Intercultural Relations, Vol. 27, 2003, pp. 421-443. 10 K. Van der Zee and J. Van Oudenhoven, ‘Psychometric Qualities of the Multicultural Personality Questionnaire: A Multidimensional Instrument of Multicultural Effectiveness’, European Journal of Personality, Vol. 14, 2000, pp. 291-309; K. Van der Zee and J. Van Oudenhoven, ‘The Multicultural Personality Questionnaire: Reliability and Validity of Self- and Other Ratings of Multicultural Effectiveness’, Journal of Research in Personality, Vol. 35, 2001, pp. 278-288. 11 G. Alred and M. Byram, ‘Becoming an Intercultural Mediator: A Longitudinal Study of Residence Abroad’, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, Vol. 23(5), 2002, pp. 339-352. 12 C. Colvin, S. Volet and F. Fozdar, ‘To See or Not See Diversity: Home Students and Intercultural Interactions’, Studies in Higher Education, under review. 13 M. Goot and I. Watson, ‘Immigration, Multiculturalism and National Identity’, Australian Social Attitudes, S. Wilson, G. Meagher, R. Gibson, D. Denemark and M. Western (eds), NSW Press, Sydney, 2005, pp. 182-203; Skrbis and Woodward, loc cit.

Bibliography Alred, G. and Byram, M., ‘Becoming an Intercultural Mediator: A Longitudinal Study of Residence Abroad’. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development. Vol. 23(5), 2002, pp. 339-352. Asmar, C., ‘Internationalising Students: Reassessing Diasporic and Local Student Difference’. Studies in Higher Education. Vol. 30(3), 2005, pp. 291-309. Colvin, C., Volet, S. and Fozdar, F., ‘To See or Not See Diversity: Home Students and Intercultural Interactions’. Studies in Higher Education. under review. Dillenbourg, P. (ed), Collaborative Learning: Cognitive and Computational Approaches. Elsevier, Oxford, UK, 1999. Dunstan, P., ‘Cultural Diversity for Life: A Case Study from Australia’. Journal of Studies in International Education. Vol. 7(1), 2003, pp. 64-76.

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__________________________________________________________________ Goot, M. and Watson, I., ‘Immigration, Multiculturalism and National Identity’. Australian Social Attitudes. Wilson, S., Meagher, G., Gibson, R., Denemark, D. and Western, M. (eds), NSW Press, Sydney, 2005. Hammer, M., Bennett, M. and Wiseman, R., ‘The Intercultural Development Inventory: A Measure of Intercultural Sensitivity’. International Journal of Intercultural Relations. Vol. 27, 2003, pp. 421-443. Ippolito, K., ‘Promoting Intercultural Learning in a Multicultural University: Ideals and Realities’. Teaching in Higher Education. Vol. 12(5/6), 2007, pp. 749-763. Kendall, G., Woodward, I. and Skrbis, Z., The Sociology of Cosmopolitanism. Palgrave, London, 2009. Kimmel, K. and Volet, S., ‘Significance of Context in Students’ (Meta)Cognitions Related to Group Work: A Multi-Layered, Multidimensional and Cultural Approach’. Learning and Instruction. doi:10.1016j.learninstruc.2009.05.004, 2010. Leung, C., ‘The Psychological Adaptation of Overseas and Migrant Student in Australia’. International Journal of Psychology. Vol. 36(4), 2001, pp. 251-259. Montgomery, C., ‘A Decade of Internationalisation: Has it Influenced Students’ Views of Cross-Cultural Group Work at University?’. Journal of Studies in International Education. Vol. 13(2), 2009, pp. 256-270. Ryan, J. and Hellmundt, S., ‘Maximising International Students Cultural Capital’. Teaching International Students: Improving Learning for All. Routledge, London, 2005. Sawir, E., Marginson, S., Deumert, A., Nyland, C. and Ramia, G., ‘Loneliness and International Students: An Australian Study’. Journal of Studies in International Education. Vol. 12(2), 2008, pp. 148-180. Skrbis, Z. and Woodward, I., ‘The Ambivalence of Ordinary Cosmopolitanism: Investigating the Limits of Cosmopolitan Openness’. The Sociological Review. Vol. 55(4), 2007, pp. 730-747. Smart, D., Volet, S. and Ang, G., Fostering Social Cohesion at University: Bridging the Cultural Divide. Australian Education International, Canberra, 2000.

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__________________________________________________________________ Spencer-Oatey, H. and Franklin, P., Intercultural Interaction: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Intercultural Communication. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, UK, 2009. Summers, M. and Volet, S., ‘Students’ Attitudes towards Culturally Mixed Groups on International Campuses: Impact of Participation in Diverse and Non-Diverse Groups’. Studies in Higher Education. Vol. 33(4), 2008, pp. 357-370. Volet, S. and Ang, G., ‘Culturally Mixed Groups on International Campuses: An Opportunity for Intercultural Learning’. Higher Education Research and Development. Vol. 17(1), 1998, pp. 5-23. Van der Zee, K. and Van Oudenhoven, J., ‘The Multicultural Personality Questionnaire: Reliability and Validity of Self- and Other Ratings of Multicultural Effectiveness’. Journal of Research in Personality. Vol. 35, 2001, pp. 278-288. Van der Zee, K. and Van Oudenhoven, J., ‘Psychometric Qualities of the Multicultural Personality Questionnaire: A Multidimensional Instrument of Multicultural Effectiveness’. European Journal of Personality. Vol. 14, 2000, pp. 291-309. Ujitani, E. and Volet, S., ‘Socio-Emotional Challenges in International Education: Insight into Reciprocal Understanding and Intercultural Relational Development’. Journal of Research in International Education. Vol. 7(3), 2008, pp. 277-301. Farida Fozdar is Associate Professor in Sociology and Community Development at Murdoch University. Her research focuses on race relations, citizenship and migration settlement issues.

Part 4 Transnational Identities: Diaspora and Subject Formation

Kurdish Diaspora: Creating New Contingencies in Trans-National Space Ahmet Hamdi Akkaya Abstract In recent decades, a Kurdish diaspora has begun to appear and its emergence has influenced the nature of the Kurdish question which has until then been a conflict mainly involving the Kurds and the states of the Middle East. Subsequently Kurdish communities have become very active in the diaspora, imposing themselves on the political agendas of most European countries. This change was most dramatic when the Kurds in Iraq began to develop self-government in 1991 which was recognized constitutionally after the fall of Saddam Hussein regime. The Iraqi Kurdistan turned out to be a centre of attraction for the Kurds who were living in diaspora including Turkey, Iran and Syria. The relationship between the diaspora and the homeland is addressed in this chapter in the context of such changes. The aim is to at study how the on-going nation-building process in Iraqi Kurdistan affects the Kurdish diaspora. It explores how the long enduring Kurdish struggle for nationhood and the relatively new transnational space of the Kurdish diaspora can interact and changes take place in both spaces. It is argued that the Kurdish diaspora has responded to the developments in homeland through different forms of diaspora circulation, rather than returning to homeland which was supposed in the previous studies. This chapter is based on the results of qualitative research which was conducted among the ‘elites’ of the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden, the UK, the Netherlands and Belgium in 2008. Key Words: Kurdish diaspora, Iraq, homeland, myth of return, diasporic identity. ***** 1. Introduction ‘Kurdistanê Azad Çebû’ (‘A free Kurdistan is born’) The Kurds, who live in different countries of the Middle East and in the diaspora, have used this popular motto to express the developments in the Kurdish region of Iraq since the collapse of the Saddam Hussein regime. What it implies is the realisation of a historical dream of the Kurds which can be summarised as the quest for their own state. This chapter aims to explore the impact of these developments that took place in Iraqi Kurdistan on the Kurdish diaspora. In general, the nation-building process of the Kurds is related to the nationbuilding processes in Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria, the countries governing the Kurds in the Middle East, which have given rise to different forms of exclusion of Kurds within them. 1 One of the most important results of this exclusion has been the migration movements of the Kurds which formed a Kurdish diaspora.

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Kurdish Diaspora

__________________________________________________________________ Therefore, the formation of a Kurdish diaspora has from its beginning been intertwined with the nationhood process of Kurds and the nation-building in their so-called ‘host’ states. In this sense the relationship between diaspora and homeland is a very common focal point for studies on the Kurdish diasporas, although this is studied from different perspectives. 2 In such studies, two arguments concerning the relationship between diaspora and homeland have come to the forefront: ‘Almost all Kurdish refugees wish to return to Kurdistan when conditions are appropriate’ 3 and ‘the concept of homeland for the members of diaspora is vague and ambivalent, since Kurdistan does not exist as a juridical- political reality.’ 4 This chapter aims to advance on these two arguments, assuming the conditions are now appropriate given the concept of the homeland has become concrete through the self-governing experience in the Kurdish region of Iraq which has turned into a de facto Kurdish state. What effects did the emergence of the de facto Kurdish state in Iraq have on the Kurdish diaspora? Is there a return of Kurdish diaspora? And did they formulate a more inclusive and cohesive discourse of the diasporic identity instead of the ‘home-oriented’ nationalist discourse based on victimhood? These questions are discussed from the perspectives of the people who are involved in the diaspora. Qualitative research through semi-structured in-depth interviews was conducted with those people who are actively involved in the Kurdish diaspora. 5 The present analysis draws on 17 life stories through which interviewees referred to the themes of a returning diaspora and the formation of a diaspora identity. 2. The Formation of Kurdish Diaspora The migration movements of Kurds and the formation of a Kurdish diaspora should be discussed in conjunction with the social and historical development of Iraqi Kurdistan. Since the 1970s, we can talk about four great migration movements of Iraqi Kurds. The first three of them occurred as a result of the ongoing struggle against the Iraqi state and they had a mainly regional and temporal character. Hundreds of thousands of Kurds had crossed into Iran and Turkey in order to protect themselves against attack by the Iraqi army. Relatively small numbers of peoples have been able to migrate to Europe. However the main Kurdish exodus to Europe from Iraqi Kurdistan took place in the 1990s which can be considered as the fourth wave. This started mainly after 1993 due to the economic embargo imposed upon Iraqi Kurdistan and has accelerated during the internal fighting among the Kurdish groups between 1994 and 1998. The migration movements of the Kurds from Turkey, Iran and Syria have followed their own way, however, it c an be generalized that the population movement had a ‘transnational’ character after the 1960s when the wave of mainly Turkish workers towards West European countries started. Among them the Kurds

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__________________________________________________________________ were a s ignificant number, although in the beginning their Kurdishness was not explicitly stated. Transnational migration has continued in 1970s and 80s in the form of refugee movements, because of the oppressive policies of Turkish, Iraqi and Iranian states against the Kurds. In the same period of time, a very wide economic migration has also taken place. As a r esult of these different waves of migration, a Kurdish diaspora, composing of different Kurdish communities living in different Western countries has emerged. Although no precise and reliable census of the Kurdish diaspora in Europe has been carried out, the most widely accepted estimates set their number at about 1.4 million in Western Europe and North America, nearly 85% of them from Turkey. 6 The number of Kurds from Iraq increased in the 1990s and now they form the largest part of the Kurdish communities in Great Britain, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United States. 7 This diaspora was mainly based on the ‘home-oriented’ nationalist discourse which depicted itself as a victim diaspora. 8 The Kurdish popular narrative of exile considers the Kurds’ tragic and traumatic past a major driving force for them entering the diaspora and their practice of ‘long-distance nationalism’ , which they maintain vis-à-vis their ‘land of origin’. In this sense, arguments such as ‘we are all Kurds’ and ‘we do not belong here because here is not our country’ have been very common among the Kurds in the diaspora, independently of their social or political affiliations. 9 However the emergence of the de facto Kurdish state in northern Iraq has led to the important changes, including the change in the depiction of the Kurdish diaspora as a victim diaspora and the reconstruction of a new diasporic identity. 3. The Victim Diaspora and the Myth of Return Most of the interviewees narrated their personal migration history and their position in a kind of ‘victim diaspora’, and their status as ‘guest: When we first got here, everybody was thinking ‘we will stay for a limited period of time here’. Many people thought of themselves as guests and many still think of themselves as guest. Generally the interviewees were using the term ‘diaspora’ to define themselves. Through this usage, they were mostly focusing on dispersion from their homeland of origin and the preservation of a distinctive identity vis-a–vis the host society. However there were also some hesitations in using this term, which may have be due to the fact that they were still considering themselves guests. In this sense, it can be argued that the conception of the diaspora is developing, but not established yet, as one interviewee noted; ‘The Kurds are becoming gradually a d iaspora. Maybe in the next 20-30 years, Kurds will have genuinely something called Diaspora.’

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__________________________________________________________________ In terms of the formation process of the Kurdish diaspora, all interviewees narrated their personal experiences as refugees on the basis of the critical events of the nation-building process in Iraqi Kurdistan. They had mainly migrated in the refugee waves of the late 1970’s and 1980’s and had been politically very active. Therefore they had been very sensitive to the political developments in the homeland which led to the assumption of a returning diaspora, as noted by Safran, ‘when the conditions are appropriate, they or their descendants would (or should) eventually return to their ancestral homeland.’ 10 I assumed that the latest developments in Iraqi Kurdistan could bring about such a return to the homeland for the Iraqi Kurds. However the figures did not bear witness to this. According to the figures provided by of International Organization for Migration (IOM), even though there is a slight increase in the number of people returning to Iraq since 2003, the total number of returnees between 2003 and 2007 did not exceed 11.000. 11 And not all of them were Kurds. Briefly we cannot assume a ‘return movement’ among the Iraqi Kurds, although they consider the developments in Iraqi Kurdistan successful. In this sense a returning diaspora is a kind of myth which was explicitly described as such by the interviewees: It would be individual cases. As group I do not expect them to go back. For a simple reason: their living conditions here are much better. The most expectedly what will happen is that they will have a residency here and another there. However a very limited number of the refuges, mostly from the political and cultural elite of the Kurdish diaspora, have returned to assume posts in the universities and the governmental offices. Some of the interviewees had gone to Iraqi Kurdistan in order to participate into some on-going projects. Although they had the intention of staying there, they could not. It can be claimed that maybe the developments in Iraqi Kurdistan had not reached the level of ‘appropriate’, which was put forward as a condition for a return in previous studies. The interviewees pointed out many shortcomings, problems and offered critiques related to the current situation in northern Iraq. Instead of a returning diaspora, alternative forms of diasporic circulation among the members of the Kurdish Diaspora have developed. The development of the self-governing experience in Iraqi Kurdistan since 1991 has opened doors for more contact with the homeland. This process has developed significantly after 2003; for example, the opportunity of direct flight between the diaspora and the homeland has accelerated transnational connections. As one interviewee noted; ‘Visiting Kurdistan has become a part of our everyday. There are many families, who stay there for 6 months and here for 6 months.’ Mobility between the diaspora and the homeland took other forms also including the movement of people knowledge and capital. The interviewees seem

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__________________________________________________________________ to be very confident about their roles as actors in this process. They mainly considered the diaspora as involving human capital and the homeland physical capital, especially the economic capital. This became very obvious when they talked enthusiastically about the various projects which they had developed. They saw this period as a construction process and the ‘making of the project’ as the most popular way of communicating with the homeland. Another interesting finding about the relationship between the diaspora and the homeland is the changing mentality of the political forces in Iraqi Kurdistan towards diasporic Kurds. As one interviewee stated; Until the 90’s, the political forces in Iraqi Kurdistan were seeing diaspora Kurds as lost. During the 90’s, there has been a significant change in their attitude. They came to look at diaspora Kurds as a national resource to be used and to be accounted for. However this increasing contact between the diaspora and the homeland can also create tension due to changing expectations. In general, the leadership in Iraqi Kurdistan expects the Kurds in the diaspora just to help with the building of the country and lobby for it. On the contrary members of the Kurdish diaspora criticise the Kurdish authorities for having clear expectation but no clear policy towards the diaspora. The members of the diaspora also consider themselves as being more ‘modern’ and ‘developed’ than those Kurds with political power. Some respondents, for example, talked about how the discourse of democracy is stronger in the diaspora than in Iraqi Kurdistan. This has the possibility of creating a cleavage in the relationship between the diaspora and the homeland. As noted by one interviewee; ‘In the past the Turkish, Syrian, Iranian or Iraqi elites were oppressing us. If the Kurdish elites were as bad as them, what difference does it make for me?’ Consequently it might be premature to assess increasing movement between the diaspora and the homeland and other forms of diaspora circulation have changed the main pattern of the relationship between the diaspora and the homeland. 4. The Diaspora and Identity Modern Kurdish identity which has largely developed as a reaction to cultural and political domination by the Turks, Persians and Arabs, has a very fragmented structure based on its internal as well as transnational character. 12 The emergence of the diaspora had an explicit impact on the ethno-national identity of the Kurdish immigrants in the sense that they discovered their Kurdishness in the diaspora. Asnoted by one interviewee:

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__________________________________________________________________ When I came to Sweden, I just realized that I have no need to be Iraqi since I was no longer under the oppression of the Iraqi regime. I discovered my Kurdishness here. Another important impact of the diaspora on identity is related to its unifying capability towards the formation of a general Kurdish identity. So the creation of a diasporic identity can make it possible to transcend the fragmented structure of the Kurdish identity. As one interviewee noted: The Kurds in the diaspora have more in common together than Kurds in Kurdistan. A Kurd in Sulaimaniyah would have very little in common with a K urd in Diyarbakir in terms of dialect, culture, sense of humour and daily life. But a Kurd from Britain, a British Kurd whose parents are from Diyarbakir and a B ritish Kurd whose parents are from Sulaimaniyah have more in common. They understand each other more and they have values that can actually be matched. Although diasporic experience has allowed the Kurds in the diaspora to have multiple identities rather than one based on a v ery strong reference to ‘the homeland’, most of the interviewees combined this with their newly acquired diasporic identity as such, ‘I am Kurdish. I sometimes say British Kurd. But the first thing when someone asks me who are you, with great pride, I say, I am Kurdish.’ In this sense, the homeland has still much importance in defining members of the Kurdish diaspora. Moreover the development of Iraqi Kurdistan as a locus for Kurdish national identity has exerted a very positive influence over the members of the diaspora personally, as one interviewee noted: Even up to 2003, the mental and sentimental power that I had was lesser. After that, when the Kurds became stronger, I felt myself strong as well here. Now the people regard me as somebody valuable, as somebody having a valuable identity. How they are perceived in Iraqi Kurdistan is much more complex, and sometimes it can even be considered as ‘traumatic’. One of the respondents explained this as ‘being a guest in both places’: Here, you always have in your mind Kurdistan as homeland, home. When you go home and people think that you do not belong to there, you are a guest and ask ‘where are you from?’ It creates a feeling that you have lost both, instead of gaining both.

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__________________________________________________________________ Being a guest in both places gives you a strange feeling. That is not comfortable. 5. Conclusion In this chapter, I have investigated how the Kurdish diaspora has been influenced by the developments in Iraqi Kurdistan. And as a general conclusion, it can be said that the relationship between the homeland and the diaspora has gained a new form rather than a r eturning diaspora, as it was assumed by the previous studies on the Kurdish Diaspora. The Iraqi Kurds have experienced different forms of diaspora circulation, which involve integration in the host societies as well as keeping the relations to the homeland alive. These new forms of circulation include homeland visits, return-visits, transferring knowledge capital and investment, acting as human capital in developing various projects and lobbying for the homeland. The establishment of the de facto Kurdish state in Iraq has qualitatively affected this process in the sense that it has created a more stable atmosphere and provided more resources to advance it. More importantly, it a ppears that people in the diaspora develop a distinct identity in a v ery general sense, and the assumed identification of the diaspora members themselves with the homeland can take other forms in the course of time. Last but not the least; we can also talk about a change in the depiction of the Kurdish diaspora. What takes place is a s hift from being a victimized, ethnonational, homeland-oriented diaspora to one that is orientated towards being a transnational-diasporia. One of the recent studies calls this ‘from a victim diaspora to transborder citizenship’. 13 This shift also implies the change in the conception of homeland and the nationhood or nation-building process. In Khayeti’s words, ‘the practice of transborder citizenship creates a new notion of home, which can be imagined beyond any assimilationist form of state belongingness as it is lived both here and there.’ 14 In this sense, the Kurdish diaspora now has much more capability and opportunity to be an influential actor for the general process of Kurdish nationhood.

Notes 1

M. Van Bruinessen, ‘Shifting National and Ethnic Identities: The Kurds in Turkey and the European Diaspora’, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, Vol. 18, No. 1, 1998, pp. 39-53. 2 O. Wahlbeck, Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities, Macmillan Press, London, 1999; D.E. King, When Worlds Collide: The Kurdish Diaspora from the Inside Out, Washington State University, Washington, 2000; D.J. Griffiths, Somali and Kurdish Refugees in London: New Identities in the Diaspora, Research in Migration and Ethnic Relations Series, Ashgate, Burlington, 2002; E. Østergaard-Nielsen, Transnational Politics: Turks

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__________________________________________________________________ and Kurds in Germany, Routledge, London, 2003; M. Alinia, Spaces of Diaspora: Kurdish Identities, Experiences of Otherness and Politics of Belonging, Goteborg University, Goteborg, 2004; A.C. Emanuelsson, Diaspora Global Politics: Kurdish Transnational Networks and Accommodation of Nationalism, Goteborg University, Goteborg, 2005; K. Khayati, From Victim Diaspora to Transborder Citizenship? Diaspora Formation and T ransnational Relations among Kurds in France and Sweden, Studies In Arts And Science, No. 435, Linköping University, Linköping 2008. 3 Walhbeck, op. cit., p. 106. 4 Alinia, op. cit., p. 232. 5 A.H. Akkaya, The Impact of the Nation-Building Process in Iraqi Kurdistan on Kurdish Diaspora, Master Thesis, Ghent University, Ghent, 2008. 6 Russell-Johnston Report, ‘The Cultural Situation of the Kurds’, presented to Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly in 7 July 2006, in Council of Europe, Viewed on 7/15/2008, http://assembly.coe.int/Main.asp?link=/Documents/Work ingDocs/Doc06/EDOC11006.htm. 7 Emanuelsson, op. cit., p. 85. 8 R. Cohen, ‘Rethinking Babylon: Iconoclastic Conceptions of the Diasporic Experience’, New Community, Vol. 21, No.1, 1995, pp. 5-18; R. Cohen, Global Diasporas: An Introduction, University College London Press, London, 1996. 9 Khayeti, op. cit. 10 W. Safran, ‘Diaspora in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return’, Diaspora, Vol. 1, No. 1, 1991, pp. 83-99. 11 From the personal communication with IOM- Iraq Mission, 2007. 12 A. Vali, ‘The Kurds and Their Others: Fragmented Identity and Fragmented Politics’, The Kurds: Nationalism And Politics, Saqi, Beirut, 2006, pp. 49-79; M. Van Bruinessen, ‘Transnational Aspects of the Kurdish Question’, Working Paper, 5REHUW6FKXPDQ&HQWUHIRU$GYDQFHG6WXGLHV, European University Institute, Florence, 2000. 13 Khayeti, From Victim Diaspora to Transborder Citizenship? Diaspora Formation and Transnational Relations among Kurds in France and Sweden. 14 Ibid., p, 177.

Bibliography Akkaya, A.H., The Impact of the Nation-Building Process in Iraqi Kurdistan on Kurdish Diaspora. Master Thesis, Ghent University, Ghent, 2008. Alinia, M., Spaces of Diaspora: Kurdish Identities, Experiences of Otherness and Politics of Belonging. Goteborg University, Goteborg, 2004.

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__________________________________________________________________ Cohen, R., ‘Rethinking Babylon: Iconoclastic Conceptions of the Diasporic Experience’. New Community. Vol. 21, No.1, 1995, pp. 5-18. Cohen, R., Global Diasporas: An Introduction. University College London Press, London, 1996. Emanuelsson, A.C., Diaspora Global Politics: Kurdish Transnational Networks and Accommodation of Nationalism. Goteborg University, Goteborg, 2005. Griffiths, D.J., Somali and Kurdish Refugees in London: New Identities in the Diaspora. Research in Migration and Ethnic Relations Series, Ashgate, Burlington, 2002. Khayati, K., From Victim Diaspora to Transborder Citizenship? Diaspora Formation and Transnational Relations among Kurds in France and Sw eden. Studies In Arts And Science, No. 435, Linköping University, Linköping 2008. King, D.E., When Worlds Collide: The Kurdish Diaspora from the Inside Out. Washington State University, Washington, 2000. Østergaard-Nielsen, E., Transnational Politics: Turks and K urds in Germany. Routledge, London, 2003. Russell-Johnston Report, The Cultural Situation of the Kurds, presented to Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly in 7 July 2006, in Council of Europe. Viewed on 7/15/2008, http://assembly.coe.int/Main.asp?link=/Documents/Working Docs/ Doc06/EDOC11006.htm. Safran, W., ‘Diaspora in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return’. Diaspora. Vol. 1, No. 1, 1991, pp. 83-99. Vali, A., ‘The Kurds and Their Others: Fragmented Identity and Fragmented Politics’. The Kurds: Nationalism And Politics. Saqi, Beirut, 2006. Van Bruinessen, M., ‘Shifting National and Ethnic Identities: The Kurds in Turkey and the European Diaspora’. Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs. Vol. 18, No. 1, 1998, pp. 39-53. Van Bruinessen, M., ‘Transnational Aspects of the Kurdish Question’. Working Paper. Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute, Florence, 2000.

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__________________________________________________________________ Wahlbeck, O., Kurdish Diasporas: A Comparative Study of Kurdish Refugee Communities. Macmillan Press, London, 1999. Ahmet Hamdi Akkaya is PhD. Student in the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences at the Ghent University, Belgium, affiliated with the Middle East and North Africa Research Group (MENARG). While his master thesis addressed the impact of the nation-building process in Iraqi Kurdistan on the Kurdish diaspora, his doctoral research deals with the development of PKK and the reconstruction of the Kurdish identity.

Part 5 Transnational Identities: The European Experience

Representations of European Cultural Identity in Mini-Europe Tuuli Lähdesmäki Abstract Mini-Europe – a theme park in Brussels morally supported by the European Commission and the European Parliament – consists of around 350 models of different buildings and heritage sites from all the member states of the EU. In addition the park includes an exhibition named the Spirit of Europe. This chapter explores how the European cultural identity is constructed and ‘sold’ in MiniEurope, and how history, geography, and local and regional traditions are intertwined into a politics of cultural marking, an ideology of European integration and a cr eation of shared symbols. European cultural identity has often been generated through appeals to an ancient or classical past, which is produced by stressing certain themes or ‘parts’ of Europe. Representing these ‘parts’ as common European culture is a profoundly exclusive strategy; heritage of a particular temporal or spatial unit is narrated as shared by contemporary citizens in Europe. Mini-Europe can be interpreted as an indication of this kind of panEuropeanist ideology. In addition, in Mini-Europe the European culture and identity is represented through signs, which do not refer to Europeanness as such, but function as signifiers of famous tourist attractions of particular member-states in the EU. Key Words: The European Union, cultural identity, heritage, mini-Europe, panEuropeanism. ***** 1. Creating Common Symbols for Europe The European Union has its foundation in trade cooperation, and regulating economy and labor policies. Since the establishment of the union, its main aims have been to increase the economic and political unity of its member-states. During the past decades the EU has started to pay more and more interest to cultural questions and the identification of its citizens. Since the 1980s the EU has set up various cultural programs that aim to strengthen the feeling of belonging of its citizens and produce cultural integration within the common European community. Over several decades cultural politics have become more and more significant within the principle agreements of the union and in the the resolutions of the European Council. Today the fundamental aim of the cultural policy of the EU is to emphasize the obvious cultural diversity of Europe, while looking for some underlying common elements, which unify the various cultures in Europe. Through these common elements, the EU policy produces ‘an imagined cultural

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__________________________________________________________________ community’ of Europe, which is ‘united in diversity’ as one of the slogans of the union states. 1 In the last few decades the EU has made various attempts to make the European cultural identity more concrete. The EU has promoted a set of symbolic initiatives directed at creating a sense of common belonging that include a flag, an anthem, a new ritual calendar and a common currency. 2 In addition the EU has launched various programs and actions, which focus on fostering cultural heritage in Europe, and which at the same time produce an idea of common European cultural heritage. The programs and actions include awarding EU prizes in such categories as cultural heritage and architecture, and annually nominating the European Capitals of Culture. Besides the official EU programs and actions the union is patron for various events, such as the European Night of Museums, and resorts, such as MiniEurope, that aim to foster the cultural heritage of Europe and cultural belonging to the same community. In general, cultural heritage seems to have a profoundly important role in the current production of communality, unity and integration within the EU. Various important EU documents, such as the Treaty of Lisbon and the European Agenda for Culture, stress fostering cultural heritage as a shared legacy of the Europeans. In the EU policy documents diverse regional and national heritage sites and monuments are ‘Europeanised’- represented as European and as a part of common European cultural identity. 3 These policies are implemented in practice in the EU through its support and patronage of programs and actions, such as Mini-Europe. In this chapter I focus on the attempts to encapsulate the cultural meanings of Europeanness. I will provide a cu ltural studies oriented case study analysis of Mini-Europe, a theme park in Brussels morally supported by the European Commission and the European Parliament. The park consists of around 350 models of different buildings and heritage sites, accompanied by information boards, from all the member states of the EU (Fig. 1). In addition the park includes an exhibition named the Spirit of Europe and a souvenir shop selling park and European-themed souvenirs. The main question presented in the chapter is: How is the European cultural identity constructed and ‘sold’ in Mini-Europe? In addition I will analyse how history, geography, and local and regional traditions are intertwined in MiniEurope into a politics of cultural marking, an ideology of European integration and a creation of shared symbols. The analysis is conducted through ethnographic observation and close ‘reading’ of the texts, images and spaces in the park.

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Figure 1: A view from Mini-Europe, Brussels. Photo: Tuuli Lähdesmäki. 2. Mini-Europe and Politics of Cultural Marking Mini-Europe was inaugurated in 1989 in Brupark, which is a popular leisure park located in the former World’s Fair area on the outskirts of Brussels. In 2003 an exhibition named the Spirit of Europe was opened as a part of Mini-Europe. It exhibits the history, achievements and aims of the EU, and the main symbols of the union. Today, Mini-Europe is one of Brussels’ leading attractions. It is marketed especially to families, but as the brochure of the park indicates, it also has official and political meanings. Inaugurations of architectural models and the exhibition hall have been festive events with various eminent representatives, politicians and officials from the EU and the member-states as guests and hosts. The focus of Mini-Europe is the member-states of the EU. However, the park, its information boards, the Spirit of Europe exhibition and the Mini-Europe brochure, which is given to all visitors, parallel the EU and Europe in various ways. Along with the enlargement of the EU, the number of architectural models has increased in the park. According to the Mini-Europe brochure, the resorts for the models have been chosen by art historians due to their ‘socio-cultural and architectural value, European symbolism, the beauty of the site and the technical problems involved in putting together a replica on a s cale of 1/25’. 4 Besides architectural monuments, the park includes some models of ships, air planes, trains and natural resorts. In the park each model or group of models represent a member-

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__________________________________________________________________ state. Older member-states are represented in the centre of the park with larger architectural entities, such as whole street views or a n umber of separate models. The tour in the park starts with models from ‘Europe’. Even though all the other models represent some particular state, the first two buildings are introduced with the title of Europe. These buildings are the Berlaymont (the main seat of the European Commission in Brussels) and an old farm house close to Paris in which ‘Jean Monnet and some close colleagues penned the Robert Schuman declaration, heralding the birth of the European Union’. 5 Through selecting these two buildings as the symbols of the ‘Europe’ the park merges the concept of the EU with Europe. The practice of emphasising certain buildings or monuments as significant symbols of the community, is familiar from the nation(state)-building practices of nineteenth century Europe. In addition, bringing so-called Great Men to the fore was a typical strategy in the nationalist attempts to boost national self-esteem, and create a n ational narration of history and an image of a civilised independent society. 6 Even though Mini-Europe and its exhibition stress several influential figures in the history of the EU, there does not exist any nationally recognised canon of the EU’s Great Men. As the research of Philippe Joutard and Jean Lecuir has indicated, the people in different countries of Europe tend to value only their fellow country-men as significant European figures. On regional and national levels people seem to honour their own regional and national heroes. 7 The models in Mini-Europe seem to portray the EU and Europe as a continent with historical prosperity and grandeur. The Mini-Europe brochure introduces more closely 112 of the most important models in the park. 46 % of these models represent buildings which were originally built in the 16th century or earlier. 68 % of these models represent buildings which were originally built before the 19th century. The most often represented historical buildings are; ecclesiastical buildings, such as churches, chapels, baptisteries or monasteries (16 %), administrative buildings such as town halls, courts or parliament houses (11%), castles or fortresses (9 %), different types of city gates or towers (9 %), or palaces and mansions (6 %). European cultural identity has often been generated through appeals to an ancient or classical past, which is produced by stressing certain themes, motives or ‘parts’ of Europe. Laying emphasis on architecture and architectural heritage sites is a particularly often used strategy in manifesting Europeanness. A similar strategy is used for example, in the architectural images in Euro banknotes. 8 Representing selected ‘parts’ of architectural heritage as cultural markers of Europe is a p rofoundly exclusive strategy in the creation of European cultural identity; heritage of particular temporal or spatial units are narrated as common denominators of contemporary citizens in Europe or in the EU. In addition, the selection of architecturally and stylistically excellent buildings, monuments and heritage sites as representations of common Europeanness, emphasises the heritage

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__________________________________________________________________ of the highest social strata ignoring other social classes and layers of culture in the production of common European cultural identity. The political agenda of the park underlines the excellence of the union in all sectors of societies. The information boards and the Mini-Europe brochure introduce the visitors to eight European values; democracy, the spirit of adventure, the spirit of enterprise, technology, culture and influence, the Christian heritage, social thinking, and secularism and multiculturalism, which is determined as a new value. In the texts all these values, except the last one, are attached to the particular architectural models presented in Mini-Europe: Democracy is a value that has its origins in Greece (the Acropolis). It went on to take root in our cities (belfries and city halls symbolize the independence of cities). England invented bicameral parliamentary democracy (Houses of Parliament). The French revolution injected the principle of equality into this democracy. This value was carried across Europe by Napoleon’s armies (Arc de Triomphe). The Berlaymont, seat of the European Commission, evokes a new type of European democracy. Democracy is a value that is worth fighting for every day: (Riga, Solidarnosc, Berlin wall). 9 In the texts the history of Europe is intertwined with the history of the EU. In addition, various regional or national events and trajectories are narrated as a common European history. Processes which happened only in some part of the continent are generalised as significant for the whole continent. The last value – secularism and multiculturalism – seems to contradict the emphasis on Christian heritage as one of the main values of the EU or Europe. In the case of secularism, the information boards in the park seem to include a particular political agenda; texts bring to the fore the main principle of secularism – separation of church and state – and notice that this principle ‘is not yet integrated in all European countries, whether it b e in the Constitution or in the State’s daily management’. In the texts secularism is discussed together with multiculturalism. This connection determines multiculturalism as religious pluralism – it thus underlines the existence of non-Christian communities alongside Christian communities. In the information boards multiculturalism is seen both as enrichment and a major challenge. However, the boards stress the importance of multicultural development: ‘Several studies show that multicultural societies are more dynamic. In this respect, the European Union is a r emarkable, positive example. The entire park illustrates Europe’s cultural diversity.’ It seems that multiculturalism is being discussed in the information boards and the brochure in various discourses that blend and confuse their contents. The texts seem to support pluralism produced by immigration, which however is seen as a challenge. On the

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__________________________________________________________________ other hand, the texts underline the EU as a multicultural administrative union of various nation-states. In Mini-Europe multiculturalism is narrowed down to a cultural diversity represented by architectural models in various temporal and spatial styles. The Spirit of Europe exhibition continues the political and ideological agenda of the park in a more concrete way. In addition to the political history of the union it introduces various pan-europeanist thinkers from past centuries, brings to the fore the EU’s political aims, and emphasises the official symbols of the EU; the flag, the date of Europe Day, and the anthem Ode to Joy. The exhibition starts with a panel, according to which Europe means 50 years of peace: ‘The European Union grew out of the desire to establish lasting peace in Europe. It has brought nations together in a joint endeavour. 50 years of peace, a unique historic achievement.’ The selective memory of the exhibition emphasises the political agenda of MiniEurope, which aims to present the EU as a guarantor of peace, prosperity, development and well-being in Europe. The Mini-Europe’s agenda rests on pan-Europeanism or Europeanism that stresses common values, common culture and shared heritage as the unifying factors of Europe. The roots of pan-Europeanist thinking are centuries old. However, the recent changes in Europe have concretised the pan-European ideas in a new way. John McCormick interprets the current changes in Europe with the rethinking of the meaning of citizenship and nationalism. He sees that state-based nationalism is increasingly being replaced by constitutional patriotism in addition to various non-state based forms of identification. 10 According to McCormick, this kind of change is typical for current Europeanism. Identification with Europe increases, and general interest in cosmopolitan ideas and global phenomena strengthen the role of Europe as a framework for feelings of belonging. 11 The EU itself seems to speed up this process – not only with its legislative actions, but also with cultural initiatives, establishing symbols and fostering heritage. 3. Touristification of Europe Mini-Europe can be explored in the context of the so-called ‘recreational turn’, which is being characterised by investing in creative industries, transformations of industrial agglomerations to cultural spaces, and urbanization of tourists resorts. In addition the recreational turn includes various processes of ‘touristification’ and ‘heritageing’, that is, the coming into being as a touristic place and producing and establishing heritage sites not only by preserving them, but also implementing various practices related to increasing tourist flows, consuming cultural products, and building leisure activities. 12 ‘Touristification’ and ‘heritageing’ are closely intertwined with branding and image-constructing through which urban spaces and various images related to them can be sold to visitors. Mini-Europe seems to be a part of a regeneration of the former World’s Fair area, which aims to uplift the administrative image of Brussels and transform it

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__________________________________________________________________ into a tourist attraction that simultaneously brands the city and the EU. The city, which does not have any major cultural attractions itself, has absorbed all the major tourist attractions of Europe under the concept of Mini-Europe. Thus, a visit to Mini-Europe can be marketed as ‘an exciting voyage through Europe’ (Fig.2). 13 Mini-Europe seems to take the idea that Europe is one big tourist resort one step further; the whole of Europe can be experienced in one spatial place.

Figure 2: A cover of the brochure of Mini-Europe. According to the tourist sociologist Dean MacCannel, tourist attractions are produced through an interaction of the sights themselves and various signifiers, such as brochures, guides, or hearsay. 14 According to him, the signifiers can more meaningful in the creation of experiences than the physical sight itself. In MacCannel’s theory, the tourist attractions are canonised in a process which includes a ‘sight sacralisation’ and ritual attitude of the tourists towards the sight. 15 Leaning on already existing and famous tourists attractions of the member-states, Mini-Europe utilises the signifiers and the canonisation processes of the original

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__________________________________________________________________ buildings and heritage sites. The images and emotions related to the famous original buildings and heritage sites have an influence on their reception in MiniEurope as models. Familiarity creates positive experiences and has an effect on ritual attitude and touristic behavior in Mini-Europe (Fig. 3). Even the MiniEurope brochure strengthens some of these familiar touristic practices on its cover page; taking a picture in which the tourist is holding the leaning tower of Pisa, posing with the English queen’s guard, or climbing on the slopes of Vesuvius. The tourist’s gaze, in the sense of John Urry, 16 is constructed through signs – the gaze transfers the experienced events or sights as signs of something else, such as signs of Europeanness in the case of Mini-Europe.

Figure 3: Touristic behavior in Mini-Europe. Photo: Tuuli Lähdesmäki. 4. Conclusions: Mini-Europe as a Simulacrum Mini-Europe can be interpreted as an ideological backlash to Euro-Disney, Lego-Land and to other global recreation parks in Europe. On the other hand, Mini-Europe seems to utilise a very similar logic of simulacrum, which the postmodern theorists have seen as characterising the state of Western culture since the end of the 20th century. According to Jean Baudrillard, in postmodernity reality and meanings have been replaced by symbols and signs, due to which human experience only simulates reality. 17 In postmodern culture the simulacrum precedes the original, and the distinction between reality and representation vanishes.

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__________________________________________________________________ Originality and authenticity become meaningless concepts. 18 In Mini-Europe reality is replaced by replicas, which function as signs of experiences expected to be experienced at the sights to which the models refer. In fact if tourist attractions are considered as sites, which are produced through various signifiers, as MacCannel suggests, models in Mini-Europe offer to its visitors signifiers, which reflect other signifiers. As a s imulacrum of Europe, Mini-Europe seems to reveal fundamental challenges of creating the common European culture or shared cultural identification with the EU. Europe or the EU does not have its own culture or cultural identity. The attempts to create common culture and identity seem to only simulate the signs which signify the famous tourist attractions of particular member-states in the EU.

Notes 1

M. Sassatelli, ‘Imagined Europe: The Shaping of a European Cultural Identity through EU Cultural Policy’, European Journal of Social Theory, Vol. 5:4, 2002, p. 436; M. Sassatelli, Becoming European: Cultural Identity and Cultural Policies, Palgrave Macmillian, Basingstoke, 2009. 2 C. Bee, ‘The Institutionally Constructed European Identity: Citizenship and Public Sphere Narrated by the Commission’, Perspectives on E uropean Politics and Society, Vol. 9:4, 2008. 3 T. Lähdesmäki, ‘Rhetoric of Unity and Cultural Diversity in the Making of European Cultural Identity’, International Journal of Cultural Policy, 2011. On the concept of Europeanization see R. Harmsen and T.M. Wilson, ‘Introduction: Approaches to Europeanization’, Yearbook of European Studies, Vol. 14, 2000. 4 Mini-Europe Brochure, Brussels, [2008], p. 18. 5 Ibid., p. 4. 6 L. Lindgren, Monumentum: Muistomerkkien aatteita ja aikaa, Finnish Literature Society, Helsinki, 2000. 7 Y. Laurent, ‘Ce que pourrait être un panthéon des grands hommes européens’, Le Monde, 6 March, 2003. 8 G. Delanty and P.R. Jones, ‘European Identity and Architecture’, European Journal of Social Theory, Vol. 5:4, 2002; G. Aiello and C. Thurlow, ‘Symbolic Capitals: Visual Discourse and Intercultural Exchange in the European Capitals of Culture Scheme’, Language and Intercultural Communication, Vol. 6:2, 2006, p. 154; P. Bohlman, Music, Nationalism, and the Making of a New Europe, Routledge, London, 2009. 9 Mini-Europe brochure, Brussels, [2008], p. 2. 10 J. McCormick, Europeanism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010. 11 Ibid.

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M. Stock, ‘European Cities: Toward a Recreational Turn?’, Hagar: Studies in Culture, Polity and Identities, Vol. 7:1, 2006. 13 Mini-Europe brochure, Brussels, [2008], cover. 14 D. MacCannell, The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class, Schocken Books, New York, 1976. 15 Ibid. 16 J. Urry, The Tourist Gaze: Leisure and Travel in Contemporary Societies, Sage Publications, London, 1990. 17 J. Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, University of Michigan Press, Michigan, 1994. 18 Ibid.

Bibliography Aiello, G. and Thurlow, C., ‘Symbolic Capitals: Visual Discourse and Intercultural Exchange in the European Capitals of Culture Scheme’. Language and Intercultural Communication. Vol. 6:2, 2006, pp. 148-162. Baudrillard, J., Simulacra and S imulation. University of Michigan Press, Michigan, 1994. Bee, C., ‘The Institutionally Constructed European Identity: Citizenship and Public Sphere Narrated by the Commission’. Perspectives on E uropean Politics and Society. Vol. 9:4, 2008, pp. 431-450. Bohlman, P., Music, Nationalism and the Making of a New Europe. Routledge, London, 2009. Delanty, G. and Jones, P.R., ‘European Identity and Architecture’. European Journal of Social Theory. Vol. 5:4, 2002, pp. 453-466. Harmsen, R. and Wilson, T.M., ‘Introduction: Approaches to Europeanization’. Yearbook of European Studies. Vol. 14, 2000, pp. 13-26. Lähdesmäki, T., ‘Rhetoric of Unity and Cultural Diversity in the Making of European Cultural Identity’. International Journal of Cultural Policy. 2011. Laurent, Y., ‘Ce que pourrait être un panthéon des grands hommes européens’. Le Monde. 6 March, 2003. URL http://www.lemonde.fr/cgi-bin/ACHATS/ acheter.cgi?offre=ARCHIVES&type_item=ART_ARCH_30J&objet_ID=795324. Viewed 15 March 2011.

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__________________________________________________________________ Lindgren, L., Monumentum. Muistomerkkien aatteita ja aikaa. Finnish Literature Society, Helsinki, 2000. MacCannell, D., The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class. Schocken Books, New York, 1976. McCormick, J., Europeanism. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010. Sassatelli, M., ‘Imagined Europe: The Shaping of a European Cultural Identity through EU Cultural Policy’. European Journal of Social Theory. Vol. 5:4, 2002, pp. 435-451. Sassatelli, M., Becoming European: Cultural Identity and Cultural Policies. Palgrave Macmillian, Basingstoke, 2009. Stock, M., ‘European Cities: Toward a Recreational Turn?’. Hagar: Studies in Culture, Polity and Identities. Vol. 7:1, 2006, pp. 1-19. Urry, J., The Tourist Gaze: Leisure and T ravel in Contemporary Societies. Sage Publications, London, 1990. Tuuli Lähdesmäki is a P hD researcher at the Department of Art and Culture Studies, University of Jyväskylä. In her current research project funded by the Academy of Finland she explores identity politics in the EU’s cultural policy from the points of view of cultural studies and sociology of art.

Part 6 Remaking the Re-Inventing Identities

Left-Wing Italian Jews from the 1960s to 1980s: A Fluid Identity Matteo Di Figlia Abstract The aim of this chapter is to show how belonging to the Jewish Community as well as to the Italian left contributed to create the identity of certain Italian Jews. Through three life stories an attempt will be made to demonstrate that this link with the left-wing movement, which was very strong in the 1960s and 1970s, started to disappear in the early 1980s. At this time, due to the debate on the Lebanese war, Israel became the main component of their identity. Of course, this process had different characteristics which depended on different experiences. However, generally speaking we can talk about ‘mixed identities’ in which the link with Israel and political ideologies were balanced in various ways against different Italian political periods. Key Words: Italian political identities, Italian left-wing parties, Italian Jews, Italian politics and Israel. ***** 1. Three Life Stories Stefano Jesurum was born in Milan in 1951. His parents were Venetian and descended from a Portuguese Sephardic family. During the persecution, most of the family took refuge in Switzerland. Between the 1960s and 1970s Jesurum was an active member of the student movement in Milan. At first, he maintained both his political activities and strong sense of belonging to the Israeli State. 1 This mixed identity crumbled in 1972, when several members of the Israeli Olympic team were killed by a Palestinian terrorist group during the Munich Olympics The Olympics won’t stop – the show must go on. I feel such shame. I hurry off to Via Festa del Perdono, where I have my university life, my family, my student politics. In language typical of those years I say that this is a tragic mistake, a disgrace to the Palestinian cause. My leaders reply ‘It would be better if you comrade Jews kept quiet on subjects like this’. That evening, at home, I cry. 2 Afterwards, Jesurum joined the Socialist Party, aligning himself with the more extreme part of the party led by Riccardo Lombardi. In 1976 Bettino Craxi, leader of the right-wing faction became the new Socialist Party leader (PSI). A few days

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__________________________________________________________________ later, Jesurum left the PSI and started voting for the Communist party, even though he never officially joined. Anna Foa was born in Rome in 1945. She worked as a historian and wrote several studies on Giordano Bruno. She was also a supporter of Lotta Continua, a Marxist and extra-parliamentary movement which started in 1969, although she wasn’t directly involved in political activities: ‘However, I delegated political activism to my family…’ 3 She was the daughter of Vittorio Foa, former leader of the antifascist group Giustizia e Libertà and a member of the Partito d’Azione. He then became a member of the national secretariat of the main communist Italian trade union, the CGIL, and later the national leader of the FIOM, the CGIL section for the metal and mechanical workers. Foa was considered one of the most important theorists of Italian working class thought and his essays strongly influenced the members of Lotta Continua. During the 1970’s and 1980’s he joined extreme left-wing parties. 4 Fiamma Nirenstein was born in 1945 to Wanda Lattes and Alberto Nirenstein. Wanda was a Jew from Florence who participated in the Resistance. Alberto was born near Warsaw at the beginning of the Great War, in what was to become the future Poland. He was very interested and active in both Zionism and Communism. Consequently, in 1932 he moved to Palestine, were he lived on a kibbutz. During the Second World War most of his family, who had remained in Poland, were exterminated. Alberto enrolled in the Jewish Brigade, a section of the VIII Army Corps belonging to the British army and made up exclusively of Jewish recruits. He arrived in Italy in 1944 and during the liberation of Florence met Wanda, his future wife. In 1950, Alberto Nirenstein went to Poland: he wanted to do research on the Holocaust in Eastern Europe and particularly in Poland. The Polish communist regime stopped him from returning to Italy. He was only allowed to do so in 1953 after Stalin’s death. Although Alberto Nirenstein spent the rest of his life in Italy, he never applied for citizenship and therefore never voted. His wife, Wanda, was a communist for a while, but after Alberto’s experience in Poland and especially the USSR invasion of Hungary in 1956, she left the PCI and started voting for the PSI. Fiamma Nirenstein went to Israel for the first time in 1966. She went back for a second time in 1967, a few days before the Six Day War broke out. On returning home, she started to work as a journalist and joined the Communist party. 5 ‘Indeed it is rare for a prevailing identity to prove capable of hiding others,’ 6 but in the three life-stories just described, political activity was the main element of their ‘mixed identity.’ 7 Hebraism was not absent, but it was certainly in conflict with the main political component. This balance changed at the beginning of 1980s.

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__________________________________________________________________ 2. The Point of No Return In 1982, during the Lebanese war, many Italian Jews entered the debate on Israel as never before. A few days after the Israeli attack on Lebanon, a group of Italian Jews published an appeal against the war in ‘la Repubblica’, an important liberal newspaper. It was supported and signed by many significant members of the Italian Diaspora, such as Primo Levi. 8 Foa and Nirenstein also signed it. Meanwhile, various events at home were contributing to increase tension. In June 1982 a group of protesters, part of a CGIL demonstration, threw a coffin outside the Synagogue in Rome symbolically blaming the Jewish community for the events in Lebanon. Then, some weeks later Yasser Arafat made a co ntroversial visit to the Italian Parliament. However, the worst source of tension was when a group of Palestinian terrorists attacked the Synagogue in Rome injuring several people and killing a two year old Jewish child. 9 In this atmosphere, there were several disagreements, even within the Jewish community. Fiamma Nirenstein, for instance, differed in opinion with her father, who strongly criticised the public disappointment of the Diaspora against the Lebanese war and the Israeli government. 10 Fiamma expressed a different point of view. She thought the link with Israel depended on its being an ‘inner nucleus’: ‘For my father it was where he was at the beginning of the 1930s, with copies of Freud and Marx under his arm, as it was for us, those of us under 40, with our promised lands of communism and feminism. Israel was everything even for those who landed on those beaches after the Holocaust except the beach would be defended by the barbed wire of international law and self-interest, and defended less than ever by revanchism and religious fanaticism’. 11 Jesurum, meanwhile, took part in the demonstration organised in Milan immediately after the attack on the Synagogue of Rome. However, he did not agree with the political stand of the Milanese Jewish Community. Therefore, he decided to join the Communists who were parading within the demonstration. Wearing his kippà, he walked next to a high ranking member of the PCI among the red flags with hammer and sickle, thus uniting Jewish and Communist symbols. 12 However, it was not an untroubled union due to several reasons. Firstly a substantial number of high-ranking left-wing politicians criticised not only Israel but the whole Italian Jewish community, as if it were responsible for what was happening in Lebanon. 13 Secondly, many liberal and communist intellectuals belittled any specific link between Israel and Italian Jews, who, they said, should be considered just as Italians with a Hebraic religion; 14 In spite of this, in 1982, many people proclaimed their Jewish roots for the first time in their life because of the debate on Israel. Finally, the union was troubled because of a wider political shift which was happening at that time.

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__________________________________________________________________ 3. New Identities for a New Season During the 1980s, Italian left-wing groups and parties were disappearing due to a deep political and ideological crisis. In 1979, the PCI had started to lose votes 15 and in 1982 the newspaper ‘Lotta Continua’ went out of publication. 16 The latter was the last legacy of a political group which had already split up in 1976. As in the rest of the western world, ‘physiological as well as political self-images’ were ‘apt to lose their boundaries and coherences.’ 17 Most of the militants then reshaped their public identity, often seeking non ideological features. Hebraism could be considered one such feature and Israel could be seen as the nucleus around which their Jewish identity was assembled. Anna Foa, for instance, changed her approach radically. She had been pushed away from politics by terrorism, which had been widespread in Italy from the late 1970s to the beginning of 1980s. Therefore, by rethinking her belonging to the Jewish world, and by rediscovering a particular link with Israel, she started a new kind of political activity: ‘It was like a kind of second youth, everything had finished with the terrorist events of 1977. It was also a return to a political sphere with which one had lost contact.’ 18 Moreover, due to the fact that only her father was a Jew, she decided to study the Torà and the Talmud and in 1990 she passed the exam necessary for formal conversion to Hebraism. 19 Israel played a strong role in this process. This was clear in 1991, when the Italian parliament was asked to decide about Italian participation in the First Gulf War. The PCI’s identity had been changing dramatically since the fall of the USSR in 1989. The PCI was expected to vote for Italian participation in the war, also because it had been officially decided by the United Nations. Nevertheless, the majority of the communist members of Parliament voted against the war. Vittorio Foa was then a member of parliament for he had been elected in 1988 as an Independent Communist. He was one of the few who supported participation in the war. 20 Meanwhile, during the Iraq invasion of Kuwait and the First Gulf War, his daughter Anna was in Israel (where her new partner lived) and in the USA. 21 Stefano Jesurum publically considered the Jewish identity, and in 1987 h e wrote the book ‘Essere Ebrei in Italia nella Testimonianza di Ventuno Protagonisti.’ 22 At the same time, he was involved in several congresses organised by the PCI, with both Jewish and Palestinian speakers. He cooperated with highranking members of the PCI such as Piero Fassino, as well as Giorgio Napolitano, who was the communist foreign secretary. ‘I have great personal pride in having conducted an interview, for ‘L’Europeo’ I think it was, in which Napolitano said ‘Zionist is not a dirty word’ It was the first time he said it in public.’ This thinktank used typical communist strategies: We spent many evenings at the Casa della Cultura, in Communist Party offices, at trade union headquarters – in other words all that domain belonging to the Left.(…) On average

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__________________________________________________________________ there was usually someone from the Party or the union who introduced the discussion and then there was almost always someone ready to defend the Palestinians. At that time it was mainly the moderate faction of the PLO who came to discuss things. All this had great importance from the standpoint of the communists and the Left because some kind of barrier had been knocked down. I am sure it was very useful. The evidence suggested that trying to be the good Jew and the good Palestinian was less so – the tactics were a little ambiguous, a bit false. 23 Even in the Nirenstein family 1982 started to be considered a point of no return. In 1988, some days after the First Intifada outbreak, Fiamma held: Over these last 20 years I have had a t housand conversations with Israel – you are not as beautiful as I dreamed, you are not the land of milk and honey; you are so human, so fallible, sometimes even abominable and yet I love you so much. You make me argue with everyone, you make me an arrogant warmonger in the eyes of my friends. You put up a barrier between me and my fellow travellers, you even give me a guilty conscience but still I feel such a strong bond with you. 24 Moreover, she epitomised a generational issue. A generation of Italian Jews had suffered the persecution and then in 1945 had also claimed a J ewish space and identity in the Italian Republic. The memory of the Resistance and the Shoah, and the link with Israel had been the base on which they had made up this political, symbolic and social configuration. The 1968 movements represented the main and for a long period only social affiliation for their children 25, those Italian Jews who were about forty years old in the 1980s and who only had a received memory of the anti-fascist struggle, of the Holocaust and the birth of Israel. The disappearance of the 1968 movements enabled their family legacy to emerge. 4. Epilogue In 1993-1994 the second republic started in Italy. It was also founded on the discrediting of the antifascist struggle. The legacy of the Resistance, which had helped avoid the foundation of a strong right-wing party from 1945 to 1992, was then strongly undermined. A lot of intellectuals and politicians held that there had been no relevant difference between fascists and anti-fascists. It was a rhetorical invention, they said, used by left-wing parties as a p olitical weapon. Fiamma Nirenstein herself agreed with this. In 1998 Alberto, Wanda and their three daughters Fiamma, Susanna and Simona wrote a book in which each of them told their own story. Fiamma dealt with the memory of the anti-fascist struggle. She

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__________________________________________________________________ told a story about her relationship with Bibi, a teacher at a primary school in Florence. They got on very well except for the fact that the teacher, even in her 50s, kept admiring Mussolini. Once Miriam (Fiamma’s name in the story) nervously asked her the reason for this persisting fascist support. Bibi thought hard and remembered something that had happened. She recounted how when Florence had been liberated about 50 partisans crowded opposite that gate you can see at number 18. A tough policeman used to live there, a ‘capo’ a blackshirt, someone she had met a couple of times at the theatre during the fascist period. He seemed a quiet, well dressed sort of person. She didn’t know exactly what he had done, but it doesn’t matter. They climbed up the tree overhanging his gate, banged it violently and took it off its hinges. They dragged the man from his house in his underwear followed by his wife and children in their nightclothes, covering their faces, screaming. Within a short time people had come out of their houses and collected in the street, each of them with a stone or stick in their hand. ‘Soon he was a bloody mess,…. and all the others I had seen at the rallies, I had seen them in the square, hailing the Duce and shouting out against the Jews’ Her heart pulsed hard again, the white wisp of hair had curled on her perspiring forehead. Miriam screwed up courage and took Bibi’s hand. 26 It is relevant that the reconciliation of a young Italian Jew (Miriam) with a fascist teacher was founded on the juxtaposition between the Italians who in 1938 had cheered the racial laws and the ones who in 1945 had killed the fascists. It was a Jewish perception of the general political shift. Once the memory of the antifascist struggle was abandoned, almost rejected, the link between the Jewish identity and the left-wing parties finally changed radically.

Notes 1

S. Jesurum, Interview with the author, 15 October 2010. S. Jesurum, Israele nonostante tutto, Longanesi, Milan 2004, p. 48. 3 A. Foa, Interview with the author, 15 November 2010. 4 V. Foa, Il cavallo e la torre, Einaudi, Turin 1991. 5 E. Galli della Loggia, ‘L’ebreo che volle farsi apolide’, Corriere della Sera, 3 September 2007 p. 31; A. Nirenstein, F. Nirenstein, S. Nirenstein, S. Nirenstein and W. Nirenstein, Come le cinque dita di una mano. Storie di una famiglia di ebrei da Firenze e Gerusalemme, Rizzoli, Milan 1998; F. Nirenstein, Interview with the author, 23 July 2010. 2

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D. Della Porta, M Diani, I movimenti sociali, La Nuova Italia Scientifica, Rome, 1997, p. 118. 7 Z. Baumann, Intervista sull’identità, Benedetto Vecchi (ed), Laterza, Rome-Bari, 2003; G. Schwarz, Ritrovare se stessi. Gli ebrei nell’Italia postfascista, Laterza, Rome-Bari, 2004. 8 ‘Perché Israele si ritiri’, la Repubblica, 16 June 1982, p. 10. 9 M. Molinari, La sinistra e gli ebrei in Italia, 1967-1993, Corbaccio, Milano, 1995. 10 A. Nirenstein, ‘Il censimento delle coscienze’, Shalom, June 1982, pp. 4-5. 11 F. Nirenstein, ‘Non solo la diaspora può discutere sull’operato di Israele, ma anzi lo deve’, Shalom, June 1982, p. 11. 12 Jesurum, Interview. 13 Molinari. 14 E. Scalfari, ‘Non ci sono ebrei ma solo italiani’, la Repubblica, 12 October 1982, pp. 1e4; R. Rossanda, ‘Voglio essere ebrea’, Il Manifesto, 2 July 1982, pp. 1-2. 15 L. Paggi, ‘La strategia liberale della seconda repubblica: Dalla crisi del Pci alla formazione di una destra di governo’, Partiti e organizzazioni di massa, L’Italia repubblicana nella crisi degli anni settanta, Vol. III, Rubettino, Soveria Manelli, 2001, p. 94. 16 L. Bobbio, Storia di Lotta Continua, Feltrinelli, Milan, 1988 (1979); A. Cazzullo, I ragazzi che volevano fare la rivoluzione, 1968-1978: storia di Lotta continua, Mondadori, Milan, 1998. 17 R. Barglow, The Crisis of the Self in the Age of Information: Computers, Dolphins and Dreams, Routledge, London and New York, 1994. 18 A. Foa, Interview. 19 Ibid. 20 P. Bat, ‘Vittorio Foa: perché mi dissocio’, La Stampa, 18 January 1991, p. 13. 21 Foa, Interview. 22 Jesurum, Essere Ebrei in Italia nella testimonianza di ventuno protagonisti, Longanesi, Milan, 1987. 23 Jesurum, Interview. 24 ‘Undici giornalisti si esprimono su Medio Oriente, Stampa, Tv e antisemitismo’, Shalom, January 1988, pp. 15-19. 25 Schwarz, op. cit., p. 108; A. Goldstaub, ‘L’antisemitismo in Italia’, Storia dell’antisemitismo: 1945-1993, La Nuova Italia, Florence, 1996, p. 436; C. Pavone, ‘Presentazione’, Parole Chiave, 1998, pp. 9-16. 26 Nirenstein, et al., pp. 96-97.

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Bibliography Baumann, Z., Intervista sull’identità. Laterza, Rome-Bari, 2003. Barglow, R., The Crisis of the Self in the Age of Information: Computers, Dolphins and Dreams. Routledge, London and New York, 1994. Bobbio, L., Storia di Lotta Continua. Feltrinelli, Milan, 1988. Cazzullo, A., I ragazzi che volevano fare la rivoluzione, 1968-1978: storia di Lotta continua. Mondadori, Milan, 1998. Della Porta, D., I movimenti sociali. La Nuova Italia Scientifica, Rome, 1997. Foa, V., Il cavallo e la torre. Einaudi, Turin 1991. Goldstaub, A., ‘L’antisemitismo in Italia’. Storia dell’antisemitismo: 1945-1993. La Nuova Italia, Florence, 1996. Jesurum, S., Israele nonostante tutto. Longanesi, Milan 2004. Jesurum, S., Essere Ebrei in Italia nella testimonianza di ventuno protagonist. Longanesi, Milan, 1987. Molinari, M., La sinistra e gli ebrei in Italia: 1967-1993. Corbaccio, Milan, 1995. Nirenstein, A., Nirenstein, F., Nirenstein, S., Nirenstein, S. and Nirenstein W., Come le cinque dita di una m ano: Storie di una famiglia di ebrei da F irenze e Gerusalemme. Rizzoli, Milan 1998. Paggi, L., ‘La strategia liberale della seconda repubblica: Dalla crisi del Pci alla formazione di una destra di governo’. Partiti e organizzazioni di massa, L’Italia repubblicana nella crisi degli anni settanta, Vol. III. Rubettino, Soveria Manelli, 2001. Pavone, C., ‘Presentazione’. Parole Chiave. 1998. Schwarz, G., Ritrovare se stessi: Gli ebrei nell’Italia postfascista. Laterza, RomeBari, 2004.

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__________________________________________________________________ Matteo Di Figlia is Associate Researcher at the University of Palermo. After studying Italian Fascism, he is now studying the debate on Israel among Italian Left-Wing Parties from 1948 to 1994.

How Things Are Remade Georgian: Glocalisation and the Assertion of ‘National’ among Georgian Youth Lia Tsuladze Abstract The chapter discusses the ways bifocality (in terms of both the local/global and the traditional/modern) is perceived and enacted by contemporary Georgian youth. Stating that at the present time in Georgia retraditionalisation in the sense of reviving ‘national spirit’ is embedded in social and political discourses, consequently, reflected in youths’ narratives, it is demonstrated how, in Georgian youths’ understanding, this revival should be undertaken in a modernised way so that ‘reworked traditional themes provide the basis for innovative and adaptive responses to outside influences’ (Blum, 2007). Different types of youth narratives such as ‘cultural stories’ and ‘collective stories’ (Richardson in Miller & Glassner, 2004) are presented to reveal this complex interrelation between the traditional and the modern within Georgian youth culture. Furthermore, likewise complex interrelations between the local/global and the eastern/western in Georgian youth culture is discussed. It is demonstrated how the perception of Georgia as a ‘bridge’ between Europe and Asia both problematises the notion of local and provides a vast opportunity for localisation and the assertion of ‘national.’ Accentuating ‘national’ represents not only the means of retaining ‘cultural intimacy’ (Herzfeld, 2005) in the modern globalised world, but also the main strategy for Georgian youth to resist both the powerful neighbour and certain westernisation trends, especially the western concept of freedom. In addition, it is presented how two distinct types of youth argot, namely, the ‘Russian-Georgian’ and the ‘EnglishGeorgian’ ones, can serve different purposes of national resistance and international integration. Finally, the attempt to both accept and eschew westernisation is discussed and it is illustrated how Georgian young people resolve this issue through remaking global, especially western cultural objects Georgian. Key Words: Georgia, youth culture, national, traditional, modern, local, global, westernisation, retraditionalisation, glocalisation. ***** 1. Introduction Globalisation has to be understood as a dialectical phenomenon, in which events at one pole of a distanciated relation often produce divergent or even contrary occurrences at another. The dialectic of the local and global is a basic emphasis... 1

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__________________________________________________________________ In this chapter I deal with the essential question of how societies manage globalisation simultaneously maintaining their national identity. I look at how national identity is articulated based on not only traditional elements but also those global cultural objects that are innovatively applied by local people. I try to trace ‘the dialectic of the local and global’ and to show its impact on re-creation of cultural identities. Particularly, based on the example of Georgian society, I attempt to demonstrate how bifocality (in terms of both the local/global and the traditional/modern) is perceived and enacted by contemporary Georgian youth. It is a widespread assumption that; these days patterns and configurations are no longer ‘given’, let alone ‘self-evident’; there are just too many of them... And they have changed their nature and have been accordingly reclassified: as items in the inventory of individual tasks. 2 Indeed, nowadays too many global flows or ‘configurations’ are encountered by even a relatively closed society being usually ‘reclassified’ or reworked by each local context. Through the process of reclassification based on local actors’ creative approaches, these flows or configurations gain novel meanings and become the objects of culture-specific manipulations. How are these culturespecific manipulations, that is the process of cultural re-creation, undertaken and how does it serve the assertion of ‘national’? 2. Dual Aspiration toward the Traditional-Local and Modern-Global Social scientists identify different responses to globalisation such as absorption, rejection, and assertion. 3 Our emphasis is put on t he strategy of assertion as it implies ‘articulating a coherent national identity’ based on both the traditionallocal and modern-global cultural patterns as a means of both emphasising the ‘national’ and fostering international integration. 4 No doubt, not all the assertions of ‘national’ represent a strategic response to globalisation. 5 However, in the countries that are largely the recipients of globalisation, including Georgia, the assertion of the ‘national’ is presumably encouraged by the need to cope with global trends, adapting those elements that are considered concurrent to local cultural traditions and abandoning those that are perceived as harmful to them. Thus, ‘assertion works to consolidate customary practice in the face of new, dislocating practices, and thereby assists in the balancing act of becoming modern without sacrificing’ culture-specific traditional 6 that reveals a v ery complex interrelation between the traditional and modern as well as the local and global in contemporary societies. At this point I’d like to switch to my research on youth culture in modern Georgia, in which I attempt to find out how youth identities are constructed through bricolage manipulating the modern and traditional as well as the global

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__________________________________________________________________ and local cultural elements. Attempting to bring closer ‘the world of engaged scholarship and the world of everyday life’, 7 I have involved my students as coresearchers in the study aiming to analyse youth culture seen from the perspective of youth themselves, as these co-researchers represent the same age group involved in similar cultural practices as the target group. Thus, the ultimate findings come from the comparison between the interpretations by my students and me, and the secondary interpretation by me as a means of gaining a ‘thick description’. 8 Such an approach has proved to be especially revealing in identifying research subjects’ different kinds of narratives, namely, ‘cultural stories’ - ‘told from the point of view of the ruling interests and the normative order’ and ‘collective stories’ - told from the perspective of those ‘who are silenced or marginalised in the cultural story’. 9 In our case, these two distinct narratives have illustrated the research subjects’ aspirations toward both tradition (told to me from the perspective of ‘cultural story’) and modernity (told to their peers/my co-researchers from the perspective of ‘collective story’), and revealed how this dual aspiration can serve as a s trategy to assert the ‘national’ simultaneously fostering international integration. I should emphasise that such a dual aspiration toward the traditional-local and modern-global is not a s pecific feature of non-western societies immersed in westernisation, but also western societies spreading fashionable cultural trends themselves. Tim Edensor discusses it through the example of Britain and even illustrates how ‘the Union Jack (the British flag) has become both traditional and fashionable, spanning contrary desires to keep things the same and transcend tradition’. 10 Such an attempt to achieve the ‘changing same’ 11 is one of the main characteristic features of Georgian youth culture as well: They aspire to maintain the ‘same’ in the sense of preserving those traditional cultural features that distinguish Georgian culture from others such as Georgian polyphony, Georgian folk songs and dances, Georgian table traditions, and even ‘Georgian relations’ mostly implying emotional interdependency and support among in-group members, at the same time achieving the changes through more ‘modern’ representations of Georgianness that is via adapting the old system of toastmaking, 12 listening to modernised versions of Georgian folk music, 13 and even inventing a modernised version of traditional ‘Georgian relations’. The latter is quite complex as it s upposes retaining the traditional system of youngsters’ subordination to elders while gaining a considerable amount of freedom from them, and even a more complex aspiration to become freer in the sphere of sexual relations while retaining the traditional religious-normative perception of the Georgian woman as rather desexualised. These ideas have been clearly reflected in the youths’ narratives, which demonstrate that Georgian youngsters feel pretty comfortable getting both emotional and material support from their parents. However, paradoxically, the same young people express their desire to be materially and emotionally

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__________________________________________________________________ independent from elders and to gain more freedom of choice and action. Thus, young people face the dilemma to choose between the safety provided by material and emotional dependency and the uncertainty caused by independent decisions, and although they acknowledge that being modern has largely to do with the freedom of choice, they still appreciate the tradition of reciprocal emotional and material dependency, which is beneficial to both younger and older generations. Thus, this dual aspiration toward interdependency/independence, avoidance of uncertainty/freedom of choice, and ultimately, the traditional/modern coexists among Georgian youth and is usually assessed by them as ‘the Georgian way of doing things’ (Davit, 19). This complex interrelation between the traditional and modern is further complicated while dealing with the sphere of sexual relations. Here the young people both idealise the traditional perception of the Georgian woman as modest, reserved, and distant from being an object of physical desire, and look up to the modern western perception of women as rather free in their sexual relations. It was evident in the young people’s discourses on Georgian women as always being the source of spiritual insight for the poets, for whom ‘the farther you are, the more inspiration I get’ (Galaktioni, 1908), simultaneously stating that the time for the Georgian woman to ‘humbly wait for her prince on a white horse’ has passed away (Eka, 21), and that Georgian society should adopt the western style of relations, where young people cohabit before marriage and their parents are not able to interfere in their private life. It is noteworthy that one could trace these ideas in the young people’s narratives to both the co-researchers (who represent the age group of 18-21) and the researcher (me); however, while in the ‘collective stories’ meant for their peers (my co-researchers) they openly claimed the desire to freely decide on their future life and to gain sexual experience before marriage, in the ‘cultural stories’ meant for the researcher (me) they attempted to manipulate the normative perceptions of the society and apparently applied the strategy of ‘deducing modern values from traditional ones’, 14 stressing that although traditionally in Georgia, youngsters were subordinate to elders, there were lots of examples in the history of Georgia when the most famous kings, making the most essential decisions for the future development of the country, started to reign at the age of 16 or even earlier; and that although Georgian women were traditionally considered quite modest, they have always been revealing their culturally approved dominance both within and outside families. Presumably, the youth narratives reflect the dominant sociopolitical discourses of the country as the latter most vividly demonstrate the desire to accomplish modernisation of the traditional, including the attempt to harmonise the traditional religious worldview with the modern secular perceptions, as well as considering natural the traditional system of nepotism and particularistic vision, while

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__________________________________________________________________ continuously stating that Georgia is a part of Europe, loading this statement with the positive connotation of being civilised and modern. 3. The Youth Argot - National Resistance or International Integration? One more area that is heavily influenced by the dominant sociopolitical discourses is Georgian youth argot, which represents a wonderful example of how different kinds of slang can be used as a means of national resistance or international integration. If we assume that ‘the state is (...) responsible for enforcing and prioritising specific forms of conduct, of inducing particular kinds of learning experiences’ and discourses, 15 then we can clearly identify the traces of such an enforcement in the youth discourses and see how their expressions of mock or insult can be used as a means of national resistance or how their attempts to sound ‘cool’ or up-to-date can be considered as a s trategy to claim one’s involvement in the global processes. Through providing me with lots of examples of the youth argot and interpreting the meaning of the phrases applied by their peers, my co-researchers have fostered the following finding: It has turned out that when the young people intend to insult someone or mock his/her provincialism, they usually apply ‘Russian-Georgian slang’ that is actually Russian words transformed into Georgian, resulting in a strange hybrid of these two languages. 16 While trying to sound ‘modern’ or ‘cool’ Georgian youth mainly use ‘English-Georgian slang’. 17 It is evident that the political climate of the country and Georgia’s attitude to the hegemonic states is reflected in the youth argot; therefore, it should not sound surprising at a time when Russia is considered to be Georgia’s major enemy, while the US is seen as Georgia’s major protector, to say nothing about the fact that English itself is the language of globalisation. 4. Retraditionalisation and Glocalisation as the Means of Asserting National Once again returning to the complex processes of retraditionalisation (or the modernised representations of the traditional) and glocalisation, one would primarily ask what purposes they serve, and the most probable response would be that in the Georgian reality they represent the means of asserting ‘national’ or, to quote my respondents, ‘the Georgian way of doing things’. Why should there be such an acute need for the assertion of ‘national’ today, when identity is believed to be nationally deterritorialised, and how authentic is the passion for ‘national’? As Manuel Castells observes, cultural nationalism is largely a defensive reaction against globalisation. 18 Our respondents’ words do demonstrate that accentuating the ‘national’ is their main strategy to retain ‘cultural intimacy’ 19 in the modern globalised world. And it seems especially vital in the conditions of overwhelming cultural flows, when the boundaries of the national and ethnic seem to become blurred and fragile causing quite complex identity issues as;

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__________________________________________________________________ the ‘ethnicity’, unlike any other foundation of human unity, has the advantage of ‘naturalizing history’, of presenting the cultural as ‘a fact of nature’… [Therefore] the choice is not between different referents of belonging, but between belonging and rootlessness, home and homelessness, being and nothingness. 20 No doubt, facing such a hard choice would evoke a strong desire to protect one’s cultural ‘being’ or ‘belonging’ against ‘nothingness’ and ‘to limit, or otherwise manage, the identity effects of foreign influences introduced by absorption’. 21 The assertion of the ‘national’ as a means of preserving ‘cultural intimacy’ would probably be a common feature of most of the globalising societies, but what makes it culture-specific in the Georgian context is a dual strategy to use it for resisting both the powerful northern neighbour and certain westernisation trends. In the current conditions, we should be especially sober to protect our deeply cultural from the outside attempts to demolish it. At the moment, I am talking about both cultural and physical survival... Historically, our northern neighbour was doing it in a very crafty way under the mask of being of the same religious faith and driven by the same humanistic values. As it didn’t work, the former strategy has been reworked and now we are attacked in an extremely aggressive way! 22 Thus, here is a cal l for national resistance as a response to both a cunning strategy and ‘an extremely aggressive’ attack considered dangerous for both cultural and physical survival. ‘In this sense national-traditional assertion represents a cultural ‘counterattack’.’ 23 But it is not the only danger Georgian youngsters try to avoid. Another one comes from westernisation and the trend that is closely associated to it by Georgian youth. Their main concern relates to the western concept of freedom, which, in their opinion, is absorbed by the local environment in ‘an extremely distorted way’ (Keti, 18) and perceived by their peers as ‘unrestraint’. 24 My co-researchers provided wonderful reflections on this issue. They openly confessed that despite attributing it to others, their in-group and they themselves superficially imitated western practices. However, their main concern was not the fact of ‘distortion’ but of imitation itself: The epoch of imitating to others and being either pro-Russian or pro-American or something else hasn’t yet ended in Georgia and the epoch of being pro-Georgian hasn’t started by now... America can teach us how to create democracy but not culture.

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__________________________________________________________________ And we should take as examples only those principles of democracy that are concurrent to the Georgian culture and reality. 25 And although the young people recognised that it was not only impossible but also irrational to remain uninvolved in the conditions of ongoing globalisation, they emphasised that for such small and powerless countries as Georgia it was absolutely vital to retain their ‘national spirit’ though in a retraditionalised way so that the ‘changing same’ could be achieved and ‘reworked traditional themes provide the basis for innovative and adaptive responses to outside influences’. 26 How can this goal be achieved? Through remaking things Georgian! The fact that Georgia has traditionally been considered as a ‘bridge’ between Europe and Asia seems to problematise the perception of local simultaneously providing a vast opportunity for localisation and the assertion of ‘national’. The young people state that Georgian culture, including youth culture, is hard to be classified as it combines the elements of both eastern and western cultures, at the same time remaining ‘purely Georgian’ (Mary, 20). They claim that ‘no one could absorb and localize European culture so as it has been done in Georgia. Consequently, Georgian youth culture has formed as an amorphous mixture of different consisting parts that have been remade Georgian’ (Tina, 19). Taking into consideration the young people’s ideas, it is hard not to agree with Tim Edensor’s words that; as global cultural flows become more extensive, they facilitate the expansion of national identities and also provide cultural resources which can be domesticated, enfolded within popular and everyday national cultures. 27 However, based on the fact that nowadays dominant cultural flows come mostly from the west, Georgian youth is especially concerned with westernisation and its possible outcomes revealing a dual attempt to both accept and eschew it. And their bricolage or ‘the Georgian way of doing things’ is most obviously reflected in this dual aspiration as Georgian youth ‘improvise local performances from (re)collected pasts, drawing on foreign media, symbols and languages’ 28 and these improvisations take place in the local context encouraging the assertion of ‘national’. Finally, I would like to underline another dual aspiration closely related to the spectacular aspects of the assertion of ‘national’, which can be considered as specific to Georgian culture, including youth culture, and has been traced in the youths’ narratives as well. I emphasise the spectacular as this aspiration represents Georgians’ attempt to impress foreigners/outsiders by overtly performing the national (through socio-political discourses, toast-making, frequent references to the history of Georgia, etc.), while the same performances, shared and welcome by

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Notes 1

A. Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1991, p. 22. Z. Bauman, Liquid Modernity Polity Press, Cambridge, 2000, p. 7. 3 D. Blum, National Identity and Globalization: Youth, State, and Society in PostSoviet Eurasia, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007, pp. 12-34. 4 Ibid., p. 26. 5 According to B. Anderson, highlighting ‘national’ is primarily a means of dividing ‘us’, ‘indigenous’ from ‘them’, ‘foreign’ (2006, p. 141). 6 D. Blum, op cit, p.29. 7 K. Narayan, ‘How Native is a ‘Native’ Anthropologist?’, American Anthropologist, Vol. 95 (3), 1993, pp. 671-686. 8 C. Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures, Basic Books, New York, 2000. 9 J. Miller and B. Glassner, ‘The ‘Inside’ and the ‘Outside’- Finding Realities in Interviews’, Qualitative Research: Theory, Method and Practice (2nd ed), D. Silverman (ed), Sage Publications, London, 2004, p. 130. 10 T. Edensor, National Identity, Popular Culture and Everyday Life, Berg, Oxford and New York, 2002, p.26. 11 P. Gilroy, The Black Atlantic: Modernity and D ouble-Consciousness, Verso, London, 1994. 12 It is shortened and more focused on up-to-date issues. 13 Based on the interviews with young people, ‘Shin’ creating modernized versions of Georgian folk songs and ‘Assa-Party’ performing Georgian folk dances in a modernized way, are recognized as the most popular Georgian performers. 14 C. Camilleri and H. Malewska-Peyre, ‘Socialization and Identity Strategies’, Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology (2nd ed), Vol. 2, J.W. Berry, Y.H. Poortinga and J. Pandey (eds), Allyn and Bacon , Boston, 1997, p. 58. 15 T. Edensor, op cit, p.20. 16 Well evidenced by such expressions as ‘nu blataob’ (meaning ‘don’t try to be self-important’) derived from the Russian word ‘blatnoi’ (self-important), ‘ra rojaa’ (making fun of someone) derived from the Russian phrase ‘nu i roja’ (meaning ‘what a [ horrible] face!’), ‘magari prativnia’ (meaning ‘someone is disgusting’) derived from the Russian word ‘protivnii’ (disgusting, terrible), etc. 17 Well evidenced by such expressions as ‘magari coolia’ (meaning ‘how cool!’), ‘es musika laitia’ (meaning ‘this music is light’), ‘damimesije’ (meaning ‘send me a message’), ‘promousheni gauketes’ (meaning ‘he/she was promoted’), etc. 2

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__________________________________________________________________ 18

M. Castells, The Power of Identity (2nd ed), Wiley-Blackwell, Malden and Oxford, 2010, p. 69. 19 M. Herzfeld, Cultural Intimacy: Social Poetics in the Nation-State (2nd ed), Routledge, New York, 2005. 20 Bauman, op. cit., pp. 172-173. 21 Blum, op. cit., p 30. 22 Giorgi, op. cit., p. 18. 23 Blum, op. cit., p 29. 24 ‘Despite the fact that they want to be free, they don’t understand what this freedom means... It is probably caused by our mentality. The line between freedom and unrestraint is erased’ (Salome, 20). 25 Anano, op. cit., p. 19. 26 Blum, op. cit., p. 27. 27 Edensor, op. cit., p. 29. 28 J. Clifford, The Predicament of Culture, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1988, p. 15. 29 E. Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Doubleday, New York, 1959.

Bibliography Anderson, B., Imagined Communities. Verso, London and New York, 2006. Bauman, Z., Liquid Modernity. Polity Press, Cambridge, 2000. Blum, D.W., National Identity and G lobalization: Youth, State, and Society in Post-Soviet Eurasia. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007. Camilleri, C. and Malewska-Peyre, H., ‘Socialization and Identity Strategies’. Handbook of Cross-Cultural Psychology (2nd ed). Vol. 2. Berry, J.W., Poortinga, Y.H. and Pandey, J. (eds), Allyn and Bacon, Boston, 1997. Castells, M., The Power of Identity (2nd ed). Wiley-Blackwell, Malden and Oxford, 2010. Clifford, J., The Predicament of Culture. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1988. Edensor, T., National Identity, Popular Culture and Everyday Life. Berg, Oxford and New York, 2002.

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__________________________________________________________________ Geertz, C., The Interpretation of Cultures. Basic Books, New York, 2000. Giddens, A., Modernity and Self-Identity. Polity Press, Cambridge, 1991. Gilroy, P., The Black Atlantic: Modernity and D ouble-Consciousness. Verso, London, 1994. Goffman, E., The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Doubleday, New York, 1959. Herzfeld, M., Cultural Intimacy: Social Poetics in the Nation-State (2nd ed). Routledge, New York, 2005. Hobsbawm, E. and Ranger, T., The Invention of Tradition. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1983. Miller, J. and Glassner, B., ‘The ‘Inside’ and the ‘Outside’- Finding Realities in Interviews’. Qualitative Research: Theory, Method and Practice (2nd ed). Silverman, D. (ed), Sage Publications, London, 2004. Narayan, K., ‘How Native is a ‘Native’ Anthropologist. Vol. 95 (3), 1993, pp. 671-686.

Anthropologist?’.

American

Surmanidze, L., kartuli kulturis zogierti orientacia (Some Orientations of the Georgian Culture). International Center for Women’s Education and Information, Tbilisi, 2000. (in Georgian and Russian) Tsuladze, L., socializaciis zogierti problema kartuli kulturis kontekstshi avtonomiuroba da s ankciebi (Autonomy and Sanc tions in Socialization in the Context of Georgian Culture). Dissertation. Tbilisi State University Press, Tbilisi, 2003. (in Georgian) Lia Tsuladze is an associate professor at Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Tbilisi State University, Georgia. Her research interests include cultural sociology, cultural anthropology, and cultural semiotics. Lia’s current research relates to the youth culture in modern Georgia focusing on the construction of youth identities in the context of glocalization. In order to trace both the Western and Eastern influences experienced by Georgian youth, she has done her research in the US (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 2007) and Japan (Tokyo, Waseda University, 2009). She is also planning to make a co mparative analysis of youth cultures in post-soviet vs. post-communist European countries.

Disfigured Past: Unmasking the Meaning and Identity of Historic Architecture Jennifer Tran Abstract With today’s popularity for recreational travel and global interests in heritage tourism, historic architectural sites are commonly viewed as tangible representations of the past which embody an important aspect of the socio-cultural history of a given place. These views are informed and projected by the heritage tourism industry, whereby historical buildings are physically conserved and presented to reinforce and preserve their ‘valued’ prior identity. Such practices represent architecture as having a specific historical identity relating to a particular aspect of the building’s past, and give the impression that this identity has been physically preserved both consistently and immutably over time. However, these representations of architecture and its identity are questioned when considering notions on the perceptual, cultural, and historical formation of meaning as discussed by theorists such as Pierre Bourdieu and Michel Foucault. These ideas expose architectural identity as a cu ltural construction of meaning specific to a given context and time as opposed to it being a fixed, tangible entity preserved by built form. This suggests that conventional, ‘preservations’ and representations of the identity of historical buildings actually portray a distorted contemporary impression of their past identity, whereby the meaning of the building has been culturally adapted according to present values and ideals about the past. Drawing on Bourdieu’s and Foucault’s theories, this chapter explores these issues through an historical analysis of the formation and transition of the identity of an architectural case study in Perth, Western Australia. It focuses on investigating how people and their perception within specific cultural, historical contexts shape as well as distort the identity of built forms, and how this conflicts with existing representations of architecture within the heritage-tourism industry. In doing so, this investigation provides a more critical view of current depictions of historical built forms which offer a limited and idealised articulation of identity and history, and will contribute to an understanding of key issues surrounding the notion of architectural identity. Key Words: Architecture, identity, meaning, history, heritage, historical change, Bourdieu, Foucault. ***** 1. Introduction Historic built forms are today often brandished as culturally significant sites of history which allow tourists to experience and comprehend architecture as it was in

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__________________________________________________________________ the past. This is reflected in conventional strategies exercised by the heritagetourism industry which endeavour to preserve the historical significance of buildings through the conservation of their physical appearance and modes of heritage ‘interpretation’. These current methods of retaining and presenting historic sites are approached in a manner which emphasises a particular historical context, and portrays architecture with a specific prior identity. In doing so, these depictions of the built environment assume that the meaning and value of built forms are physically embodied and maintained over time, and project the impression that architecture has continuously retained its past identity within a present contextual environment. Although conventionally practiced, these representations of identity are problematised when drawing on theories of meaning expressed in the works of Pierre Bourdieu and Michel Foucault. These theories stress the roles of sociocultural, perceptual and contextual factors involved in the formation of meaning and ideas. By casting these notions onto the context of the built environment, architectural identity is highlighted as a culturally informed and historically specific construct, rather than an immutable or trans-historical entity. These ideas not only challenge current heritage-tourism practices of conserving and presenting built forms, but also suggest that conventional representations of the identity of existing historic sites are misleading and embedded with flaws. In this regard, this chapter investigates these issues by critically evaluating present methods of preserving and portraying historic architecture within the heritage-tourism industry. Conceptualising architectural identity as the meaning and value by which built forms are defined, the first section of this chapter explains how current heritage-tourism strategies commonly approach and depict architecture with a continuous or ‘timeless’ identity. This is followed by a discussion of Bourdieu’s and Foucault’s theories of meaning which draw attention to the cultural, historical nature of identity, and uncover problems with conventional modes of portraying historic sites. Drawing on these ideas in a critical analysis of a case study in Perth, Western Australia, the final section of this chapter elaborates on these problems and discusses the flaws in current representations of architecture and identity. 2. Static Identity Within the heritage-tourism industry, current conservation practices for preserving historic architecture commonly seek to maintain the heritage value of built forms which are considered to be physical representations of certain significant aspects of the past. These valued historical aspects include particular socio-cultural practices, social figures, or historical events associated with a building in the past, and are often considered to form a valuable part of the collective identity of a given place. 1 In a bid to preserve the significance of historic buildings, revered as tangible expressions of such valued facets of their past, the

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__________________________________________________________________ appearance and physical fabric of these built forms are often restored, furnished and maintained in a manner which historically coincides and reflects its asserted value. Additionally, conventional methods of conserving historic architecture also involve practices of heritage ‘interpretation’ presented through visitor information, guided tours, signage, imagery or historical re-enactments which inform and showcase a specific past, and socio-cultural aspects related to the heritage significance of the building. 2 Together, these practices view, characterise and exhibit architecture with an immutable historical identity, which is assumed to be prescribed by physical form and historically maintained within a contemporary context. This can be recognised in the conservation and heritage interpretation of historical tourist sites, such as ‘Tranby House’ (Fig. 1) in Maylands, Perth, Western Australia. Constructed in 1839 during the early colonial period of Western Australia, ‘Tranby House’ has been conserved by the National Trust of Australia

Figure 1: ‘Tranby House’, Maylands, Perth. 2011. (Photograph: Jennifer Tran).

Figure 2: Restored ‘19th century’ interior of Tranby, 2011. (Photograph: Jennifer Tran).

(W.A.) and opened to the public as a house museum since 1977. 3 Its conservation is underpinned by heritage assessments of the building’s significance, which have predominantly emphasised ‘Tranby’ as a v aluable representation of early 19th century rural development and way of life of the Swan Colony, and an expression of ‘the form and function of a colonial farmhouse in Western Australia.’ 4 Additionally, it is also valued for its close association with the Hardey family, whose members resided at ‘Tranby House’ during the 1800’s, and ‘were influential in religious, political and business activities of the Swan River Colony and farming district.’ 5 With the intention of conserving Tranby’s perceived historical significance and 19th century colonial identity, its built fabric and physical appearance has been restored, furnished and retained in a manner which is ‘compatible with the original intention of the place as a r esidence’, and representative of the 1830’s to 1850’s era in which it was built and occupied by the Hardeys. 6 This has involved refurbishing and maintaining the building’s physical

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__________________________________________________________________ fabric to prevent it from structurally deteriorating and aesthetically deviating from its revered colonial farmhouse identity. Items belonging to the Hardeys, as well as domestic furniture and farming equipment pertaining to the style of the 1800’s, have also been arranged and displayed within ‘Tranby House’ (Fig. 2) to reflect previous uses of specific living spaces and everyday practices particular to the period. 7 Therefore, these methods of maintaining the architectural form and colonial appearance of ‘Tranby’, as a means to conserve its significance as a former pioneer home of the Hardeys, seem to approach and convey the past identity of the building as an accessible and physically defined entity. Additionally, heritage interpretations of ‘Tranby’, in the form of guided tours, verbal descriptions of its history, brochures, signs and portraits displayed throughout its interior, have also been presented to visitors to project and conserve its valued historical identity. Against the backdrop of ‘Tranby’s’ preserved form, these interpretations predominantly inform tourists about members of the Hardey family in terms of their migration from England, their biographies, their residence at ‘Tranby’, and their ‘contributions’ to the Swan River Colony during the 19th century. 8 Furthermore, colonial building methods and the architectural style associated with the construction of the building are also described to tourists, as well as domestic living rituals and rural practices which might have been carried out during the 1800’s. 9 By consistently defining ‘Tranby’ in terms of its previous occupants, use and conditions within the 19th century, these interpretive depictions of the building offer a historically rigid portrayal of ‘Tranby House’, as they project the impression that it has possessed and maintained this fixed identity of a former colonial farmhouse associated with the Hardey family, since the 1830’s. Similarly, these trans-historical ideas and projections of identity also seem to be echoed across the globe in the conservation and interpretation of other existing historic tourist sites, such as the Tower of London with its medieval themed artefacts, furnishings, tours and re-enactments; Shakespeare’s former birthplace in Stratford-upon-Avon with its 16th century furnished interiors; the restoration of Leonardo Da Vinci’s 16th century last place of residence at Close Luce in Amboise, France; and The Forbidden City in Beijing, China with its preserved dynastic artefacts and imperial tourist costumes. Like Tranby House, these existing conventional conceptions of retaining the historical significance of built forms commonly regard the identity of historic architecture as a preservable tangible construct, and tend to thematically articulate buildings in terms of a specific historical period and particular prior identity. In doing so, these practices conceptualise and portray the identity of architecture as a ‘ timeless’ inherent property of built form that has been historically maintained over time. 3. Bourdieu, Foucault and the Formation of Meaning Although commonly accepted, these conventional notions and depictions of identity within the heritage-tourism industry are questioned when considering

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__________________________________________________________________ theories on the cultural and historical formation of meaning. Such theories are discussed by Pierre Bourdieu and Michel Foucault, and suggest that architectural identity is a culturally shaped and contextually specific construct, as opposed to a preservable trans-historical entity. For example, Bourdieu’s sociological concepts and notion of ‘habitus’ discusses how the ways in which people interpret and respond to their environment are framed by their knowledge, familiarised ideas, and personal habitual experiences within the socio-cultural context of their surroundings. He explains that the knowledge which people hold and their familiarity of ideas are shaped from their own past encounters, as well as personal everyday experiences of being within the socio-cultural conditions of their environment. It is through these everyday experiences that people develop a ‘feel’ of prevailing norms and accepted ideas practiced within the particular context of their surroundings. From this, they internalise aspects of these prevailing norms, ideas and practices through their personal repeated encounters and experiences. According to Bourdieu, it is this familiarity and subconscious internalisation of existing contextual norms and ideas, intertwined with knowledge shaped from past, personal socio-cultural encounters, which informs the particular way people react and make sense of their environment. 10 Therefore, Bourdieu’s theories suggest that people’s interpretation of their surroundings, and the meanings they perceive of it, are derived from individual aspects of experience and perception, which are tied to specific social, cultural, and contextual conditions of their experienced environment. On a similar note, Foucault’s particular notion of discourse emphasises the cultural and historically specific formation of meaning and ideas. In The Order of Things, Foucault explains that people make sense of reality by ‘ordering’ or assigning things with meaning that is discursively shaped within the specific context out of which it is produced. 11 He highlights that a particular socio-cultural context produces its own specific ‘order’ of knowledge, or particular discourse (all forms of knowledge, accepted ideas, meanings and practices), which informs, entails and limits the possibilities of what ideas are thought; what meanings are perceived of things; and what is considered to be ‘true’ within a certain historical period. In other words, particular ideas, meanings of things or practices do n ot form or exist in isolation, but rather, their construction and existence are made possible through their relation to a web of other existing forms of knowledge or practices which inform and rationalise them within a given historical context. In this regard, Foucault argues that particular meanings and ideas exist only within the specific historical context and discursive conditions which inform and allow them to be possible. 12 Therefore, Foucault’s concepts emphasise that the meaning of things are not historically continuous or consistent, as they are specifically formed and rationally understood according to particular discursive contextual conditions of a given historical period.

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__________________________________________________________________ By projecting Bourdieu’s and Foucault’s theories onto the context of the built environment, this infers that people construct and endow architecture with meaning or value, rather than it being embodied and expressed by architectural form. Since people can only understand things according to the ‘order’ of knowledge, or discourse, prevailing within their existing environment, Bourdieu’s and Foucault’s concepts indicate that people draw on such accustomed forms of knowledge and cultural conditions when constructing architectural meaning, in order to make sense of architecture within the given historical context of which it is perceived in. In other words, architectural meaning is culturally formed and rationalised according to familiarised socio-cultural conditions and the ‘order’ of knowledge specific to the contextual setting out of which people perceive and understand built forms. This implies that the formation of architectural identity is not only influenced by the existing forms of knowledge and contextual circumstances of a particular time, but it also depends on people’s awareness of these conditions, which can only be obtained through their own experiences of being within the specific context from which these conditions exist. Therefore, this highlights that architectural identity is historically specific and culturally adapted to the particular socio-cultural environment and context of prevailing ideas, practices, norms and values from which it is rationalised, formed and understood. Thus, against conventional practices of preserving and representing the historical significance of architectural tourist sites, these ideas implied by the works of Bourdieu and Foucault raises the question: Can the past identity of a building really be preserved, maintained or even exist within a c ontemporary context? And if not, then what cultural, historical reality and identity of architecture is actually being represented to visitors by the heritage-tourism industry? 4. Illusions of the Past These questions are explored by adopting Foucault’s and Bourdieu’s theories of meaning in a h istorical analysis of the identity of ‘Tranby House’. A critical assessment of the past and present identity of this site in the light of these theories suggest that the ‘preserved’ colonial identity of Tranby presented by today’s heritage industry has not been historically maintained by the building, nor did it exist within the historical period of which it refers to. This is recognised in the contrast between the socio-cultural significance of Tranby during the 19th century, and its heritage significance within today’s context. What was once considered a home by a newly settled European family of three, to protect against a harsh and unfamiliar environment, and which operated as a farmhouse to harvest food for survival during the context of Western Australia’s early 1840’s, ‘Tranby House’ is now currently perceived, treated and showcased as a historical artefact of the past. 13 Having received colonial styled ‘facelifts’ since the 1970’s, Tranby’s architectural shell is currently adorned with objects, farming tools and furniture pertaining to the 1800’s era, all arranged within its empty spaces based on

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__________________________________________________________________ contemporary ideas of what a colonial home during the period looked like. No longer privately utilised for domestic or agricultural purposes, Tranby’s interior is currently exposed and accessible to the public: tour guides narrate aspects of the building’s history; they describe the Hardeys who resided there; and demonstrate how farm tools or domestic objects would have been used, whilst tourists gaze upon the assembled artefacts displayed before them. 14 Thus, shifting from its specific agricultural, domestic and familial function and value within the particular conditions of the 1800’s, ‘Tranby House’ is now leisurely observed by the public, and revered as a historical object associated with certain aspects perceived of the past. This transition indicates that despite the physical vividness and conservation of Tranby’s 19th century appearance and form, its identity within the 1800’s has not been preserved nor reconstructed within a present context. Drawing on Bourdieu’s and Foucault’s theories, this is because Tranby’s identity within the 19th century was rationalised, shaped and understood according to the particular ‘order’ of knowledge, socio-cultural practices and experienced conditions prevailing within the specific context of the time. As such, Tranby’s past identity can only exist within the specific lived contextual conditions of the 1800’s from which it was formed and perceived in. Considering these conditions of the past have now departed, Tranby’s identity during the 19th century can therefore not be attained nor physically revived within today’s changed contextual setting and socio-cultural circumstances. Instead, the building is now experienced, perceived and understood from a co ntemporary perspective within a s hifted present context of accepted ideas, norms, practices, values and ideals about the past. Additionally, because people can only make sense of things according to the existing contextual conditions and familiarised ‘order’ of knowledge prevailing within their time, this implies that within today’s context, ‘Tranby House’ and its past are inevitably viewed through a contemporary contextual ‘lens’ framed by current experiences, accepted ideas, values and norms which colourise current perceptions of Tranby’s past identity. Since contemporary views and experiences of Tranby are historically detached from the specific conditions of the past, and informed by current socio-cultural value systems, ideas and practices of the present, current ‘timeless’ depictions of Tranby’s identity (as a co lonial pioneer home of the Hardey family) are thus unveiled as contemporary, superficial, idealised fabrications of the building’s identity during the 1800’s. This undermines current heritage-tourism practices which aim to preserve the historical identity of built forms, and suggests that existing static portrayals of the identity of historic tourist sites are actually misleading contemporary illusions of the past condition of architecture.

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__________________________________________________________________ 5. Conclusion Although conventionally exercised and accepted by the heritage-tourism industry, existing trans-historical and ‘preserved’ representations of the identity of historic tourist sites are permeated with flaws. These flaws are unravelled by drawing on Bourdieu’s and Foucault’s concepts on the cultural formation and historically specific nature of meaning and ideas. These concepts highlight architectural identity as a historically specific entity that exists only within the given discursive context and experienced socio-cultural environment from which it is formed and rationally understood. As such, these ideas dislodge the basis of conventional heritage-tourism practices which seek to preserve the historical significance of architecture, and highlight how current depictions of historic sites are actually present constructs reflecting present ideas about the past, rather than the reality of a building’s prior identity. Additionally, this also draws attention to the problematic nature of current projections of identity by the heritage-tourism industry, as they often cast the misleading impression that the condition of architecture within the past is accessible and retained within the present. This indicates that further studies into the cultural, perceptual and historical aspects surrounding the formation of architectural meaning and value is necessary within the field of architecture and heritage, in order to obtain a more critical understanding of the identity of built forms.

Notes 1

UNESCO World Heritage Council, The List: The Criteria for Selection, UNESCO, 2010, Viewed on 5 J anuary 2011, http://whc.unesco.org/en/criteria; ICOMOS, ‘International Cultural Tourism Charter: Managing Tourism at Places of Heritage Significance (1999)’, International Charters for Conservation and Restoration, Euromed Heritage, 2010, Viewed on 5 January 2011, http://www.international.icomos.org//charters/charters.pdf; ‘International Charter for the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites (the Venice Charter 1964)’, International Charters for Conservation and R estoration, Euromed Heritage, 2010, Viewed on 5 January 2011, http://www.international.icomos.org/ charters/charters.pdf. 2 ICOMOS, ‘ICOMOS Charter: Principles for the Analysis, Conservation and Structural Restoration of Architectural Heritage 2003’, International Charters for Conservation and R estoration, Euromed Heritage, 2010, Viewed on 5 January 2011, http://www.international.icomos.org//charters/charters.pdf; ‘International Charter for the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites (the Venice Charter 1964)’, pp. 2-4; P. Marquis Kyle and M. Walker, The Illustrated Burra Charter: A Good Practice for Heritage Places, Australia ICOMOS Inc., Burwood, 2004, pp. 10-12, 16, 20-23,42, 60-63, 74-77.

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R. McCampbell and I.H. van Bremen, Tranby House, Peninsula Farm, Maylands, Conservation Report, Perth, 1992, pp. 1 and 12; Heritage Council of WA, Register of Heritage Places Assessment Documentation, Tranby House (1995), The Government of Western Australia, 2011, pp. 4 and 6, Viewed on 10 January 2011, http://register.heritage.wa.gov.au/PDF_Files/T%20-%20A-D/Tranby%20House% 20(P-AD).PDF. 4 Heritage Council of WA, p. 3. 5 Ibid., p. 1. 6 Ibid., p. 3. 7 Personal visit, 2011; The National Trust of Australia (WA), Visitors Guide, Tranby Peninsula Farm 1839, The National Trust of Australia, Perth, 2011, p. 2; Heritage Council of WA, p. 6. 8 Ibid., pp. 1-2. 9 Ibid. 10 P. Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1977, pp. 72-95; P. Bourdieu, ‘Habitus’, Habitus: A Sense of Place, J. Hillier and E. Rooksby (eds), Ashgate Publishing Limited, Burlington, 2002, pp. 27-33. 11 M. Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences, Pantheon Books, New York, 1970, p. xv. 12 M. Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge, Routledge Classics, New York, 2009, pp. 28-132; Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences; S. Mills, Discourse, Routledge, New York, 2004, pp. 10-47; G. Kendall and G. Wickham, Using Foucault’s Methods, Sage Publications, London, 1999, pp. 34-39. 13 Campbell and Bremen, op. cit., p. 1; Heritage Council of WA, op. cit., pp. 4-5. 14 Personal visit, 2011.

Bibliography Bourdieu, P., ‘Habitus’. Habitus: A Sense of Place. Hillier, J. and Rooksby, E. (eds), Ashgate Publishing Limited, Burlington, 2002. Bourdieu, P., Outline of a Theory and P ractice. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1977. Bourdieu, P., The Field of Cultural Production. Polity Press, Cambridge, 1993. Campbell, R. and van Bremen, I.H., Tranby House, Peninsula Farm, Maylands, Conservation Report. Perth, 1992.

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__________________________________________________________________ Foucault, M., The Archaeology of Knowledge. Routledge Classics, New York, 2009. Foucault, M., The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences. Pantheon Books, New York, 1970. Heritage Council of WA, Register of Heritage Places Assessment Documentation, Tranby House (1995). The Government of Western Australia, 2011. Viewed on 10 January 2011. http://register.heritage.wa.gov.au/PDF_Files/T%20-%20A-D/Tra nby%20House%20(P-AD).PDF. ICOMOS, ‘ICOMOS Charter - Principles for the Analysis, Conservation and Structural Restoration of Architectural Heritage 2003’. International Charters for Conservation and R estoration. Euromed Heritage, 2010. Viewed on 5 January 2011. http://www.international.icomos.org//charters/charters.pdf. ICOMOS, The Role of ICOMOS in the World Heritage Convention. Euromed Heritage, 2009. Viewed on 20 January 2011. http://www.international.icomos. org/world_heritage/icomoswh_eng.htm. ICOMOS, International Charters for Conservation and Restoration. Euromed Heritage, 2010. Viewed on 5 January 2011, http://www.international.icomos.org/ charters/charters.pdf. ICOMOS, ‘International Cultural Tourism Charter, Managing Tourism at Places of Heritage Significance (1999)’. International Charters for Conservation and Restoration. Euromed Heritage, 2010. Viewed on 5 J anuary 2011, http://www. international.icomos.org//charters/charters.pdf. ICOMOS, ‘International Charter for the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites (the Venice Charter 1964)’. International Charters for Conservation and R estoration. Euromed Heritage, 2010. Viewed on 5 January 2011. http://www.international.icomos.org//charters/charters.pdf. Kendall, G. and Wickham, G., Using Foucault’s Methods. Sage Publications, London, 1999. Marquis Kyle, P. and Walker, M., The Illustrated Burra Charter: A Good Practice for Heritage Places. Australia ICOMOS Inc, Burwood, 2004. Mills, S., Discourse. Routledge, New York, 2004.

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__________________________________________________________________ The National Trust of Australia (WA), Visitors Guide, Tranby Peninsula Farm 1839. The National Trust of Australia (WA), Perth, 2011. UNESCO World Heritage Council, The List: The Criteria for Selection. UNESCO, 2010. Viewed on 5 January 2011. http://whc.unesco.org/en/criteria. Williamson, A.J., Tranby House, Maylands Peninsula, Western Australia. The National Trust of Australia (WA), Perth, 1977. Jennifer Tran is a postgraduate studying at Curtin University of Technology, Western Australia. Her current doctoral research focuses on areas of architectural theory and history, and explores the dynamic nature of built forms as transformative ‘states of becoming’.

Part 7 Educational Institutions and the Making of Identities

Mirroring Absences: Spatiality and the Schooling of Minorities Georgina Tsolidis Abstract Globalisation brings with it a more pronounced interest in diaspora and the fluid identities associated with it. In this chapter I explore young people’s identification in relation to spatiality. The Greek community of Melbourne, in Australia, is the focus of this study funded by the Australian Research Council. Spaces used to teach Greek culture and language, are examined towards understanding constructions of belonging. Commonly students of Greek occupy classrooms on the weekends after ‘real’ school has finished. I argue that the relationship between these learning spaces and discursive constructions of belonging (to Australia, to Greece) are complex and in continual flux. This complexity is characterised by real and imagined absences – the students who are there during the week, whose presence nonetheless remains through art work on the walls, for example, and the memory of Greekness brought into the classroom by teachers and parents. Key Words: Diasporic identification, spatiality, Melbourne Greek community, belonging. ***** 1. Defining Diaspora In his exposition of ‘diaspora’ Brubaker 1 argues that the term risks losing its discriminatory power because it has become stretched to a point whereby it can accommodate an ever broadening range of groups. Instead of a term that describes ethnocultural groups outside their homelands, such as the Jewish, Armenian and Greek communities, it is extended to include any population dispersed in space (for example, the liberal diaspora or the gay diaspora), which he refers to as the ‘diaspora’ diaspora. Because ‘diaspora’ is taken to include an increasing range of dispersed populations, it is being considered within a broader range of intellectual traditions. Brubaker moves to link diaspora to its foundational characteristics and offers three elements that characterise diasporas. Foremost is the notion of dispersal. Commonly this has meant dispersal outside national boundaries but has come to include dispersal within state boundaries in the sense illustrated by terms such as ‘gay diaspora’. Here ‘diaspora’ denotes displacement of a metaphorical kind. The second foundational aspect of diaspora relates to a homeland orientation. In this sense a diasporic identity is linked to a real or imagined homeland that suggests a journey of leaving and returning. While contemporary theory has embraced the notion that culture is not static and simply transported but can be created in diverse locations, nonetheless, the sense of remembering something linked to somewhere else remains significant. The third characteristic is boundary-

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__________________________________________________________________ maintenance, which is essential for the existence of a community established outside a distinct territorial polity. Brubaker concedes that within the literature on diaspora there is ambivalence with emphasis placed on both boundary-maintenance and erosion – the difference between diaspora as a space where cultures are melded or a space where they remain ossified. Because of this ambivalence, Brubaker argues that diasporas also need to have ‘multigenerational staying power’. 2 Brubaker concludes by suggesting that diaspora remains useful if we consider it as a ‘category of practice’. ‘We should seek, rather, to bring the struggles themselves into focus, without presupposing that they will eventuate in bounded groups.’ 2. Diasporic Identification Brubaker brings to the fore several characteristics of diaspora that frame this discussion. In particular the sense of remembering something linked to somewhere else, the tension between boundary maintenance and boundary erosion and the transferral of these sentiments between generations. These elements are immediately obvious in relation to the Melbourne Greek community and the young people who are the focus of this discussion. It is a ‘ category of practice’ with ‘multigenerational staying power’ and particularly for young people, it captures a range of struggles that illustrate the ambivalence that surrounds their identification. Instead of identities bounded by place, there is an emphasis on identification, a process of perpetual transformation that makes use of resources, including those that may be a product of an historical birthright. I am particularly interested to explore this sense of diaspora in relation to schooling as an institutional practice through which identities are mediated. This sense of diaspora space is most obvious in relation to schooling that is established to promote Greek culture and language. In his exploration of identification, Hall shifts the emphasis away from a place and its corresponding identities to a process that melds and reforms in response to cultural difference. This is not a t eleological process but instead a co ntinuous ‘suturing’ that attends to otherness. This is a view of diaspora that supports boundary erosion rather than boundary maintenance. Boundaries remain important but instead of being established to exclude and include, these are understood as permeable. Differences exist and are exchanged rather than subsumed through expectations of assimilation. Negotiation occurs whereby a r ange of cultural resources are drawn upon and reconfigured in response to time and circumstance. Though they seem to invoke an origin in a historical past with which they continue to correspond, actually identities are questions of using the resources of history, language and culture in the process of becoming rather than being: not ‘who we are’ or ‘where we came from’, so much as what we might become, how

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__________________________________________________________________ we have been represented and how that bears on how we might represent ourselves. 3 Melbourne schools where Greek language and culture are taught are spaces in which a family’s past becomes a resource which young people draw upon in order to represent their becoming. Space has been nominated as the anxiety of our time. Our lived experience reflects the sanctification of space through dichotomies established to distinguish private and public space or sacred and profane space. Here space is not understood as an empty vessel waiting to be filled, instead it is constituted through heterogeneous sets of social relations that demark sites with various levels of significance. This significance is marked by a r ange of power relations and in this chapter I wish to explore those that surround diasporic communities and within them, young people who are the children, grandchildren and great grandchildren of immigrants. 3. The Melbourne Greek Community In 2006 t he census indicated that while 109 989 pe rsons living in Australia were born in Greece the number who nominated Greek as a language spoken at home was 252 222. Relative to other ethnic minorities with similar migration histories, a higher proportion of the Greek population maintain their mother tongue, despite increased out-marriage. Most Greek speakers live in Melbourne, Victoria. In 2005 a total of 5 830 students were learning Greek through the Government sector 4 while the recorded number of students enrolled in ‘after hours’ schools was 6 395. Anecdotally, the belief is that the numbers are larger. These schools are run by private providers as profit making enterprises or as non-profit organisations associated with churches or community groups. 5 Classes are held during the evening on weekdays and on Saturday mornings. In some schools students will learn from materials produced in Greece, by teachers trained in Greece and using the Greek language. In other schools, English is used and teachers, often with no formal qualifications, are more concerned to elicit a sense of Greekness. 4. Teaching Identification The term ‘after hours schools’ is emblematic of the space these schools occupy. The label positions them outside what is seen as the core business of Australian schooling which happens within the hours of ‘normal’ school. However, ‘after hours’ also illustrates how these schools are integral to the core business of family and community. The hours after ‘normal’ schooling are the hours associated with home and family. In this way, ‘after hours schools’ are identified with the private sphere in contradistinction to the public, mainstream and Australian schools. These young people drew a distinction between their home and their school and identified the former as Greek and the latter as Australian. Despite ‘after hours

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__________________________________________________________________ schools’ being part of their home culture they nonetheless argued that it was mainstream schooling that made them feel Greek because it was this environment that offered them an opportunity to recognise their difference. I perceive myself to be Greek-Australian. My actions at school make me feel Greek. This is because not many people in my class care about their identity. I feel Greek because I eat lots of Greek foods, follow the Greek soccer team, listen to Greek music etc. The reason I feel Australian is because I’ve grown up and lived the Australian way and most of my friends are Australian. For these students ‘schools’ were mainstream schools where they spent five of every seven days, and ‘after hours’ schools were where they spent several hours a week. And it is through the space of ‘real’ school that these students come to understand their sense of self. Here is highlighted the connection between mainstream schooling and a taken for granted-ness about certain identifications. In this space, students’ contemplation about identification remains private in contrast to ‘after hours school’ where identification is core business. Taken together, ‘after hours schools’ and mainstream schools provide these students with a range of cultural resources and understandings that they can draw on for their identity work. As spaces, schools conjure ambivalent belonging for many students. They represent necessity and compulsion as well as transition - being there in order to get somewhere else – employment, tertiary education. In the context of this study, schools are also spaces where students transition between the cultural pasts of their forebears, their present as students who attend different types of schools, and their cultural futures formed through the lived experience of boundary erosion. I feel a m ixture of Greek, Cyprian and A ustralian. I was born here, however we speak a bit of Greek at home and we also have Greek traditions. Firstly, I feel Greek in the sense that I have a lot of family here that are Greek. Secondly, I feel Cyprian because of my appearance. I look very similar to my father. On the other hand, I feel Australian because I was born here and I speak mostly English. I feel European when I attend school however I still feel Australian. In her comment this girl links her identification with spaces – home, school, nation and beyond. These are not clear-cut and bounded but instead, multilayered – each used to signal a d ifferent sense of belonging. She uses ‘Greek’, ‘Cyprian’, ‘Australian’ and ‘European’ in connection to who she is.

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__________________________________________________________________ 5. Learning Belonging In Diasporic Spaces These students’ lived experience reflects the significance of space through dichotomies such as Greek or Australian. In this sense, rather than a s et of boundaries that capture place, space is constituted through heterogeneous sets of social relations that demark sites with various levels of significance. The social relations that demark sites are constituted as much by absences as they are by those who are present. In the diaspora this is particularly pronounced because those who are not present have a significance linked to nostalgia and an idealised place and time. These are the forebears that link young people living in Australia to a ‘home land’ that is both real and imagined. Utopias are sites that remain ‘unreal’ because they are idealised. Heterotopias on the other hand are real and fundamental to the way a c ulture represents itself. Because of this, they are capable of juxtaposing several often incompatible spaces in the same real place and thus include contested images simultaneously. The schools where Greek language and culture are taught are heterotopias in the sense that they capture social relations linked to an imagined homeland and those associated with it a nd also relations that demark Australian minorities as marginal. Students study Greek in spaces occupied by ‘real’ students when these students have left their classrooms. It is through this dynamic that students arguably learn the status of minority cultures. They learn their ‘home’ language and culture in spaces much too big for the small classes that occupy them, at times when very few people are there. There are no bells, no noise in the playground, no announcements through the loud speakers. The canteen is not open. They sit at desks that other students ‘own’ and look at these students’ work on the walls and on the blackboards. The absent students’ presence is pronounced. Thus there is a two-way absence - the ‘home land’ that students look to is absent, but so too are the ‘Australian’ students whose presence is nonetheless visible through their artwork, books and graffiti. In this sense, such schools are heterotopias where contrasted images of who these young people are exist simultaneously – they are both striving to be Greek and striving to be Australian and in the process defining new ways of being both. Identification is negotiated by individuals in response to other individuals, communities and social institutions. Schooling offers an important set of relations that mediate identification. This is particularly pronounced in the case of diasporic communities. Their language and culture is taught in public school buildings ‘after hours’. These spaces include contested images and like mirrors they reflect an image that is both real and illusory. The ‘real’ students absence compounds their presence and the teaching of Greek is almost chimera because it sits awkwardly within the ‘real’ classroom that does not reflect its significance. Heterotopias are capable of juxtaposing several, often incompatible, spaces in the same real place and because of this it is through the mirror we discover our absence from the place where we think we are. ‘From the standpoint of the mirror I

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__________________________________________________________________ discover my absence from the place where I am since I see myself over there.’ 6 Heterotopias are likened to mirrors because they reflect an image that is both real and illusory.. This offers us a powerful way of understanding how school spaces come to reflect the place of ethnic minorities - theirs is an absence from the place where they are because they can still see themselves over there. In the context of mainstream school ‘there’ is the family home with its association to somewhere else – the looking back that defines diasporas. In the context of ‘after hours schools’ ‘there’ is both the culture of their forebears but also the school as it operates during ‘normal’ hours when the ‘real’ students attend. The social relations that configure spaces reflect a s et of uneven power relations but nonetheless provide opportunities for creative self-fashioning that illustrates the new identities that are a product of boundary breaking. Rather than promoting ossification, ‘after hours schools’ allow students to experience a community of practice that promotes cultural melding and diversity.

Notes 1

R. Brubaker, ‘The “Diaspora” Diaspora’, Ethnic and R acial Studies, Vol. 28:1, 2005, pp. 1-19. 2 Ibid., p. 7. 3 S. Hall, ‘Who Needs Identity?’, Questions of Cultural Identity, Sage, London, 1996, pp. 1-17; M. Foucault and J. Miskowiec, ‘Of Other Spaces’, Diacritics, Vol. 12 (1), 1986, pp. 22-27. 4 Department of Education and Early Childhood Development http://www. education.vic.gov.au/. 5 Tsounis, 1974. 6 Foucault and Miskowiec, p. 24.

Bibliography Brubaker, R., ‘The “Diaspora” Diaspora’. Ethnic and Racial Studies. Vol. 281 , 2005, pp. 1-19. Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. http://www.edu cation.vic.gov.au/. Foucault, M. and Miskowiec, J., ‘Of Other Spaces’. Diacritics. Vol. 12 (1), 1986, pp. 22-27. Hall, S., ‘Who Needs Identity?’. Questions of Cultural Identity. Sage, London, 1996.

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__________________________________________________________________ Tsounis, M., Greek Ethnic Schools in Australia. Australian National University, Canberra, 1974. Georgina Tsolidis holds a Chair in Education at the University of Ballarat. Her research explores identification, schooling and family. She has researched extensively with minority communities and has a particular interest in gender.

Part 8 Migrants and Flexible Identities

The (Im)migrant ‘Other’: Conventional and Challenging Representations of the Migrant Subject in Two Greek Plays Alexandra Simou Abstract Migration as a historic phenomenon is the movement of people embedded in certain socioeconomic conditions. On the other hand, ‘immigration’ constitutes a constructed concept which sees migrants from the standpoint of the receiving country only, and produces them as the Other to the national Self, either directly through their ‘illegalisation’ or indirectly through their ‘victimisation’. As a result, the images of the immigrant /‘illegal alien’ and of the immigrant /‘victim-neoslave’ may prove equally reproductive of an ideology whereby the ‘immigrant’ as the Other is held in a position of inferiority, always from below, and the ‘national’ as the Self, in a position of hegemony. In that context, we will discuss different representations of the ‘immigrant’ as these appear in two contemporary greek plays Katsikonouris’ To Gala [Milk] and Spiliotis’ Fotia kai nero [Fire and water]. Katsikonouris’ play attempts to present a r ealistic perspective of migrants and migration through a focus on the daily problems the latter encounter. However, noble his intentions might be, he ends up imprisoning the migrant subject in stereotypical images, projecting fixed identities for the ‘immigrant’ and the ‘national’, compliant with the dominant ideology of the national-Self and the immigrant-Other. In effect, the dichotomy of Self-Other and the relations of power this entails are reproduced rather than dismantled. On the contrary, in Spiliotis’ play more unconventional images of the respective identities are revealed through an inspired reversal of roles. Despite the fact that the binary pattern of the Self and the Other is not completely obliterated but only reversed, it does challenge stereotypical readings of each category and therefore encourages new spaces in which the migrant’s identity can emerge. Key Words: Immigrant, national, self, other, drama, representation, identity. ***** 1. Constructing the ‘Immigrant’ as the ‘Other’ of Our Times ‘Immigration’, whenever mentioned, seems to signal the beginning of a fervent dialogue, or to be more precise of fervent monologues. On one side, the state mechanisms which construct the ‘illegal’ immigrant, in the name of a ‘nation-state’ they have to protect. On the other, the host society which constructs the immigrant ‘victim’, in the name of a ‘difference’ they have to defend. And somewhere in the middle, betwixt and between, there lies oscillated the subject, the once migrant but now transformed into the much easier to speak for, ‘immigrant’. For the

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘immigrant’, as DeGenova very aptly mentions implies a unilinear teleology ‘posited always from the standpoint of the migrant-receiving nation-state, in terms of outsiders coming in, presumably to stay,’ 1 feeding an orientalist discourse founded on and reproductive of the originary schema of ‘us’/ ‘them’. A range of key theorists discuss how the ‘immigrant’s’ otherness has come to be naturalised, producing them as an essentialised, spatialised and racialised generic category and maintaining, thus, their vulnerability. To begin with, Sassen discusses the historicity and embeddedness of citizenship itself concluding that both citizenship and alienage are ‘incompletely theorised contracts between subjects and the state.’ 2 As it is the immigrant’s ‘illegality’ that is used for their differentiation from the citizen, DeGenova proceeds with an analysis of ‘illegalisation’ as the productive power of immigration law in producing its own subjects and acknowledges ‘the critical role that the ‘illegality’ of the undocumented plays for disciplining and othering all non-citizens.’ 3 In a similar paradigm, Petrakou sees ‘illegalisation’ as an invention of the western states that does not as much exclude the ‘immigrants’ as it includes them in a predetermined system of social relations (re)producing their vulnerability. 4 In a similar vein, Chang and Aoki discuss the operational function of the border as a social construct that contains the nation and the national community and in effect constructs the immigrant-border crosser as a threat, as an invader from ‘there’ to ‘here’, 5 contributing to what Balibar calls an apartheid of European citizenship. 6 However, it is not only by means of the nation and the border that the immigrant is constructed as Other but also through their victimisation, something which migrant friendly groups share the responsibility for, as well. For it is them who, albeit noble their intentions, often project such images of immigrants as ‘victims’, ‘neo-slaves’ and ‘non-people’ thus reproducing -rather than dismantlinga racism from within. What Gilroy describes with regard to the black of the past seems to exist with regard to the ‘immigrant’ of the present: ‘[s]eeing in black life nothing more than an answer to racism means moving on to the ideological circuit which makes us visible in two complementary roles –the problem and the victim.’ 7 Sandro Mezzandra, one of the major representatives of a new theoretical approach towards migration, grounds his work on this very stance against the victimisation of ‘immigrants’ and argues accordingly: The moment has therefore come to make a first assessment of the way in which immigrants have been confronted in recent years. By this I do not mean so much the way in which dominant public discourse, strung between the obsession with security and the following of new nationalisms and racisms, has represented the ‘foreigner’ and the ‘immigrant’ legitimating the stigmatization and exclusion brought about by governmental politics and legislation. Beyond this, it i s also necessary to come to terms

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__________________________________________________________________ with the image of the immigrant as a weak subject, hollowed by hunger and misery and needing above all care and help […] Without a doubt, around this image there have grown, among lay and catholic voluntary workers, the noblest experiences of solidarity with migrants. […] In more general terms, however, it is necessary to note that this image lends itself easily to the reproduction of ‘paternalistic’ logics which renew an order of discourse and a co mplex of practices that denote migrants to an inferior position, denying them all chance of becoming subjects. 8 To sum up, the state’s construction of the ‘immigrant’ as ‘illegal’ on the one hand, and the solidarity group’s construction of them as ‘in need of care and help’ on the other, degrade the migrant to the ‘subaltern subject’ that needs to be spoken for, thus promoting rather than dismantling the ideology whereby the oppressed can never know and speak for themselves. 9 The ‘immigrant’ is doubly othered. 2. The Greek Experience of ‘Immigration’: Conditions and Perceptions In the last two decades, Greece has turned into a migrant receiving country with statistics estimating the foreign population at about 10%, with increasing tendencies. 10 The problem of so-called ‘illegal immigration’ seemed to reach its peak in the autumn of 2010 when the Greek Government declared a s tate of emergency and asked for assistance in the control of its external land border with Turkey due to an ‘exceptional mass inflow of irregular immigrants’ 11 . This was followed by the consequent media projection of the ‘immigrant’ as a threat to the socioeconomic welfare and the national coherence of the country. Despite the fact that in reality ‘illegal immigrants’ with their cheap and hard labour contributed enormously to the country’s economy in the late 1990s and the pre-2004 period, in representations they are scapegoated and blamed for present day’s economic crisis. Lalioutou explains accordingly: [T]he national imaginary has identified immigration with criminality, while no effort was made on the political or cultural level to produce positive representations and cultural references that would relate the migrants to the hegemonic narratives of economic development and modernization. […] Consequently, the actual histories of migration became symbolically invisible, and the migrants’ physical presence was associated with the decadence of urban centers and with criminality. The experience of migration was mutilated and the life histories of those who migrated were silenced. It was as if those people had no past before arriving to the Greek homeland, as if their present had no

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__________________________________________________________________ other content than the provision of cheap and hard labor, as if their future should not exist. 12 Furthermore, any efforts to compare the public’s negative treatment of new immigrants in Greece today, with the phobic attitudes that Greek emigrants had to face in their host countries earlier in the twentieth century, were met with a very uneasy reaction. 13 As a result, in the imaginary of the Greek, there has been a clear distinction between the ‘migrant-us’ and the ‘immigrant-them’ giving way to different migration narratives whereby the ‘national-Self’ is reproduced as a homogeneous category; either against the exploitative Other, host of Greek emigration or against the immigrant-Other, invader of national borders. In other words, the Greek migrant experience rather than narrowing down the bridge between the Greek and the ‘immigrant’ produced the typified figure of the Greek migrant which eventually has come to play a k ey role in the construction of a homogeneous, solid and resilient Greek identity, paving the way for the construction of the new immigrant as Other. 3. Representations of the ‘Immigrant’ in Drama: A Comparative Analysis of Two Greek Plays Fischer-Lichte defines dramatic art as the representation of a r eality, -existent either outside or within the work itself- which then can be interpreted as an affirmation or criticism of that reality. In that respect then we set out to explore how the conflicting identities of the ‘immigrant’ in relation to the ‘national’ are represented in contemporary Greek dramaturgy. As, chronologically, the phenomenon of migration towards Greece is a very recent one it is natural that the ways it is re-presented in drama may be quite immature, with playwrights projecting rather stereotypical images of the ‘immigrant’ circumscribed around ‘a generic (traumatic) immigrant experience’ and therefore leaving little room for new spaces to emerge in terms of multiple migrant identities. Hence, issues such as ‘immigrants’ strangeness (Mentis’ Kseni [Strangers], 2002), exploitation (Katzourakis’ Sas aresei o Brahms? [Do you like Brahms?], 2001; Fais’ To kitrino skili [The yellow dog], 2009; Vasileiou’s Enas stous deka [One in ten], 2007) and lower status (Katsikonouris’ To Gala [Milk], 2005) seem to dominate. On the other hand, we do have some instances of more challenging representations of the ‘immigrant’ who is either equated to the national (Spiliotis’ Fotia kai nero [Fire and water], 2007) or becomes the catalyst that reveals the national’s otherness (Reppas’ & Papathanasiou’s O Evros apenanti [At the other side of Evros], 2001). In order to explore these conflicting tendencies in Greek dramaturgy we will use as points of reference the most representative, it is believed, plays; Katsikonouris’ Milk and Spiliotis’ Fotia kai nero. What we will argue is that the former, through the stereotypical image of the ‘immigrant’ it projects, ends up reproducing a reverse racism which maintains the immigrant as

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__________________________________________________________________ Other, while the latter through the reversal of the roles of the ‘immigrant’ and the ‘national’, contributes to the idea that the ‘immigrant identity’, like any identity, is not fixed and bound. Vasilis’ Katsikonouris’ Milk was written and first staged in 2005. In 2008 the play gets restaged and is toured all over Greece with performances still on, something quite unusual for Greek theatrical productions. Furthermore, it was an official nominee for five audience awards in 2008. The play’s plot develops around the story of an immigrant family’s struggle (Rina’s and her two sons’, Antonis and Lefteris) who have left their country, Russia, for a better future in Greece. Despite the fact that the dead father was of Greek origin all characters experience their life in Greece in traumatic, however different, ways; Rina’s constant fear of deportation and obsession with her sons’ becoming Greeks, Antonis’ fervent struggle for assimilation and Lefteris’ obstinate resistance to identification with the Greeks, all seem to nurture the dichotomy between the national and the immigrant, circumscribing the characters in their otherness. The playwright has stated in an interview in Kathimerini accordingly: I didn’t know from the very beginning where this was going, but I knew that through this story very strong and immediate things would come out. Mainly around otherness. Feeling like a stranger. Not only literally, as the immigrant and the mentally ill -the younger son in the play- but feeling like a stranger in a broader sense. 14 Despite the fact that otherness as a potential characteristic of our times seems to have been among the intentions of the playwright, it eventually develops as an issue relevant only to ‘immigrants’. However, as it was briefly mentioned above, this otherness is experienced in different ways in terms of the two brothers’ selfconceptions and attitudes. Lefteris is totally identified with his Russian identity and feels alienated from the receiving country, a cl ear Other to the national Self. Antonis, on the other hand, is totally identified with his semi-Greek identity, struggling to assimilate with the national Self, a camouflaged Other to the national Self. For his tenacious, almost obsessive denial of his Russian part is not the result of the dismantling of the binary schema ‘Greek-immigrant’ but its confirmation. When he announces to his mother his marriage to a Greek woman (his boss’s daughter) it is implied he does so in order to secure a better future; A: ‘Who were I? A day’s wage man… maybe a tip every now and then. And being scorned on top.’ –R: ‘Scorned?’ -A: ‘Yes, scorned. You know very well what I am talking about. [Pause] And from now on you’re not ever washing their stairs again nor ironing their underpants! Do you hear me?’ 15 It is this very marked dichotomy between the superior Self -the national- and the inferior Other -the immigrant- that makes Antonis negate his Russian identity

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__________________________________________________________________ and become a Greek. The ‘immigrant’ has to yield in the national hegemony or go back. Both Lefteris’ self-proclamation as a Russian and Antonis’ as a Greek are the reverse sides of the same coin; the ‘immigrant-Other’, that ‘frightened beast’ as Antonis calls it 16 who has to plead forged identities. In Lefteris’ case things are even worse because with the mental illness he suffers from, he is also submitted to another type of otherness, that of the ‘mad’. As Hubert argues about the exclusion of the ‘mad’: ‘The social (and often physical) exclusion of people who are classified as mentally ill, and/or intellectually disabled, is an extreme example of the way in which human beings act in order to separate themselves from those who are considered different.’ 17 Is Lefteris’ mental illness a possible metaphor for ‘immigration’? The comment of the play’s first director, Nikos Mastorakis’, is indicative: To me both of them [the sons] suffer from equally severe illnesses: that is even the son who struggles to escape from his foreignness. For the foreigner is seen as infectious, as a ‘taint’ for the society which he is trying to integrate into. Therefore I see ‘illness’ as a metaphor in the play. One son is physically ill, the other positionally, like all immigrants. 18 ‘Immigration’ then seems to be projected as a s ocial taint just like schizophrenia is projected as a physical taint. The image of the ‘immigrant’ seems to take new negative dimensions, and their perception as the Other to the national Self is reinforced. Quite different are things in Spiliotis’ Fire and Water. Written and presented in 2007, it builds around three characters, the Iraqi Said, the Iranian Hayat, and the national. A very interesting reversal in roles is made right from the beginning of the play; the national, trying to find a delicatessen, enters Said’s house mistakenly and is kept as a hostage; we never get to know his real name, he is simply ‘the Foreigner’ in the context where the playwright has chosen to place him. The trick is apt and Spiliotis manages in this way to present another perspective of the ‘immigrant’, not the stereotypical one of being and feeling a foreigner but of someone who is master of one’s self and house. In this farce the author has set for the characters, two worlds, the Eastern and the Western, eternal rivals, are brought together, and in this union stereotypes are both rejected and confirmed, differences both questioned and celebrated, preconceptions both revised and reaffirmed. Said used to be a teacher in his country. When he ties up the Foreigner he does not wish to harm him, he just wants to ‘teach’ him, to make him learn about his culture. Being himself an ‘Oriental’, his ‘teaching’ aims at the deconstruction of the image of the Orient as ‘backwards’, ‘inferior’, ‘barbarian’: Said asks: ‘In medieval times who were the civilised?’ - Foreigner: ‘The Arabs’. - S: ‘And who were the barbarians?’ - F: ‘The Europeans.’ – S: ‘And what was the centre of the

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__________________________________________________________________ world?’ - F: ‘Baghdad.’ 19 A further comment on how the West continues to construct whatever is ‘different’ as Other is found later with the Foreigner’s infatuation with Hayat, whom he wants to save from her ‘barbarian’ husband. However, what is not understood by the European is that this is another perspective, a culturally loaded one imposed by western norms, and not the ‘truth’. What is seen as oppressing and hence barbarian in the westerner’s eyes is protective and hence liberating in the easterner’s eyes. What is very interesting here is that Spiliotis makes her characters comment on their own constructed images; the barbarian East, the liberal West. Despite the fact that they seem to realise that the image the one has of the other is a re-presentation formative through the discursive, they cannot escape it and eventually they continue to operate according to its premises. The result is that they end up ignoring Hayat’s will, who unlike Katsikonouris’ Rina, becomes an agent of her lot with migration being represented as the release rather than the damnation of the Self. When Said and the Foreigner, lost in their absurd male antagonism, bet her on a chess game Hayat opens the door and leaves. Similar to the Ibsenian Nora who slams the door on male values and becomes a symbol of feminism, Hayat decides to open the door and leave and becomes a symbol not only for the female subject but also for the migrant subject. The migrant, unlike the ‘immigrant’, is represented, as a conscious political subject and is given back his/her lost subjectivity. In conclusion, Spiliotis’ play may be full of binarisms (East/West, national/immigrant, barbarian/civilised, male/female) and in that respect it may maintain rather than dismantle the dualistic schema of Self/Other. Categories are clear cut, the national and the immigrant, the male and the female, and are projected as mutually exclusive elements, ‘like fire and water, one eats the other’, as Said himself admits. 20 On the other hand, one cannot but recognise the positive thing that the ‘immigrant’ in this play is re-presented as an equal rival and as a political subject and not as a waif of poor victim of his/her lot.

Notes 1

N.P. DeGenova, ‘Migrant Illegality and Deportability in Everyday Life’, Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 31, No.1, 2003, p. 421. 2 S. Sassen, ‘The Repositioning of Citizenship and Alienage: Emergent Subjects and Spaces for Politics’, Displacement, Asylum, Migration: The Oxford Amnesty Lectures 2004, K.E. Tunstall (ed), Oxford University Press, New York, 2006, p. 176. 3 De Genova, RSFLWp. 425. 4 E. Petrakou,’Παράνομη μετανάστευση στην Ελλάδα και την Ευρώπη’ [Illegal Migration in Greece and Europe], M. Pavlou and A. Skoularikis (eds), Μετανάστες και μειονότητες,[Migrants and Minorities], Bibliorama, Athens, 2009, pp. 311.

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R.S. Chang and K. Aoki, ‘Centering the Immigrant in the Inter/National Imagination’, California Law Review, Vol. 85, No. 5, 1997, p. 311. 6 E. Balibar, ‘World Borders, Political Borders’, Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, Vol. 117, No.1, 2002, p. 76. 7 P. Gilroy, ‘The End of Antiracism’, Race, Culture, and Difference, J. Donald and A. Rattansi (eds), Sage Publications Ltd, London, 1992, p. 60. 8 S. Mezzadra, ‘The Right to Escape’, Ephemera: Theory and Politics, Vol. 4, No. 3, 2004, pp. 267-268. 9 G.C. Spivak, ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’, P. Williams and L. Chrisman (eds), Colonial Discourse and P ost-Colonial Theory: An Introduction, Columbia UP, New York, 1994, p. 75. 10 M. Baldwin-Edwards, ‘Στατιστικά δεδομένα για τους μετανάστες στην Ελλάδα’ [Statistics for immigrants in Greece], IMEPO, November 2004. 11 S. Carrera and E. Guild, ‘Joint Operation RABIT 2010’–FRONTEX Assistance to Greece’s Border with Turkey: Revealing the Deficiencies of Europe’s Dublin Asylum System¶ CEPS Liberty and Security in Europe, November 2010, Viewed on 15 January 2011, http://www.ceps.eu/book/%E2%80%98joint-operation-rabit2010%E2%80%99-%E2%80%93-frontex-assistance-greece%E2%80%99s-borderturkey-revealing-deficiencies. 12 I. Laliotou, ‘Remembering Diaspora, Forgetting the Global? Emerging Cosmopolitics in Contemporary Greece’, Journal of Modern Greek Studies, Vol. 28, No. 2, 2010, p. 252. 13 For a detailed discussion see D. Papanikolaou, ‘Repatriation on Screen: National Culture and the Immigrant Other Since the 1990s’, Greek Diaspora and Migration since 1700: Society, Politics and C ulture, D. Tziovas (ed), Ashgate Publishing, Surrey, 2009, pp. 255-269. 14 V. Aggelikopoulos, ‘Τέσσερις νέες φωνές για το θέατρο’ [Four New Voices for Theatre], Kathimerini (my translation) 15 V. Katsikonouris, Το Γάλα [Milk], Kedros, Athens, 2006, p. 32. (my translation) 16 Ibid., p. 106. 17 J. Hubert (ed), Madness, Disability and Social Exclusion: The Archaeology and Anthropology of Difference, Routledge, London, 2000, p. 4. 18 Aggelikopoulos and Vasilis, ‘Ο ασθενής-μετανάστης και η ‘ένταξη’’ [The Diseased-Immigrant and Integration], Kathimerini, p. 15. (my translation) 19 C. Spiliotis, Φωτιά και Νερό [Fire and W ater], Sokoli-Kouledakis, Athens, 2007, p. 24. (my translation) 20 Ibid., p. 63.

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Bibliography Aggelikopoulos, V., ‘Τέσσερις νέες φωνές για το θέατρο’ [Four New Voices for Theatre]. Kathimerini. —, ‘Ο ασθενής-μετανάστης και η ‘ένταξη’’ [The Diseased-Immigrant and Integration]. Kathimerini. Baldwin-Edwards, M., ‘Στατιστικά δεδομένα για τους μετανάστες στην Ελλάδα’ [Statistics for Immigrants in Greece]. IMEPO. November 2004. Balibar, E., ‘World Borders, Political Borders’. Publications of the Modern Language Association of America. Vol. 117, No. 1, 2002, pp. 71-78. Carrera, S. and Guild, E., ‘Joint Operation RABIT 2010’–FRONTEX Assistance to Greece’s Border with Turkey: Revealing the Deficiencies of Europe’s Dublin Asylum System’. CEPS Liberty and Security in Europe. November 2010. Viewed on 15 January 2011. http://www.ceps.eu/book/%E2%80%98joint-operation-rabit2010%E2%80%99-%E2%80%93-frontex-assistance-greece%E2%80%99s-borderturkey-revealing-deficiencies. Chang, R.S. and Aoki, K., ‘Centering the Immigrant in the Inter/National Imagination’. California Law Review. Vol. 85, No. 5, 1997, pp. 1395-1447. De Genova, N.P., ‘Migrant Illegality and Deportability in Everyday Life’. Annual Review of Anthropology. Vol. 31, No. 1, 2003, pp. 419-447. Fischer-Lichte, E., The Show and the Gaze of Theatre: A European Perspective. University of Iowa Press, Iowa City, 1997. Gilroy, P., ‘The End of Antiracism’. Race, Culture, and D ifference. Sage Publications Ltd, London, 1992. Hubert, J. (ed), Madness, Disability and Social Exclusion: The Archaeology and Anthropology of Difference. Routledge, London, 2000. Katsikonouris, V., Το Γάλα [Milk]. Kedros, Athens, 2006. Laliotou, I., ‘Remembering Diaspora, Forgetting the Global? Emerging Cosmopolitics in Contemporary Greece’. Journal of Modern Greek Studies. Vol. 28, No. 2, 2010, pp. 247-255.

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__________________________________________________________________ Mezzadra, S., ‘The Right to Escape’. Ephemera: Theory and Politics. Vol. 4, No. 3, 2004, pp. 267-275. Papanikolaou, D., ‘Repatriation on Screen: National Culture and the Immigrant Other since the 1990s’. Greek Diaspora and Migration since 1700: Society, Politics and Culture. Ashgate Publishing, Surrey, 2009. Petrakou, E., ‘Παράνομη μετανάστευση στην Ελλάδα και την Ευρώπη’ [Illegal Immigration in Greece and Europe]. Μετανάστες και μειονότητες [Migrants and Minorities]. Pavlou, M. and Skoularikis, A. (eds), Bibliorama, Athens, 2009. Sassen, S., ‘The Repositioning of Citizenship and Alienage: Emergent Subjects and Spaces for Politics’. Displacement, Asylum, Migration: The Oxford Amnesty Lectures 2004. Tunstall, K.E. (ed), Oxford University Press, New York, 2006. Spiliotis, C., Φωτιά και νερό [Fire and Water]. Sokoli-Kouledakis, Athens, 2007. Spivak, G.C., ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’. Colonial Discourse and Postcolonial Theory: An Introduction. Williams, P. and Chrisman, L. (eds), Columbia UP, New York, 1994. Alexandra Simou is a Phd Candidate at the School of English, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her research interests include the exploration of different representations of migrant identities in drama, with the aim of the overall project being the proposal of a drama-based model, suitable for intercultural education.

Kyrgyz Feasts and Migrant Dreams: Embedding Remittances in Hybrid Social Networks Igor Rubinov Abstract This chapter outlines how transnational remittances sent back to Kyrgyz households are invested into resurgent local celebrations and life-cycle ceremonies (tois). To harness the incomes, totalling over a billion dollars a year and accounting for nearly a third of Kyrgyzstan’s GDP, migrant-sending households are integrating transnational networks into multi-local livelihood strategies. This economic windfall is being directed towards cultural practices as a corollary to prosaic consumption and asset accumulation. Communal festivities and increasingly monetised gift exchange are taking place in the local nodes of transnational networks; offering migrants and their families the support that state actors and international agencies cannot. Fluid cultural practices, when tasked with transnational operations, remake the social categories which help define local identities. The hybrid adaptation of these local practices supports a form of place making, which challenges gendered patriarchies for both women and men in sending communities. This immensely important new income source is not only reconfiguring the contested terrain of trans-local identities, but employing placespecific logics to address economic inequities availed by the crossing of postSoviet borders. Key Words: Remittances, alternative modernities, place-making, assemblages, contested terrain, gender, Kyrgyzstan. ***** 1. Introduction This chapter asks how local practices support migration and the ways in which the resulting remittances do the work of development. In this case, we will be considering remittances sent from circular labour migrants working abroad in Russia to households in a small, mountainous and relatively poor country excised from the Soviet Union in 1991: Kyrgyzstan. Starting as a trickle at the start of this millennium, migration to the Russian Federation (as well as natural gas-rich Kazakhstan) is now a widespread phenomenon. 1 Remittances coming back to Kyrgyzstan have hit a billion dollars annually in each of the last three years 2 and now make up nearly a third of the nation’s GDP. 3 Since independence 20 years ago, the country has experienced a fall in nearly all metrics of economic and social wellbeing, until about seven years ago, when poverty rates actually began to reverse. 4 My intent in this chapter is to contextualise the process through which remittances are being embedded into local places. There are several key concepts I

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__________________________________________________________________ find useful to understand the process of remittance allocation in contemporary Kyrgyzstan: alternative modernities, place-making and a co ntested terrain. I will briefly sketch out these terms in the introduction and then outline the three categories of consumption that they operate through in the social process of remittance use. Migration within post-Soviet space is one of many instances where transnational movement has been added on as a necessary component of a diverse livelihood strategy 5 taken up by households. As visas are not required for citizens of CIS countries to travel to Russia, nor the other member states, movement tends to follow the path of least resistance along channels of colonial heritage. Hence, post-Soviet borders are porous enough to allow the linguistic, educational, and historical ties of the Soviet era to guide modern migration (which were cemented into transportation infrastructure such as trains, trade connections for shuttle traders and social networks to find illicit jobs abroad). Due to this particular historical and cultural context, circular migration out of Kyrgyzstan thereby offers one of many ‘alternative modernities’. 6 An alternative modernity built upon the creative adaptation and bricolage of local practice is, as Dilip Gaonkar defines it, ‘[…a] site where a people ‘make’ themselves modern, as opposed to being ‘made’ modern by alien and impersonal forces, and where they give themselves an identity and a destiny.’ 7 The unique geopolitical landscape in which any process of being contemporary takes place leads to a bricolage, a cobbling together of whatever pieces lay available, to make sense of life – so that modernity is not a teleological endpoint awaiting attainment, but is a constantly reshaped iteration of cohering practices. When remittances are embedded into local rites and social practices, they alter the mores and norms that constitute locality. One of the most tangible ways that this happens is through feasts and life-cycle rituals – known broadly as tois in Kyrgyz. I will highlight the spending of remittances on these festivities and their impact on local identities and social relationships. Feasts are the place where dreams and aspirations turn into reciprocities supporting migrants and remaking social roles in local spaces. When taken as an entire body of communal obligations, social rites and gift exchange practices – they form what I call the toi economy. The toi economy is the tool or conduit for place-making in the Kyrgyz context. Place-making is a fusion of geographic and anthropological thinking, which recognises that locality is processually being remade. 8 Manifesting the local requires a communal, discursive project of making place, often draws from beyond the borders of that space to elicit the collaboration of migrants labouring far afield alongside the narratives they help weave into local culture. Locality is now, in some sense, always global. Despite its lack of coherent border or boundaries, place-making is a p rocess that builds community through the enactment of concrete practices. As these practices take shape within lived reality, they inform and respond to a co mmunal

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__________________________________________________________________ symbolic exchange. Symbolic points of reference produce identities that exist as assemblages 9 – as coherent wholes that only come together when they are enacted. The practices that enable place-making weave transnational webs into local relationships, though they are liable to disappear at any moment. Nonetheless, these fleeting assemblages are made reliable through sociability and mutual interdependence - when bonds of kinship and obligations of gift exchange insist that assemblages persist. What guides the practices that construct identity are communally-defined signifiers, or points of reference, that set a quilting point, 10 a beacon that guides action. Although each individual and their family have their own conversation about using money, this decision-making is always in response to intersubjective imaginings – to points of reference set outside the family’s dialogue, which are often in conversation with extralocal realities. The money that flows into the local economy from migration offers economic salvation because it adapts and employs cultural norms, not in spite of them. Culture in practice is the conduit enabling remittances to be invested into local spaces. Culture as the guide for remittance allocation is the invisible hand of local development. Embedding remittances brings migrants working abroad into conversation with local actors in an iterative process that opens up a space for contestation. While cultural practices help create new identities, they inevitably reshape the parameters of the local, consequently unsettling gendered and place-based patriarchies. In my research this past summer in rural, urban and peri-urban Kyrgyzstan, I have undertaken an ethnographic analysis of how migration is affecting the gendered and classed opportunities found within a shifting matrix of social roles that sets the stage for how remittances are utilised. As migrants seek ways to support their movements, the hybridity and fluidity of cultural practices makes them ideal conduits for embedding remittances. This malleability of culture which makes it so useful for a new transnational, multi-local livelihood strategy has the unintended consequence of reforming local identities which are constructed out of those practices. Thus, the consequence of relying on culture for the economic task of development creates a locally contested terrain of social membership and identity. Thus, remittances rely on cultural enactment but then in turn reform the norms that define it in a process of negotiation I conceive of as a ‘contested terrain’. Remittances interface with the household in three ways. These can be disaggregated into consumptive, material and ideational outcomes for embedding remittances. I will parse the main investment of remittances into the toi economy by crudely delineating them into these three categories. Hopefully, by the conclusion, it will be evident that neither of these categories can hold itself up without the others and that they all rely on a cultural backbone of place-making that provides the toolkit for building an alternative modernity.

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__________________________________________________________________ 2. Consumption: Eating the Gift The primary investment that households will put their remittances into is food and basic household necessities which comprise roughly 40 t o 60% of a household’s budget. 11 Many respondents that stated that food and basic necessities constituted the bulk of their remittance spending: ‘We only get the basic things’ is the way a conversation about remittance spending often starts out. With a bit of further prodding, the picture began to change from simple sustenance to more broad consumption parameters – wherein, food as a category becomes a constitutive part of the toi economy. Most remittances are literally eaten up in the process of daily consumption, which includes the normalised, and thus seemingly invisible, spending required to maintain a robust social network. What should be appreciated in the consumption of remittances is the nearly imperceptible way that feasting becomes integrated into these extra social obligations. What I found quite surprising was that migrants and their remittance receivers rarely discussed what remittances would be used for with any specificity. Excepting specific saving for a wedding, a house or other planned purchase, remittances were spent on what was most pressing that week – the migrants simply trusted their family members. 12 This meant that remittances were often unquestioningly allocated to communal obligations of gifting and other reciprocities whenever a toi obligation came up. 13 This is where consumption blurs the divide between daily necessities and the culture work of maintaining social reciprocities. When a toi comes up, you use your kin’s transnational income without giving it much thought. But it is the very use of the migrants’ earnings within local systems of value which supports the transnational networks which allow multi-local households to make place. One consequence of upholding transnational networks in local regimes of value is that it allows migrants to share in the gift of communality. 14 This ‘gift’ of mutual indebtedness 15 between households, induced through feast and gifting obligations, allows remittances spent on cultural investments to be paid back in three ways. Through connections perpetuating further migration, 16 to garner prestige and status 17 and for psychological praise and support. 18 The investment of remittances into the toi economy thus becomes a normalised way to consume transnational incomes, which works in the absence of the migrant herself. 3. Material: Asset Accumulation We now move on to the material implications of remittance allocation. Once a migrant has established him or herself successfully in Russia and begun to meet the basic obligations required of daily sustenance, building a home becomes the most important asset category. 19 The construction of a new home is usually a personal decision made between the son and his parents. Yet these prosaic and private decisions become integrated into the community through their intersection with the

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__________________________________________________________________ toi economy. While home construction is certainly a material economic decision, it is also far more. Across Kyrgyzstan, setting the foundation of a new home, purchasing an apartment, or the completing a r oof on the patrilineal home are all triggers for a sizable toi. Housing is not only an important impetus for migration and a grounding point for embedding its remittances, but it is also deeply involved in the formation of new identities. As a result, the construction and renovation of homes integrates transnational migrants and their incomes with seemingly prosaic spending decisions. This is not simply bricks and mortar, but the very necessary (re)creation of social identities enabling both migrants and static community members to populate newly-built homes. Like the category of consumption, the material investment of remittances into an alternative modernity often entails a corollary social investment made viable through cultural practices and performance. Homes become the vessel into which newly-defined social actors are emplaced. 20 The festival that joins the completion of a house defines the status and level of support that the household can now draw from. 4. Ideational: Gendered Contestation Lastly, I’ll touch on the ideational, or intangible, forms of remittance allocation. There are several ways in which migrants seek to remake their social status and inadvertently recast the possibilities and patriarchies existing locally. Migration creates opportunities to reimagine who the migrant is not by adopting global, cosmopolitan norms but in building new constructions of local selves from historically-adapted practices that refashion those external norms. Many Kyrgyz migrants leave the country with the express interest of reshaping their identity, either by securing the material goods needed for the dowry or bride wealth or by financing a cel ebration that they already have planned. However, the migrants’ desire to build a better life is not always achieved through the acquisition of something tangible. Building prestige through the ritual integration of incomes into local networks offers migrants culturally-emplaced tools to engage in a remaking of locality. This localised network of meaning is called upon to support their movement through the xenophobic and exploitative migratory pathways in Russia and Kazakhstan. Migrants receive pride and a p romise of appreciation for their hard work abroad through transnational relationships that help shape local identities. While cultural practices help make income locally meaningful, the very adaptability of praxis to transnational obligations alters the rigidities of patriarchy and power that those practices had ossified into locality. The changes effected by this contested terrain are visible along the axis of gender. Kyrgyz women, as opposed to their Tajik or Uzbek counterparts, have been fortunate enough to shed some domestic patriarchies by taking up the opportunity to migrate. While Tajik men make up 95% of flows, the equation is roughly equal in Kyrgyzstan. 21 Thus, women who had felt compelled to marry, to succumb to

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__________________________________________________________________ bride kidnapping, or resigned themselves to a life of domestic labour now have the opportunity to find work abroad. Decisions about who to marry, where and when to go to school, and what kind of bride wealth they should fetch are now all in play because a woman can make connections to find work abroad at a feast or through a friend. While women face a demotion on some fronts, 22 there is a host of new opportunities and freedoms that are allowing Kyrgyz women to enter confidently into modernity. While it is still expected that a woman moves into a new household and takes a subordinate position [a daughter-in-law with diminished household status is known as a snaha], she can now use her mobility as leverage in the conversation about her entry. It does not mean that gender parity has swept through Kyrgyzstan like a post-Soviet tornado, but opportunities unthinkable a decade ago are now commonplace. Women are making their own decisions and their parents, the parents of their spouses, or the mates themselves are left shaking their fist as the Moscow-bound train rumbles out of Bishkek. Changes have been underfoot for men’s roles as well. Kyrgyz men face another obligation that is a consequence of their attachment to the patriarchies of households, just as women’s movement from their natal home presents its own burdens. The youngest son of any household is typically expected to take care of their parents through old age. As a result, the opportunities for a young man are very much constrained by what demands are placed on them by their parents. I have witnessed examples of young men who cannot secure medical treatment for their ailing children because migration is forbidden. Their parents are counting on immobility as a form of social security. However, I have also spoken to men who have gone abroad to work for a short period of time and been so successful that they have absconded the youngest son obligation. Either another son takes up the support, or the remittances are valuable enough to supplant the loss of the son’s labour. This brief sketch shows that contestation is common to both genders and social obligations are constantly up for negotiation. 5. Conclusion Kyrgyz feasts provide a cr ucial space for allowing remittances to reconfigure the contested terrain that defines modernity in Kyrgyzstan. Cultural acts guided by communal reciprocities and obligations of exchange help support migrants as they wrestle with inequities of global proportions. The toi economy, through the identities it fosters and the values of assets it introduces, is a collaborative process, not a static mold into which remittances are pressed. Bringing transnational incomes into local spaces enlists and enlivens place-based cultural practices to redefine and challenge local identities. The transnational becomes another layer within the households’ livelihood strategies and enters into conversation with the histories and imagined futures of local actors. This place-making process coalesces in fleeting assemblages that guide the flows of billions of dollars. The types of imaginaries constructed through the expectations of local networks and foreign

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__________________________________________________________________ markets reshapes the point towards which migrants are striving – giving new meaning to remittance investments and reshaping the possibilities of local development. Repeated instants of social cohesion through indebtedness and exchange force us to rethink what family, community and resistance look like for multiply-scalar subjects that engage with economic necessities and political allegiances in a constant state of flux. Thus, culture as practice becomes the stage upon which the politics of patriarchy and the vagaries of economic inequality are contested and, always provisionally, resolved.

Notes 1

OSCE, Impact of the Global Financial Crisis on L abour Migration from Kyrgyzstan to Russia: Qualitative Overview and Quantitative Survey, ACTED & European Commission Joint Publication, Bishkek, 2009. 2 D. Ratha, Migration and Remittances Factbook, World Bank, Washington 2009, p. 41. 3 IOM, Global Remittances: Definition, Scale and Importance of Remittances, International Organization for Migration, Geneva, 2006, p. 87. 4 Asian Development Bank, International Migrants’ Remittances and Poverty in the Kyrgyz Republic, ADB Report, Singapore, 2008. 5 S. Thieme, ‘Sustaining Livelihoods in Multilocal Settings: Possible Theoretical Linkages between Livelihoods and Transnational Migration Research’, Mobilities, Vol. 3, Iss. 1, 2008, pp. 51-71. 6 D.P. Gaonkar, Alternative Modernities, Duke University Press, Durham, 2001. And also see D. Moore, ‘Beyond Blackmail: Multivalent Modernities and the Cultural Politics of Development in India’, Regional Modernities: The Cultural Politics of Development in India, K. Sivaramakrishnan and A. Agrawal (eds), Oxford University Press, Delhi, 2003, pp. 165-214. 7 Gaonkar, op. cit., p. 18. 8 For examples of place making as a cultural underpinning to development see A. Tsing, ‘The Global Situation’, Cultural Anthropology, Vol. 15, Iss. 3, 2000, pp. 327-360; J. Ferguson and A. Gupta, Culture, Power, Place: Explorations in Critical Anthropology, Duke University Press, Durham, 1997; and A. Escobar, Territories of Difference: Place, Movements, Life, Redes, Duke University Press, Durham, 2008. 9 C. McFarlane, ‘Translocal Assemblages: Space, Power and Social Movements’, Geoforum, Vol. 40, Iss. 4, 2009, pp. 561-567. 10 S. Žižek, The Sublime Object of Ideology, Verso, London, 1989. 11 OSCE, op. cit., p. 48. 12 60% of remittances are sent to parents and 27% to a spouse (OSCE, 2009, p. 19, Table 12).

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Tois are most frequent in autumn, when animals are fattened and crops harvested, but can arise at any time when life-cycle rituals need to be celebrated, a funeral commemorated or a welcome-back ceremony carried out. For the feast’s host, this portends a great expense to which they call upon their social network for support by way of volunteer labour, cattle for slaughter and extra money needed to put on the festivity. In turn, for the attendees there is the necessity of fulfilling obligations of gift exchange – which is now monetized and expected in cash. 14 J. Carling, ‘The Human Dynamics of Migrant Transnationalism’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol. 31, Iss. 8, 2008, pp. 1452-1477. 15 C. Werner, ‘Household Networks and the Security of Mutual Indebtedness in Rural Kazakstan’, Central Asian Survey, Vol. 17, Iss. 4, 1998, pp. 597-612. 16 A. Portes, ‘Conclusion: Theoretical Convergencies and Empirical Evidence in the Study of Immigrant Transnationalism’, International Migration Review, Vol. 37, Iss. 3, 2003, pp. 874-892. 17 L. Goldring, ‘The Power of Status in Transnational Social Fields’, Transnationalism from Below, M. Smith (ed), Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, NJ, 1998, pp. 165-195. 18 J. Cohen, ‘Remittance Outcomes and Migration: Theoretical Contests, Real Opportunities’, Studies in Comparative International Development, Vol. 40, Iss. 1, 2005, pp. 88-112. 19 Migrants are also interested in buying cattle, a car or investing in agriculture [in that order] (OSCE 2009, 28). All of these purchases are also commonly expected to be attended by a corollary festivity. 20 J. Chu, ‘To Be “Emplaced”: Fuzhounese Migration and the Politics of Destination’, Identities, Vol. 13, Iss. 3, 2006, pp. 395-425. 21 IOM, ‘Trudovaya migratsiya iz Kyrgyzstana [Labour Migration from Kyrgyzstan]’, International Organization for Migration Publications, Geneva, 2008, p. 11. 22 S. Thieme, ‘Coming Home: Patterns and Characteristics of Return Migration in Kyrgyzstan’, International Migration, forthcoming.

Bibliography Asian Development Bank, International Migrants’ Remittances and Poverty in the Kyrgyz Republic. ADB Report, Singapore, 2008. Carling, J., ‘The Human Dynamics of Migrant Transnationalism’. Ethnic and Racial Studies. Vol. 31, Iss. 8, 2008, pp. 1452-1477. Chu, J., ‘To Be “Emplaced”: Fuzhounese Migration and the Politics of Destination’. Identities. Vol. 13, Iss. 3, 2006, pp. 395-425.

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__________________________________________________________________ Cohen, J., ‘Remittance Outcomes and Migration: Theoretical Contests, Real Opportunities’. Studies in Comparative International Development. Vol. 40, Iss. 1, 2005, pp. 88-112. Gaonkar, D.P., Alternative Modernities. Duke University Press, Durham, 2001. Goldring, L., ‘The Power of Status in Transnational Social Fields’. Transnationalism from Below. Smith, M. (ed), Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, NJ, 1998. IOM, Global Remittances: Definition, Scale and Importance of Remittances. International Organization for Migration Publications, Geneva, 2006. IOM, ‘Trudovaya migratsiya iz Kyrgyzstana [Labour Migration from Kyrgyzstan]’. Central Asia Unit: International Organization for Migration. Geneva, 2008. McFarlane, C., ‘Translocal Assemblages: Space, Power and Social Movements’. Geoforum. Vol. 40, Iss. 4, 2009, pp. 561-567. Moore, D., ‘Beyond Blackmail: Multivalent Modernities and the Cultural Politics of Development in India’. Regional Modernities: The Cultural Politics of Development in India. Sivaramakrishnan, K. and Agrawal, A. (eds), Oxford University Press, Delhi, 2003. OSCE, Impact of the Global Financial Crisis on L abour Migration from Kyrgyzstan to Russia: Qualitative Overview and Q uantitative Survey. ACTED & European Commission Joint Publication, Bishkek, 2009. Portes, A., ‘Conclusion: Theoretical Convergencies and Empirical Evidence in the Study of Immigrant Transnationalism’. International Migration Review. Vol. 37, Iss. 3, 2003, pp. 874-892. Thieme, S., ‘Sustaining Livelihoods in Multilocal Settings: Possible Theoretical Linkages between Livelihoods and Transnational Migration Research’. Mobilities. Vol. 3, Iss. 1, 2008, pp. 51-71. Thieme, S., ‘Coming Home: Patterns and Characteristics of Return Migration in Kyrgyzstan’. International Migration. forthcoming.

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__________________________________________________________________ Tsing, A., ‘The Global Situation’. Cultural Anthropology. Vol. 15, Iss. 3, 2000, pp. 327-360. Werner, C., ‘Household Networks and the Security of Mutual Indebtedness in Rural Kazakstan’. Central Asian Survey. Vol. 17, Iss. 4, 1998, pp. 597-612. Žižek, S., The Sublime Object of Ideology. Verso, London, 1989. Igor Rubinov received his MA in International Development & Social Change at Clark University, during which he carried out a research project on remittance use in northern Kyrgyzstan as a Visiting Research Fellow at the American University of Central Asia. That project is the basis for this chapter and will inform his dissertation project as he begins his PhD in Anthropology at Princeton University in 2011. Although interested in the intersection of remittances with development policy, he has decided to return to his ethnographic roots (planted at Cornell University) to give scholastic treatment to migration and economic development in Central Asia.

Part 9 Authenticity, Identity and Media

Advertising Strategy for Teenagers in Taiwan Tatiana Lishchenko, Meng-Dar Shieh and Kuo-Hsiang Chen Abstract While reaching different markets marketers realise the importance of culture in developing effective advertising campaigns. Global companies entering markets tend to localize their advertisement to fit local culture. Cultural values in the society change with the time. Previous research demonstrates significant cultural difference between Westerners and East Asians in cognition, value, and social behaviours. Taiwanese located in East Asia are regarded as an eastern culture in literature. However, being in a fast growing economy, Taiwan is regarded as one of the most high-tech nations, and its cultural values are influenced by globalization and in particular, the export of Western, mainly American values. This study aims to investigate whether localising of advertising to meet traditional East Asian, collectivist culture values and holistic thinking, is necessary while reaching out to Taiwanese young adults, since during the last few decades Taiwan has been influenced strongly by western values. The author recognises the multicultural experience of the Taiwanese young generation and proposes that global values will be more or at least equally attractive for the teenagers in Taiwan. Real food advertisement performances in Taiwan were examined to test the proposed hypothesis. The sample included advertisements for Dove chocolate (representing western values) and advertisements for Zhangjunya xiao meimei - a popular dry noodles snack (representing eastern values). The total number of respondents was 28, represented by college students with fluent English ability from one of the local colleges. Evaluating the effectiveness of advertisements was based on the criteria developed by Lucas and Britt. The results indicate that Taiwanese teenagers are likely to demonstrate favourable attitudes towards western commercials; however, they find local counterparts more attractive. Therefore, a specialisation strategy is suggested for marketers operating on this market. However, a limitation must be borne in mind when interpreting the results of this study. There is a s ource of subjectivity and error in choosing the sample, small sample group and possible influence of brand preferences. Further research should be conducted to confirm the results of this pre-study. Key Words: Youth, advertising, Taiwan. ***** 1. Introduction Consumers are exposed daily to large amounts of advertising. Advertising does not only transmit information about the product but also transmits cultural

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__________________________________________________________________ information. Cultural values in a society change over time. 1 Research in consumer behaviour has shown that advertising as a cultural artefact not only transmits and reflects existing values, but also plays a role in shaping new values. 2 Advertising acts as an agent of social change in society, thus it is necessary for marketers to design advertising campaigns that reflect the cultural values of their target audience. 3 The Taiwanese political situation (one country, two systems), its openness to the world influence, closeness to China and support of powerful Western countries have made the country attractive to foreign companies wishing to invest and enter the market. Multinationals entering the country after the second World War were not only bringing new products and services but also new cultures and lifestyles into the market. More and more Western appeals were presented in advertisement, western models were used to introduce the products and non-translated advertisement in French or English appeared in magazines and TV. Advertisements reflect not only a company’s strategic goals but also its perception of local culture. While promoting itself on any market, a company has to choose standardisation, specialisation or a combination of the above two in its advertising strategy. Foreign companies usually implement a standardisation strategy, taking advertisements from their own country and broadcasting these in the Taiwanese market. In most cases these reflect western values. Other companies adapt their advertisement according to cultural appeal and broadcast different products; thus, implementing a specialisation strategy. Advertisement by the majority of local companies can be classified as specialised since it targets traditional Asian appeals, while currently some of the local companies are trying to make their message more internalised, by using western models, language, and background. This study aims to investigate whether localising of advertising to meet traditional East Asian, collectivist cultural values and holistic thinking, is necessary while reaching out to Taiwanese young adults. The author believes that the multicultural experience of the Taiwanese young generation will result in equal attractiveness of advertisement containing western and eastern values. The authors are seeking empirical evidence and practical suggestions for the selection of appropriate advertising strategies for local and foreign companies to use within the unique Taiwanese culture. 2. Literature Review Understanding cultural similarities and differences are crucial for the creation of international advertising/communication campaigns. Culture is ‘the collective mental programming of the people in an environment’ and ‘culture is not a characteristic of individuals; it encompasses a number of people who were conditioned by the same education and life experience’. 4 There are various theories explaining cultural differences. The influential scholar Mueller exploring

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__________________________________________________________________ westernisation of Japanese magazines developed criteria for explaining advertisement. 5 Standardised advertisement is ‘an advertisement which is used internationally with virtually no change in its theme, copy or illustration, except for translation when needed.’ Further to this, Ducan et al. argue that ‘standardization means keeping one or more of the three basic components of a multinational advertising campaign, strategy, execution, language, the same. 6 Proponents of standardisation argue that improved, faster communication has stimulated a worldwide acceptance of art, literature, tastes, thoughts, beliefs, language, and therefore advertising. Although people are different, their basic physiological and psychological needs remain the same. 7 According to Mueller when advertising is developed for global customer culture, the following Westernised appeals are expected to be found: individual and independence appeals (emphasis on being distinct, unlike others), hard-sell appeals (stressing brand name, product recommendations), youth and modernity appeals (stress on contemporariness and youthful benefits of the products), product merit appeals (features of the product is described in depth), manipulation of nature appeals (man’s superiority over nature is reflected, emphasis on technological achievement). 8 On the other hand, localised campaigns require adaptation or customisation of advertising messages in global markets. 9 Tansey, Hyman and Zinkhan contend that it is important to understand cross-cultural differences in the way the values are conveyed since they provide situations for interpreting advertisements, are frequently implied by advertisements, vary across countries and may be used for market segmentation. 10 Other researchers are of the opinion that targeting consumers by using their cultural values is a potential marketing strategy in developing successful international advertising strategies, 11 12 13 and consumers reward advertisers who understand their culture and tailor advertisements to reflect their values. 1415 Taiwan is an Asian country, thus it is commonly understood that traditional appeals should be stressed when specialising advertisement. Muller in her work specified that traditional appeals include group consensus appeal (the individual is a part of the whole), soft-sell appeal (mood and atmosphere are conveyed through a beautiful scene or the development of an emotional story or verse), veneration of elderly and tradition appeals (older group members are asked for advice, opinion), status appeals (use of particular product will improve users’ status), openness with nature appeal. 16 As it has been mentioned above cultural values change over the time. If we take Taiwan as an example, it has been both influenced by Eastern and Western values in the past decades. Several main factors can be identified. Taiwanese modernisation, economic development and the influence of the USA forced local consumers to accept modern-western values. Taiwan is a country that has built itself in America’s image, economically and politically. 17 Taiwan has undergone economic growth as well as cultural change through the process of

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__________________________________________________________________ ‘industrialisation’ and ‘westernalisation’. Large-scale multinational corporations invested in Taiwan created a challenging environment for business and changed cultural structure. In the past decades, the growth of Taiwanese economy has been significant, the per capita share of GDP increased from USD16,100 in 2000 to $29,500 in 2009. 18 Additionally, the number of international players on the local market has also increased. Local companies shifted their focus from OEM to creating their own brands, becoming more international. More and more Taiwanese companies become global and are well known around the world. In 2009, the total value for the Top Ten Taiwan Global Brands was NT $237.126 billion. 19 At the same time, Taiwan has reached traditional culture that has been inherited from mainland China. In addition, Japanese culture has a strong influence on Taiwanese culture. Taiwan had the direct experience of colonial rule by the Japanese. 20 Chu indicates that older people in Taiwan can understand the Japanese language and appreciate traditional Japanese culture. Therefore, being influenced by opposite cultural environments, advertising themes in Taiwan have changed over time. 21 Taiwan in its attempt to become an international community, tries to open its children to international influence from childhood, almost in every family children start learning English as a second language from the age of four. We can conclude that Taiwan is evolving from a more traditional to a modem-industrial society and therefore the attitude towards advertisements will change. Since teenagers have grown up with this influence it is proposed in this research that Taiwanese youth will be more or at least equally attracted to global values than to local values. 3. Methodology Real advertisement performances in Taiwan are examined to empirically test the proposed hypothesis. Based on the classification of Mueller advertisement has been classified into: localised for Taiwanese market that meet collectivistic culture preference and other with a global focus. Our sample was represented by TV advertisements in food product categories focusing on teenagers, because when buying these products teenagers make the decision themselves and have enough money to pay for the purchase. Two advertisements have been chosen for the test with the focus group: Dove chocolate (representing western values) and Zhangjunya xiao meimei – a popular dry noodles snack (representing eastern values). Their products are substitutes and fall in the same price category. An advertisement sample was then shown to a sample group that was represented by college students with fluent English ability from the college located in Taipei. The age of respondents ranged between 17 and 18. The research took place in the second half of February, 2010. Respondents were required to watch each advertisement and then answer a s hort questionnaire that evaluated how the


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__________________________________________________________________ viewers responded to a particular advertisement. Teenagers had to indicate whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement (7 point likert scale). Questions were borrowed from Lucas and Britt and intended to measure initial attention, perception, continued favourable attention of interest, comprehension, feeling and emotional responses, motivation, beliefs, intention and decision, and imagery. 22 The questions were as following: 1. The advertisement was easy to understand. 2. The advertisement immediately grasped my attention. 3. The advertisement kept my attention. 4. I will clearly remember what was in the advertisement one week from today. 5. The advertisement generated positive feelings from me. 6. I am more inclined to buy or use the advertised product after seeing this advertisement. 4. Research Results and Discussion A total number of 28 responses have been collected in this study, the majority of which were from females. The results of the questionnaire are represented in Table 1. Both advertisements have been positively perceived. However, it terms of all comprehension, attention, memorability and positive responses the advertisement for Zhangjunya xiao meimei got a higher score; but in terms of behaviour influence the difference was not high. Therefore, from these results we can conclude that our hypothesis that Taiwanese teenagers will respond to advertisement with Eastern and Western values was partially supported. Table 1: Group mean of responses to advertisements. Dove chocolate Zhangjunya xiao meimei (n=28) (n=28) Comprehension 5.71 6.61 Initial attention 5,04 6.18 Retention of attention 4.79 6.21 Memorability 4.79 6.04 Positive emotional response 4.86 5.79 Influence on behavior 4.64 5.25 Taiwanese teenagers are likely to demonstrate favourable attitudes towards western commercials; however they find local counterparts more attractive. Therefore, specialisation strategy should be implemented by marketers while operating on this market, it is important to make the messaged understood by local consumers. However, a limitation must be borne in mind when interpreting the results of this study. There is a source of subjectivity and error in choosing the sample, even though these products can be regarded as substitutes they don’t represent the same product category. In addition, it is impossible to control brand preferences. The focus group had a very small number of 28 r espondents and males and females were not equally represented .

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__________________________________________________________________ As we discussed the limitations we need to carry out the next steps: which would be taking stronger control of sample in terms of age and number of respondents, and creating hypothetical products and taping advertisements with western and eastern values. In addition, a larger focus group with a wider age range should be chosen for the next study.

Notes 1

D.K. Tse, R.W. Belk and N. Zhou, ‘Becoming a C onsumer Society: A Longitudinal and Cross-Cultural Content Analysis of Print Ads from Hong Kong, the People Republic of China and Taiwan’, Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 15, 1989, pp. 457-72. 2 R.W. Pollay, ‘The Distorted Mirror: Reflections on the Unintended Consequences of Advertising’, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 50 (1), 1986. 3 S. Srikandath, ‘Cultural Values Deplicated in Indian Television Advertising’, Gazette, Vol. 48, 1991, pp. 165-176. 4 G. Hofstede, ‘Motivation, Leadership and Organization: Do American Theories Apply Abroad?’, Organizational Dynamics, Summer 1980, pp. 42-63. 5 B. Mueller, ‘Reflections of Culture: An Analysis of Japanese and American Advertising Appeals’, Journal of Advertising Research, June/July 1987, pp. 51-59. 6 T. Ducan and J. Ramaprasad, ‘Standardized Multi-National Advertising: The Influencing Factors’, Journal of Advertising, Vol. 24 (3), 1995, pp. 55-68. 7 A.C. Fatt, ‘The Danger of Local International Advertising’, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 31, 1967, pp. 60-62. 8 Mueller, p. 53. 9 Z. Caillat and B. Mueller, ‘Observations: The Influence of Culture on American and British Advertising: An Exploratory Comparison of Beer Advertising’, Journal of Advertisign Research, May-June, 1996, pp. 79-88. 10 R. Tansey, M.R. Hyman and G.M. Zinkham, ‘Cultural Themes in Brazilian and U.S. Auto Ads: A Cross-Cultural Comparison’, Journal of Advertising, Vol. 19 (2), 1990, pp. 30-39. 11 W. Henry, ‘Cultural Values do Correlate with Consumer Behavior’, Journal of Marketing Research, Vol. 13, 1976, pp. 121-127. 12 M.J. Munson and S.H. McIntyre, ‘Developing Practical Procedures for the Measurement of Personal Values in Cross-Cultural Marketing’, Journal of Marketing Research, Vol. 16, 1979, pp. 48-52. 13 D.E. Vinson, J.E. Scott and L.M. Lamont, ‘The Role of Personal Values in Marketing and Consumer Behavior’, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 41, 1977, pp. 4450. 14 J.J. Boddewyn, R. Soehl and J. Picard, ‘Standartization in International Marketing: Is Ted Levitt in Fact Right?’, Business Horizons, Vol. 29 (6), 1986, pp. 69-75.


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G. Harris, ‘The Globalization of Advertising’, International Journal of Advertising, Vol. 3 (3), 1984, pp. 223-234. 16 Mueller, p. 52. 17 L.F. Thomas, ‘Foreign Affairs’, New York Times, Vol. 17, 2001. 18 Indexmundi, ‘Taiwan - GDP - Per Capita (PPP) (US$)’, 2010, Viewed on 15 December, 2010, http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=tw&v=67. 19 TAITRA, ‘2009 Top Taiwan Global Brands’, Sponsored by the Bureau of Foreign Trade, Ministry of Economic Affairs of the Republic of China, 2010, Viewed on 15 December, 2010, http://kh.taiwantrade.com.tw/news/detail.jsp? id=559&lang=en_US. 20 H.C. Yu and P. Miller, ‘The Generation Gap and Cultural Influence: A Taiwan Empirical Investigation’, Cross Cultural Management, Vol. 10 (3), 2003, pp. 2341. 21 C.P. Chu, ‘A Positional Analysis of Taiwanese People’s National and Cultural Identities’, Mass Communication Research, Vol. 16, 1998, pp. 35-63. 22 D.B. Lucas and S.H. Britt, Measuring Advertising Effectiveness, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1963.

Bibliography Boddewyn, J.J, Soehl, R. and Picard, J., ‘Standartization in International Marketing: Is Ted Levitt in Fact Right?’. Business Horizons. Vol. 29 (6), 1986, pp. 69-75. Caillat, Z. and Mueller, B., ‘Observations: The Influence of Culture on American and British Advertising: An Exploratory Comparison of Beer Advertising’. Journal of Advertisign Research. May-June, 1996, pp. 79-88. Chu, C.P., ‘A Positional Analysis of Taiwanese People’s National and Cultural Identities’. Mass Communication Research. Vol. 16, 1998, pp. 35-63. Ducan, T. and Ramaprasad, J., ‘Standardized Multi-National Advertising: The Influencing Factors’. Journal of Advertising. Vol. 24 (3), 1995, pp. 55-68. Fatt, A.C., ‘The Danger of Local International Advertising’. Journal of Marketing. Vol. 31, 1967, pp. 60-62. Harris, G., ‘The Globalization of Advertising’. International Journal of Advertising. Vol. 3 (3), 1984, pp. 223-234.

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__________________________________________________________________ Henry, W., ‘Cultural Values do Correlate with Consumer Behavior’. Journal of Marketing Research. Vol. 13, 1976, pp. 121-127. Hofstede, G., ‘Motivation, Leadership and Organization: Do American Theories Apply Abroad?’. Organizational Dynamics. Summer, 1980, pp. 42-63. Indexmundi, ‘Taiwan - GDP - Per Capita (PPP) (US$)’. 2010. Viewed on 15 December, 2010. http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=tw&v=67. Levitt, T., ‘The Globalization of Markets’. Harvard Business Review. Vol. 61 (3),1983, pp. 92-102. Lucas, D.B. and Britt, S.H., Measuring Advertising Effectiveness. McGraw-Hill, New York, 1963. Mueller, B., ‘Reflections of Culture: An Analysis of Japanese and American Advertising Appeals’. Journal of Advertising Research. June/July 1987, pp. 51-59. Munson, M.J. and McIntyre, S.H, ‘Developing Practical Procedures for the Measurement of Personal Values in Cross-Cultural Marketing’. Journal of Marketing Research. Vol. 16, 1979, pp. 48-52. Pollay, R.W., ‘The Distorted Mirror: Reflections on the Unintended Consequences of Advertising’. Journal of Marketing. Vol. 50 (1), 1986. Srikandath, S., ‘Cultural Values Deplicated in Indian Television Advertising’. Gazette. Vol. 48, 1991, pp. 165-76. TAITRA, ‘2009 Top Taiwan Global Brands’. Sponsored by the Bureau of Foreign Trade, Ministry of Economic Affairs of the Republic of China. Viewed on 15 December, 2010. http://kh.taiwantrade.com.tw/news/detail.jsp?id=559&lang=en_ US. Tansey, R., Hyman, M.R. and Zinkham, G.M., ‘Cultural Themes in Brazilian and U.S. Auto Ads: A Cross-Cultural Comparison’. Journal of Advertising. Vol. 19 (2), 1990, pp. 30-39. Thomas, L.F., ‘Foreign Affairs’. New York Times. Vol. 17, 2001.


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__________________________________________________________________ Tse, D.K., Belk, R.W. and Zhou, N., ‘Becoming a Consumer Society: A Longitudinal and Cross-Cultural Content Analysis of Print Ads from Hong Kong, the People Republic of China, and Taiwan’. Journal of Consumer Research. Vol. 15,1989, pp. 457-72. Vinson, D.E., Scott, J.E. and Lamont, L.M., ‘The Role of Personal Values in Marketing and Consumer Behavior’. Journal of Marketing. Vol. 41, 1977, pp. 4450. Yu, H.C. and Miller, P., ‘The Generation Gap and Cultural Influence: A Taiwan Empirical Investigation’. Cross Cultural Management. Vol. 10 (3), 2003, pp. 2341. Tatiana Lishchenko is a Ph.D. student at the Institute of Creative Industry Design, National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan, ROC. Currently her research writing is devoted to branding and marketing. Meng-Dar Shieh is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Creative Industry Design, National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan, ROC. Kuo-Hsiang Chen is a Professor at the Institute of Creative Industry Design, National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan, ROC.

‘Martin was in the jungle alone, and the sun was sinking’: The Weather, Culture and Identity in Virginia Woolf’s The Years Verita Sriratana Abstract Depictions of the weather as cultural representation in literature, particularly in Virginia Woolf’s The Years (1937), challenge the construction of meanings, identity, and culture. Basing my argument on Homi K. Bhabha’s concept of colonial ambivalence, I propose in this chapter that though the weather is often portrayed in our daily life as an essence, it is, at the same time, portrayed as the very ‘thing’ which constantly escapes essentialisation and, therefore, can be compared to an individual’s complex sense of self, sense of place, and sense of culture. There are numerous attempts to regulate the weather, as there are numerous attempts to regulate and pigeonhole one’s identity and mind-set. Endeavours of this kind are, according to Woolf, constantly challenged by the weather and the self’s dynamism and unpredictability. Also, the weather endows place with a sense of identity, a s patial consciousness. Its very physicality contributes to the construction of an imagined community at both regional and national levels. However, in the text, the weather’s ambivalence and changeability, as reflected in human beings’ past and present obsessive attempts to control and rationalise it, shatter its very essence and challenge our fixed concepts of identity, sense of regionality and sense of nationhood. Key Words: Place, race, region, nation, the weather, Englishness, British Imperialism, Virginia Woolf, Homi K. Bhabha, regional and national stereotypes. ***** When we think of Virginia Woolf, the so-called ‘high modernist’ who has often been portrayed as ‘very British,’ we might not expect to see issues regarding interculturalism in her works. Some might argue that it might be more apt to look at the literature or reflections of diaspora writers in postcolonial literature, in works of the displaced or the marginalised. However, I believe that the term ‘marginalised,’ a spatial term and metaphor, is based on the assumed fixity of the so-called ‘centre’ or ‘centralised’ subject position in terms of social class, for example, when in truth what we consider as ‘centre’ is just an illusion, an ideology which must be maintained by careful construction and reconstruction of the ‘margins.’ A creative and interesting way to question this ‘centre-margin’ paradigm, I propose, is to look at the discourse of power embedded within the minds of people whom we regarded as ‘central’ or ‘canonical.’ In Woolf’s case, sense of place in relation to sense of self can be seen portrayed, represented,

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__________________________________________________________________ exposed as unstable, and interrogated in ways that we least expect and in things we think of as ordinary and mundane like the weather condition. In a 1936 letter to Hugh Walpole, Woolf wrote from Monk House, Sussex: ‘There’s a raging wind; some of Leonard’s crocuses are up, the churchyard is full of snowdrops, and old Mrs Mockford was buried yesterday. This is said to bring back the sense of England.’ 1 The wind, the crocuses, the snowdrops, and the death of a local woman all uncannily contribute to what she considers to be ‘the sense of England’ which she wants to share with Walpole. The question that concerns this chapter is why and how such common images of plants blooming, the common sensation of the wind on one’s skin, and universal notions of birth and death, for example, come together to shape and make up something so specific as ‘the sense of England.’ 2 Focusing particularly on the weather in her novel The Years, 3 I propose that the weather can be regarded as a ‘technology of place’ 4 which constructs and, at the same time, deconstructs our sense of self and sense of place. Descriptions of the weather help establish scenes. They provoke one’s imagination of an ‘other’ place. The conjured up visions in one’s mind transform the way one sees, experiences, and understands ‘home’ or home country. As Eleanor reads her brother Martin’s letter from India on a cab ride to watch Morris, another brother, practice law in a court session, she suddenly feels that she is in the middle of an Indian jungle instead of Oxford Street: ‘I had lost my way; the sun was sinking,’ she read [Martin’s letter from India]. ‘The sun was sinking…’ Eleanor repeated, glancing ahead of her down Oxford Street. The sun shone on dresses in a window. A jungle was a very thick wood, she supposed; made of stunted little trees; dark green in colour. Martin was in the jungle alone, and the sun was sinking. What happened next? ‘I thought it better to stay where I was.’ So he stood in the midst of little trees alone, in the jungle; and the sun was sinking. The street before her lost its detail… The cab stopped. For a moment Eleanor sat still. She saw nothing but stunted little trees, and her brother looking at the sun rising over the jungle. The sun was rising. Flames for a moment danced over the vast funereal mass of the Law Courts. 5 The sinking sun, its heat and light, is transported to London through Martin’s words and narrative. London’s scenery viewed through the cab’s window has increasingly ‘lost its detail’ and, hence, become questionable. London as a concrete place is, in turn, tinted and reshaped by Eleanor’s imagination of India as an abstract place. When the physical and mental experiences of place meet and

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__________________________________________________________________ merge, there emerges a sense of ambivalence. Eleanor is living in the empire’s seat of power but, at the same time, her mind follows Martin to the empire’s margin: India. Her brother’s landscape descriptions, particularly weather descriptions, induce her to make a mental tour with him to the jungle. She envisions the place on which the empire thrives and bases itself. This paradox of being both ‘in’ and ‘out’ of place leads to Homi K. Bhabha’s ‘moment of discursive transparency’. 6 Eleanor’s imagination of India clashes with the London she knows and the reality she later on sees in the courtroom. As Eleanor realises the constructedness of her world and of the imperial power, she realises that the pomp and ceremony which the judges and the barristers adopt as a tradition are part of the façade: [T]he Judge came in. He made one bow and took his seat under the Lion and the Unicorn. Eleanor felt a little thrill of awe run through her. That was old Curry. But how transformed! Last time she had seen him he was sitting at the head of a dinner-table; a long yellow strip of embroidery went rippling down the middle; and he had taken her, with a candle, round the drawing-room to look at his old oak. But now, there he was, awful, magisterial in his robes. 7 Weather descriptions are important to the construction and reconstruction of a sense of nationhood in that they contribute to the making of racial and national ‘signifiers’ and stereotypes. In the 1911 s ection, 8 twenty years after Eleanor’s 1891 cab ride and the courtroom scenes, we are shown here a 53-year-old Eleanor who has just returned from a trip to Spain. The air in England makes her reflect on her recent travel experience: Eleanor sat back under the shade of her white umbrella. The air seemed to hum with the heat. The air seemed to smell of soap and chemicals. How thoroughly people wash in England, she thought, looking at the yellow soap, the green soap, and the pink soap in the chemist’s window. In Spain she had hardly washed at all; she had dried herself with a pocket-handkerchief standing among the white dry stones of the Guadalquivir. In Spain it was all parched and shrivelled. But here—she looked down the High Street—every shop was full of vegetables; of shining silver fish; of yellow-clawed, soft-breasted chickens; of buckets, rakes and wheel-barrows. And how friendly people were! 9 The heat and ‘the smell of soap and chemical’ in the air propel Eleanor to think back and compare her ‘sense of England’ with her ‘sense of Spain.’ She juxtaposes two different places and climatic conditions: England’s clean air and vegetation in

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__________________________________________________________________ atoms the colour of an Italian officer’s cloak; until it reached the horizon where there was a long bar of pure green. Everything looked very settled; very still; very pure. There was not a single cloud, and the stars were not yet showing. It was small; it was smug; it was pretty after Spain, but still, now that the sun had sunk and the trees were massed together without separate leaves it had its beauty, Eleanor thought. The downs were becoming larger and simpler; they were becoming part of the sky. ‘How lovely it is!’ she exclaimed, as if she were making amends to England after Spain. 12 Eleanor comes to acknowledge and appreciate the English weather, with its blessed purity and tranquillity, to a more intense degree only when she experiences it ‘after Spain.’ Woolf makes it c lear that Eleanor’s reaction is dictated by nationalist discourse, not by her own sentiment: ‘she [Eleanor] felt no affection for her native land—none whatever’. 13 Thus, the urge to make amends or to compensate for England is part of the urge to persistently classify what one means by ‘Englishness’ and what one means by the opposite. As the ‘truth’ or the essence of ‘Englishness’ cannot be defined, when the English weather is evoked in thoughts or in conversations, there will always be anxiety and ambivalence. Here, anxiety is caused by strenuous attempts to construct, reconstruct, and contain the ‘signified’ or meaning of Englishness into its hollow label of a ‘signifier.’ Ambivalence is caused by the fact that nationhood is essentialised only through negotiations between binary oppositions constantly set up and pit against each other. As Bhabha points out, one always imagines the weather condition elsewhere whenever one tries to conceptualise the English weather: To end with the English weather is to invoke, at once, the most changeable and immanent signs of national difference. It encourages memories of the ‘deep’ nation crafted in chalk and limestone; the quilted downs; the moors menaced by the wind; the quiet cathedral towns; that corner of a foreign field that is forever England. The English weather also revives memories of its daemonic double: the heat and dust of India; the dark emptiness of Africa; the tropical chaos that was deemed despotic and ungovernable and therefore worthy of the civilizing mission. 14

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__________________________________________________________________ The changeability and unpredictability of the weather shatter the so-called essence of a ‘nation.’ Straddling the physical experiences of ‘here’ and the mental pictures of ‘there,’ the weather functions as a t echnology of place in that its ambivalence fabricates and tears apart the sense of nationhood. The weather operates as both a fluid ‘signified’ and an empty ‘signifier.’ Its truth claims can claim nothing but a v ague impression of what it means to be part of a n ational community: ‘‘Peculiar weather’ has always been common in England, but the English had no ready answers as to what, if anything, was wrong with their weather, much less how to correct it.’ 15 On a r egional level, different stereotypes of different locales threaten to disintegrate one’s complacent sense of nation-ness. 16 These stereotypes are abstract semiotic spaces demarcated through concrete impacts of regional weather: ‘As the weather can be understood as an interaction of regional and global movement of air, so can a n ation be defined as a n egotiation between an overlying national character and its regional idiosyncrasies.’ 17 As Eleanor listens to her sister-in-law Celia’s quavering Dorset accent, she reflects on the purity of her English language as opposed to the strangeness of other foreign languages she has heard: After all the foreign languages she had been hearing, it sounded to her pure English. What a lovely language, she thought, saying over to herself again the commonplace words, spoken by Celia quite simply, but with some indescribable vurr in the r’s, for the Chinnerys had lived in Dorsetshire since the beginning of time. 18 However, it can be inferred from Eleanor’s observation that Celia’s pronunciation and intonation are different from her own. Here she sits at the Chinnery family’s house in Peterborough, comparing and contrasting the different dialects and weather condition of more than two different regions. If there is such a thing as a fixed or wholesome ‘nationhood,’ the extract reveals numerous fractures which jeopardise its harmony. More importantly, the passage reveals that the idea of an absolute ‘nation’ comes with a p rice to pay. Eleanor’s seemingly harmless remarks signals violence which is caused by our tendency to obliterate differences in order to achieve a ‘sanitised’ sense of nationhood: 19 ‘The very idea of a p ure, ‘ethnically cleansed’ national identity can only be achieved through the death, literal and figurative, of the complex interweavings of history, and the culturally contingent borderlines of modern nationhood.’ 20 Here, Dosertshire’s unique ‘vurr in the r’s’ is also mechanically incorporated into Eleanor’s imagination of her ‘Englishness.’

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Notes 1

N. Nicolson (ed), Leave the Letters till We’re Dead: The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol. VI (1936-1941), Hogarth Press, London, 1980, p. 12. 2 One’s sense of self is, I believe, dependent upon one’s sense of place. I refer to Karol Chrobak’s discussion in his paper entitled ‘Culture from the View Point of Philosophical Anthropology’ at the conference. What marks us human beings, the generator and agency of culture, from animals is precisely the ability to grasp the boundaries of our own bodies against the backdrop of our environment. 3 The Years first originated from Virginia Woolf’s 1931 lecture at the National Society for Women’s Service, London. At that time, Woolf wanted to experiment in a new form of writing which she called the ‘novel-essay.’ 4 For more on ‘technology of place,’ see my article ‘Unleashing the Underdog: Technology of Place in Virginia Woolf’s Flush’. 5 V. Woolf, The Years, H. Lee (ed), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000, pp. 103-104. 6 Bhabha explains in The Location of Culture that the moment of ‘discursive transparency’ is ‘the moment when, ‘under the false appearance of the present’, the semantic seems to prevail over the syntactic, the signified over the signifier’ (p. 155). 7 Woolf, op. cit., p. 105. 8 In terms of the novel’s structure, the book’s sections are divided into different periods of time and headed by numbers such as ‘1880,’ ‘1891,’ ‘1907,’ etc. 9 Ibid., p. 185. 10 A. McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Se xuality in the Colonial Contest, Routledge, 1995, p. 207. 11 Ibid., p. 208. 12 Woolf, op. cit., pp. 195-196. 13 Ibid., p. 189. 14 H. Bhabha, The Location of Culture, Routledge, 2006, p. 243. 15 Janković, p. 2. 16 At the conference, Tuuli Lähdesmäki demonstrates in ‘Representations of European Cultural Identity in Mini-Europe’ that Mini-Europe, a theme park in Brussels which was morally supported by the European Commission and the European Parliament, is intended to be a mini heritage sites which seek to construct and reinforce ‘European cultural identities.’ The theme park is, ironically, an indicator of pan-Europeanist ideology which seeks to ‘sanitise’ cultural differences between different regions. 17 Ibid., p. 80. 18 Woolf, op. cit., p. 197. 19 The discussion at the conference after Aga Jarzewicz’s paper ‘The Challenges of Cultural Transgression: In Search of Lingua Franca’ supports my argument of

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Bibliography Bhabha, H.K., The Location of Culture. Routledge, 2006. Janković, V., Reading the Skies: A Cultural History of English Weather, 16501820. Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2000. McClintock, A., Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest. Routledge, 1995. Nicolson, N. (ed), Leave the Letters till We’re Dead: The Letters of Virginia Woolf Vol. VI (1936-1941). Hogarth Press, London, 1980. Sriratana, V., ‘Unleashing the Underdog: Technology of Place in Virginia Woolf’s Flush’. Forum: University of Edinburgh Postgraduate Journal of Culture and the Arts. Issue 8 T echnologies (Spring 2009). http://forum.llc.ed.ac.uk/archive/ 08/sriratana.pdf. Woolf, V., The Years. Lee, H. (ed), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000. Verita Sriratana, is a PhD. Candidate at the School of English, University of St. Andrews, United Kingdom.

Part 10 Reaching Out, Crossing the Cultural Divide

Women on Purpose: Interrogating a Model for Cross-Cultural, Interdisciplinary Collaborations Kim S. Berman and Jane A. Hassinger Abstract A South African artist/educator and an American psychoanalyst/educator describe their experience with a five-year transnational, multidisciplinary collaboration. The AIDS Action Intervention and Women on Purpose projects were developed by an international and local group of researchers, consultants, artists and students to enhance the sustainability of Phumani Paper, a poverty alleviation program founded by the South African collaborator, which established 21 papermaking craft enterprises across South Africa. Inspired by feminist ideals of empowerment and self-determination, the team introduced a qualitative, participatory action research project at six Phumani papermaking workshop sites. Participants were trained in the Photovoice methodology and art-making processes to document their struggles for economic independence. Through iterative processes of reflection and sharing, participants identified shared social action objectives. The AIDS Action Intervention was created to provide support and increase agency for Phumani papermakers, the great majority of whom are women profoundly affected by the HIV pandemic. Through the application of visual arts methods, participants engaged in processes of healing and generation of new knowledge about themselves and their communities. It is argued in this that social transformations are potentiated when cultural reference points are engaged through multidisciplinary approaches and practices. We explore challenges and lessons from different phases of the collaboration. Key Words: Cross-cultural, interdisciplinary, arts-based methods, participatory collaboration; women’s craft enterprises, HIV/AIDS action intervention. ***** 1. Introduction This chapter describes two feminist, participatory-action research collaborations among scholars and artists from South Africa and the United States of America and explores opportunities and challenges associated with transnational, interdisciplinary projects. Phumani Paper, a South African poverty alleviation project, was founded in 1999 by artist/activist Kim Berman. Phumani’s paper, handmade from recycled plant material and waste paper, is sold to crafts industries, businesses, and schools. Originally supported by government grants and the University of Johannesburg, Phumani is now comprised of independent enterprises, with marketing coordinated at the national office in Johannesburg. Of

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__________________________________________________________________ the original 21 projects, eight are active in 2011, a r emarkable achievement for government-funded poverty alleviation projects in South Africa. The AIDS Action Intervention and Women on Purpose projects were developed by Kim Berman and American psychoanalyst and educator Jane Hassinger, and assisted by an international and local group of researchers, consultants, artists and students. The AIDS Action Intervention was created to provide support and increase agency for Phumani papermakers, the great majority of whom are women profoundly affected by the HIV pandemic. Although, since 2009, the South African government has created wide access to ARVs and HIV testing, which has helped to stabilise the devastating rates of infection and death, the statistics on HIV/AIDS continue to shock. Some estimates report up to 18,000 new infections and over 1,000 deaths each day. 1 The ANC government’s earlier failure to support widespread education programs and treatment resulted in a devastating toll, and for years the cause of illness and death for many remained virtually unnamed. In communities where HIV/AIDS was associated with extreme stigma and misinformation and where worksites were diminished by 50% losses, euphemism and silence remained the norm.

Figure 1: Eshowe papermakers KZN 2005. 9 members have since passed away (Photo: K. Berman) 2. The AIDS Action Project Founded in 2005 by the Ford Foundation, the AIDS Action Project was designed to help Phumani papermakers break silence about HIV/AIDS in their communities, confront fear and stigma, and to seek voluntary counselling and

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__________________________________________________________________ testing (VCT) - and thereby contribute to reducing the numbers of deaths in their projects and communities. This multi-phased, multi-modal intervention provided support for mourning losses, initiated awareness of the value of HIV testing, and established links to local clinics, counsellors, and medical assistance. The program did not claim to reduce the infection rates of HIV. Rather our intention was to reduce fear and stigma so that the participants could act on choices available to them and increase their capacities for providing support to one another. Furthermore, we anticipated an increased capacity for productivity and income as a result of greater group trust, empowerment, and organisation-building skills. The AIDS ACTION project has been a co llaboration among faculty at the University of Johannesburg, Artist Proof Studio in Johannesburg (a community print-making centre), and the University of Michigan. In 2005, research teams of students, artists-in-training, and faculty spent three weeks at six Phumani sites in South Africa. Our methodology, Photovoice, ‘entrusts cameras to the hands of people to enable them to act as recorders and catalysts for change in their own communities’. 2 Using disposable cameras, Phumani participants documented their community life and produced photographs that tell emotionally vivid stories about how stigma has created extreme vulnerability to misinformation, infection, and death. All learned how HIV/AIDS posed the greatest challenge to Phumani’s future.

Figure 2: Photovoice intervention with UM, UJ, Artist Proof Studio and Phumani Paper (Photo courtesy of P. Allara)

Figure 3: Ma Sechaba’s photovoice: With these hands I can do (Photovoice by participant, courtesy K. Berman)

We have proposed that the visual arts can play a valuable role in connecting and integrating new knowledge transmitted from community participants to researcher, as well as positioning researchers as activists and facilitators for catalysing social action. Our process and methods aimed to bridge gaps among community development, participative/experiential learning, and academic research through an arts-based approach to knowledge creation. This pilot project was distinctive because of the relationships between partners - universities, academics, AIDS activists, artists, students, and papermakers - all sharing the

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__________________________________________________________________ common objective of enhancing the agency and productivity of the Phumani groups.

Figure 4: Masters student from UJ demonstrating printing skills to make Paper Prayers (Photo K. Berman) In the AIDS Action Project, we also envisioned an intercultural opportunity for American and South African students that positioned students and community members as researchers working in interdisciplinary teams in a ‘classroom in the field’ model of praxis, involving reflective cycles of creating stories, sharing, reflection, and collective decision-making about social goals. The ‘outsiders’ (students, trainers, Americans) were invited into the sites to learn and share knowledge. The facilitators emphasised reciprocity in the exchange of skills including art-making processes. Team diversity - of discipline, gender, culture and expertise - was strategically organised to resist hierarchies of race, privilege, and knowledge. Students exchanged cultural knowledge with one another. Working side by side, students and papermakers overcame inhibition and engaged in rich personal sharing about families, religion, gender roles, and fantasies and facts about American and South African culture.


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Figure 5: An interdisciplinary, cross-cultural team after the intervention at Kutloano Papermaking (UM-UJ-APS-PP) (Photo courtesy of P. Allara) Over a two-year period from 2006 to 2008, the AIDS Action follow-up project, staffed by artists from Artist Proof Studio and HIV/AIDS educators, conducted intensive interventions at all 16 Phumani sites. Each intervention engaged the papermakers in collaborative processes of learning about HIV/AIDS and arts-based methodologies that produced evocative photographs and artwork as well compelling narratives. Participants explored the effects of HIV/AIDS on their communities, experiences with dislocation and environmental degradation, struggles faced by women who care for children and sick family members, and visions for economic and educational advancement. The teams mentored participants to be researchers and activists in their communities. The AIDS Action Project created connections between engaged, participative learning and theoretically-based academic research, as well as leveraging the power of the visual arts to generate and integrate new knowledge. Artists, researchers, and community members acted together as activists and catalysts for social change. As a co nsequence of the AIDS Action follow-up intervention, each of the 16 papermaking enterprises gained access to support, education, and skills. Results indicate that Phumani enterprises increased productivity and income as a result of greater group cohesion and capacity for networking and marketing. Participants spoke of increased pride, being role models for their children, and passing on their new knowledge to others in their communities.

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__________________________________________________________________ 3. How Art Changes Lives Because of apartheid’s ubiquitous traumatic legacy, extreme economic inequities, dislocation, violence, and loss, the AIDS Action Intervention employed another expressive method, namely Paper Prayers - a simple print-making activity that helps participants memorialise and mourn lost loved ones. Paper Prayers has proved to be an effective method of teaching AIDS awareness and encouraging behaviour change. 3 Participants worked with manipulating images, materials, and metaphor to express emotion, engage in remembrance and strengthen ties among survivors in the community. In the process, participants broke their silence, reduced shame, and became open to learning about the facts of HIV/AIDS and treatments available to them and their families. With an increase in hope, capacity for aspiring and planning also grew. When asked why they thought Photovoice and Paper Prayers are effective, responses included: ‘It’s easy to talk about photos’; ‘You can use symbols and colours to talk about feelings and things that are not easy’; ‘Art helps to relieve stress - it is a way of healing’; and ‘I’m no longer shy to talk’. 4 Each of the papermaking enterprises gained access to support and skills. The black colour resembles the body, and the body is not well and not functioning accurately. The red (heart) colour resembles the private part of the body which is not healthy, the bottom part resembles the fire that is going to destroy the whole body, and ultimately the entire body will be in danger. HIV/Aids does not only damage your immune system, it’s like a fire that burns your heart and if you don’t let it out, your self esteem, self confidence, your sense of pride will be burnt to ashes. So start talking to someone about your status today, you wouldn’t regret it. It will be like a weight lifted off your shoulders. Please take care! Participant Madikwe, 2007

Figure 6 Sociologist Arjun Appadurai has explored the significance of the ‘capacity to aspire’ for the poor - an animating idea for the AIDS Action Project. He suggests that by ‘… strengthening the capacity to aspire … the poor … find … resources … to contest and alter the conditions of their own poverty.’ Aspiration is tied to


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__________________________________________________________________ ‘voice,’ power, and the recognition people gain through social action. He notes: ‘Voice must be expressed in terms of actions and performances which have local cultural force, in which one learns how to negotiate and change larger social contexts.’ 5 The use of photography and printmaking in the interventions facilitated opportunities for self-expression that resulted in greater openness, aspiration, and plans for collective social action. Whether or not participants produced a saleable item with Photovoice or Paper Prayers, they acquired new ‘capabilities’, ones that we found enhance agency. If one is creative, one can make a plan, come to a decision, and act to influence the circumstances of one’s life. Our approach aimed to inspire the capacities described by Appadurai: for inquiring, sharing, dreaming a better future, and planning actions that transform silence and isolation into articulated goals and collaboration. Psychoanalyst Anna Ornstein notes that through creative activity fractured and dissociated parts of self are given voice; identity and agency are reclaimed. Representing and narrating experience in art can restore subjectivity and meaning making, and enhance ongoing mastery of inner and outer reality. 6 Similarly, psychoanalyst Rosalind Minsky finds possibilities in creative activity for reducing shame, humiliation, and worthlessness. She observes how one may discover a sense of power when forcing ‘materials in the external world to bend to [an] interior vision of what we know and want.’ 7 Making art allows thinking without being drowned in feeling and opens a space for a state of absorption, normally associated with daydreaming. Instinctively, we know creativity connects to our deepest self and dreams. Often inhibited by trauma, the capacity for dreaming is associated with aspiration and belief in the future. When dehumanisation and loss are structured into community life, the ‘dreaming self’ may be silenced. Recovering one’s connection to history, culture, and future is vitally important to the ‘ongoingness’ and resilience of the self. 8 Creative activity related to loss, mourning, and aspiration particularly in groups where members share their efforts - helps restore a sense of unity of self. Viewers and listeners are also beneficiaries, acquiring more nuanced identities and ties to cultural histories. Sociologist Ari Sitas has explored the connection between daydreaming and resistance. Daydreaming is where resistance is found, facilitating the relaxation of censorship and connection to the inner self in spite of deadening and abusive circumstances. Daydreaming may be liberated for reflection and communication through creative activity. In reveries, our ‘possible selves,’ reach beyond life as lived and connect to aspiration and a vision of change. 9 We found that our engagement with mourning and aspiration resulted in significance increases in productivity for the papermakers. Members shared secrets, asked questions about HIV/AIDS, and began to access treatment. With dramatically improved health, they demonstrated increased capacity for technical skill and leadership. They began to share their knowledge and skills with their

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__________________________________________________________________ families and communities. Several have used Photovoice as a lobbying strategy for increasing resources for their community schools. Many described the pride and self-confidence that followed discovery of new creative skills. And many have urged their family members toward HIV testing and treatment. 4. Women on Purpose As Phumani approached its ninth anniversary, we planned a book project, ‘Women on Purpose: The Founding Women of Phumani,’ to honour these women and share their struggles, triumphs, and knowledge with a wide audience. In July 2008, our team, accompanied by US portrait photographer, Debbie Rasiel, travelled around South Africa to interview and photograph 22 of these remarkable women.

Figure 7: Tlaki, A Woman on Purpose (portrait by D. Rasiel) They told of beloved mothers and children, illness and loss, dependency and abandonment. They spoke with pride and gratitude about what they have learned and accomplished. When we asked for lessons to share with other South African women, one said: Black women in South Africa once were dependent - on husbands, boyfriends, white people whose homes we sometimes work in. We didn’t know what to do to help ourselves or to make money to help feed our children. Now we know that women must rely on themselves, step into the world, and make our way.


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__________________________________________________________________ We are strong and have skills. For me, it started with learning to make paper - how wonderful it is to make something so beautiful from rubbish - but this is only the beginning. 10 The women are proud that their stories and photographs will be in a book that they can share with their families and communities. 5. Reflections on Challenges of Transnational Interdisciplinary Collaboration When the AIDS Action Intervention concluded in July 2007, it was deemed a success. Reports to funding agencies documented evidence of a r enewed confidence among the Phumani papermakers. In 2008, we were invigorated to finish the book and return to the women what they had shared with us. Unfortunately, after two and a h alf years, the book has yet to materialise. Commonly, book projects involve delays - related to analysis of extensive qualitative data, publication expenses, and the frustrations of long-distance collaboration. But we fear our delays may reinforce a p erception that academics take away from the poor more than they give. Rather than engage in trusting, reciprocal exchange with community partners, researchers often disappear and disappoint. As a team of white professionals and academics from the United States and South Africa, along with white and black counsellors and artists, we were alert to the risks of imposing objectifying research practices and privileging academic career advancement of the researchers. Sources of conflict, situated in our various disciplinary and cultural positions, are also worth noting. It is probable that we began our process without fully considering the sometimes painful history of North-South collaborations. Our different disciplinary frameworks, although often sympathetic and mutually enhancing, occasionally resulted in conflicts over authority, emphasis, and interpretation. And our institutions, sometimes unsupportive of the methodology and the model of collaboration we employ, offer limited financial support and endorsement. The book project has been burdened by distance, limited funding, and inevitable personal and professional obligations. Two founding members to whom this book is dedicated have since died of AIDS-related illnesses. Other Phumani groups have closed due to lack of resources. Disappointment and a sense of betrayal over a r ecent financial crisis at the Phumani Paper national office, has created great strain and mistrust between the papermakers and researchers. Because the book is not yet finished, we struggle with feeling we have let down some of the founding women of Phumani Paper with whom we collaborated. We expect that the book will be published - but most certainly at a pace determined by academic rhythms and publishing opportunities. We have learnt important lessons concerning the obligations of cross-cultural, participatory-action research collaborations. North-South projects offer great

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__________________________________________________________________ mutual value through exchange of skills and knowledge, and the first phases of our project illustrate these possibilities. For the women of Phumani Paper, the book will serve as tangible evidence of their value and influence to their communities. As researchers who have benefitted from Africa’s rich assets and histories, we may too often fail to recognise the duty this benefit imposes. We look forward to working with others toward an articulation of an ethical framework and set of practice principles for equitable and mutually enriching transnational, interdisciplinary collaboration.

Notes 1

References to statistics can be found on the websites of the AIDS Law project: http://www.alp.org.za and Treatment Action Campaign: http://www.tac.org.za. UNAIDS (2006), ‘UNAIDS 2006 Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic’, Annex 2: HIV/AIDS Estimates and Data, 2005. By the end of 2005, there were 5.5 million people living with HIV in South Africa, and almost 1,000 AIDS deaths occurring every day, according to UNAIDS estimates. 2 C. Wang and M.A. Burris, ‘Photovoice: Concept, Methodology, and Use for Participatory Needs Assessment’, Health Education and Behavior, Vol. 24, No. 3, June 1997, pp. 369-387. 3 K. Berman and L. Allen, ‘Paper Prayers: An Arts-Based Methodological Approach for HIV/AIDS Intervention and Action’, The Social Work PractitionerResearcher, Vol. 21 (2), University of Johannesburg, 2009, pp. 219-236. 4 K. Berman, Agency, Imagination, and Resilience: Facilitating Social Change through the Visual Arts in South Africa. PhD Dissertation, University of Johannesburg, 2009, p. 239. 5 A. Appadurai, ‘The Capacity to Aspire: Culture and the Terms of Recognition’, Culture and Public Action, V. Rao and M. Walton (eds), Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 2004, p. 62. 6 A. Ornstein, ‘Artistic Creativity and the Healing Process’, 2001, Psychoanalytic Inquiry, Vol. 26, No. 3, 2006, pp. 386-406. 7 R. Minsky, Psychoanalysis and Culture: Contemporary States of Mind, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ, 1998, p. 202. 8 D.W. Winnicott, Playing and Reality, Routledge Press, London, 1971, p. 137. 9 A. Sitas, Voices that Reason: Theoretical Parables, University of South Africa Press, Pretoria, 2004, p. 74. 10 Respondent’s comment to Hassinger, interview for ‘Women on Purpose Project’, Kim Berman and Jane Hassinger, Principal Investigators, July 12, 2008, Winterveldt, Northwest Province, South Africa.


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Bibliography Appadurai, A., ‘The Capacity to Aspire: Culture and the Terms of Recognition’. Culture and P ublic Action. Rao, V. and Walton, M. (eds), Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 2004. Berman, K., Agency, Imagination, and Resilience: Facilitating Social Change through the Visual Arts in South Africa. PhD Dissertation, University of Johannesburg, 2009. Berman, K. and Allen, L., ‘Paper Prayers: An Arts-Based Methodological Approach for HIV/AIDS Intervention and Action’. The Social Work PractitionerResearcher. Vol. 21, No. 2, 2009, pp. 219-236. Manganyi, N.C., Mahangu’s Reverie and O ther Essays. Ravan Press, Johannesburg, 1997. Minsky, R., Psychoanalysis and Culture: Contemporary States of Mind. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ, 1998. Ornstein, A., ‘Artistic Creativity and the Healing Process’. Psychoanalytic Inquiry. Vol. 26, No. 3, 2006, pp. 386-406. Sitas, A., Voices that Reason: Theoretical Parables. University of South Africa Press, Pretoria, 2004. Wang, C. and Burris, M.A., ‘Photovoice: Concept, Methodology, and Use for Participatory Needs Assessment’. Health Education and Behavior. Vol. 24, No. 3 June 1997, pp. 369-387. Winnicott, D.W., Playing and Reality. Routledge Press, London, 1971. Kim S. Berman, PhD, is an Associate Professor, Department of Visual Art, Faculty of Art Design and Architecture at the University of Johannesburg. She is also the founder of Phumani Paper and founding director of Artist Proof Studio. Contact: 27 82 774 6745; email: [email protected] Jane A. Hassinger, MSW, DCSW is a Program Associate at the Institute for Research on Women and Gender and lecturer in the Women’s Studies Program at the University of Michigan. Contact 734 761 1015, email: [email protected]

An Experimental Study of Russian and Swedish Value Systems V. Shabes, G. Bostedt, E. Troshchenkova, L. Ivarsson, U. Damber and T. Potapova Abstract The purpose of this study was to develop a method comparing Russian and Swedish value systems with the overarching aim to increase understanding in intercultural communication. Value systems, as organised systems of nationally specific social concepts, are viewed as part of the cognitive, mental representations determining the behaviour of both individuals and communities. In comparative studies of value systems concepts in the national languages are often translated into English. Our Russian-Swedish project has indicated that similar national concepts, when translated into English, expose significant differences in their connotations. For example, when comparing the Swedish and Russian translations of ‘security’, much of the nationally specific contents are lost, thus, making data invalid. To overcome this problem, methods were developed to obtain comparable data, by use of experimental design, employing Russian and Swedish university students as informants. We will explicate how simple value concepts coinciding for the two cultures were obtained and how differences in similar concepts were identified. We will describe the overall structure of the multilayer value systems of both countries, where similarities and differences related to gender and ethnicity, are made visible. The methodology, results and presumptive usages of these methods will be presented. Key Words: Values, system, culture, methodology, comparison, similarity, difference, graded standard. ***** 1. Introduction This chapter focuses on values understood as components of social and mental representations regulating human behaviour in a society. 1 Values, thereby, serve as guiding principles in people’s lives. 2 There are different value types, 3 encompassing societal and individual distinctions, enabling us to understand moral foundations and principles for everyday actions taken by citizens. In this chapter we present a comparative study of values in Russia and Sweden. The aims are twofold; firstly, to present and discuss a methodological approach to comparative analysis in the area of value studies, and secondly, to present and analyse Russian and Swedish young people’s perspectives on basic values in the two countries. During the last two decades Russia has experienced a societal transformation from a totalitarian society towards democracy with a novel value system in development. 4 Sweden, on the other hand, has a history of a ‘third way’

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An Experimental Study of Russian and Swedish Value Systems

__________________________________________________________________ (the Swedish model), relatively stable societal values over time, democracy and a mixed economy, thus, making comparisons between the two countries intriguing to analyse. 5 2. Methodology This comparative study was carried using several steps that will be described chronologically below. In the first phase of the study value nominations were selected for further analysis and comparison. 100 male and 100 female respondents from each country (students from 19 t o 30) were given a questionnaire, including questions on background information, such as place of birth, parents’ educational level, personal religious beliefs, and age, as we assumed that geographical, socio-economical and educational differences may influence the formation of the value systems of the respondents. The respondents were asked to ‘write down all values that you find important’, marking the value they mentioned as ‘important for me’, ‘important for the society’ or ‘both’. The age interval was chosen due to the important formative function the years between adolescence and adulthood have in the lives of young adults. As our ambition was mainly to test the method of studying and comparing value systems, the sample group was not very large and was chosen for reasons of convenience. Thus, we can only draw sure conclusions about the chosen sample group without broad generalizations. There were no limits as to how many or what kind of values the respondents could nominate. As a r esult we obtained a total of 156 values for Russians and 77 for Swedes (closely related ones, for example, family, parents, relatives, were clustered). The respondents mentioned values of different levels with some of the value nominations being more complex and general, while a number of simple concepts were also included. 6 In order to make comparisons of value nominations possible we needed to know the components of complex values, so we conducted the second phase of the study. 78 R ussian and 62 S wedish respondents got a list of 11 a nd 10 values, correspondingly, that we considered complex on the basis of the first phase of the study. Analysis of the obtained components for complex values suggested dividing them, when possible, into ones with positive/neutral or negative connotations, which was important for further cultural comparisons. In the third phase of the study a joint list of 31 values was created in order to make direct ranking possible by creating a ‘graded standard’. 7 The list was given to 50 Swedish women, 38 Swedish men, 57 Russian women and 46 Russian men who were asked to arrange value nominations in order from the most important to the least important, according to their personal preference. By calculating the means for each value we could determine its relative position within the graded scale, thus revealing the degree of its importance within the system.

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__________________________________________________________________ To determine the degree of similarity/difference between nationalities, as well as genders, we referred to the theory of fuzzy sets, that is, a t heory of graded concepts. 8 To count the similarity/difference index (Ks), we used a formula by Sørensen, 9 2C Ks = --------A+B where, in our case, A equals the total number of putting the particular value in all places of the graded scale by, for example, the Russians, B by the Swedes, and C the total of overlapping answers in each place of the graded scale. Ks equalling 0 indicates absence of similarity and 1 indicates maximum similarity. If you have, for example, to compare the two groups -Russians and Swedes – in relation to how they graded the given list of values, one has to add for each group all the instances of ascribing a value in the list a cer tain place (in this particular experiment the number will equal the number of respondents). Thus, you will get A and B for the formula. To have C, one has to count the sum of overlapping answers in each place of the graded standard. For example, if a value N was put on the first place by 6 Russian respondents and 4 Swedes, the overlapping number for first place will be 4, then if for the second place this value was put by 1 Russian and 6 Swedes, overlapping number for the second place will be 1, and so on for each place in the graded standard. The sum of all these overlapping numbers gives C. 3. Results The data collected in the first phase of the study generated a n umber of interesting comparisons between the two countries, as well as, between genders both within and between the two countries. Examples of these similarities and differences are displayed in Table 1. For instance, between-the-cultures comparison shows difference in such values as Democracy, Culture and similarity in Material wealth, Family, Education and Health. The four most frequently mentioned values by both genders in both countries were Material wealth, Family, Education, and Health. In the fifth place the Russian respondents mentioned Love, whereas Swedes mentioned Democracy. It is also interesting to highlight the differences in respondents’ marking of values as ‘important for the society’ and/or ‘important for me personally’, in relation to their understanding of, for example, democracy.

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__________________________________________________________________ Table 1: Value nomination presented in total and divided into countries as well as divided into answers given by males and females. Russia n=1775, Sweden n=1066. Absolute numbers and per cent Total

Number of entries

Absolute no.

Percent

Value nomination

Russia

Sweden

Russia

Sweden

Russia

Sweden

Russia

Sweden

Material wealth

123

89

6.9

8.3

5.7

6.2

8.9

11.1

Family

112

82

6.3

7.7

6.0

6.4

6.7

9.3

Education

89

81

5.0

7.6

5.7

7.7

3.9

7.4

Love

80

27

4.5

2.5

5.0

2.8

3.7

2.3

Friendship

64

65

3.6

6.1

4.3

4.3

2.5

8.2

Culture

54

7

3.0

0.7

2.4

0.5

4.1

0.8

Freedom

49

53

2.8

5.0

1.2

6.4

5.3

3.2

Health

82

104

4.6

9.8

4.9

7.7

4.1

12.2

Democracy

1

68

0.0

6.4

0.0

10.0

0.1

2.1

Job

33

56

1.9

5.3

1.4

2.8

2.6

8.2

Security

4

57

0.2

5.3

0.2

6.5

0.3

3.9

Care for citizens

32

49

1.8

4.6

1.0

5.2

3.1

3.9

Environment

19

50

1.1

4.7

1.3

5.7

0.7

3.5

1033

278

58.2

26.1

60.9

13.6

53.9

36.3

1775

1066

100

100

1092

581

683

485

Other responses Tot. no. responses

of

Females

Males

On the one hand, the study has shown that none of the values mentioned is viewed purely as societal or individual. As one can see in Table 2 below marking for Respect, for example, is practically equal for these two categories in both cultures. On the other hand, there are values that distinctly tend to be viewed from a more individual (Family)/societal perspective (Social security). The latter one is interesting because for the Russians there is a greater emphasis towards societal perspective than for the Swedes. Some Russian respondents also commented that ‘it would have been nice to have it, but we don’t in this country, so I don’t expect it’. The Russians also tick Law-abidance as important for the society thrice more often, then for them personally, which supposes, paradoxically, that while people would like to have a society compliant with the law, they do not feel so strongly necessary to be law-abiding themselves. Please note that the percentages in the following table were calculated only from the total sum of the number of times these three categories were mentioned.

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__________________________________________________________________ Table 2: Value nominations divided into reflection on personal and/or societal importance. Percent. Russia n=256, Sweden n=232 Russia

Sweden

Value nomination

For me

For society

For me

For society

Family

41.0

20.3

32.8

8.6

Respect

13.3

12.5

10.3

11.2

Care for citizens, social security

4.3

8.6

16.4

20.1

The second phase of the study highlighted interesting differences among the respondents regarding their attitudes to different value concepts. For example, the components of Democracy are not only neutral or having positive connotations (e.g. freedom of speech, equality) in Russian culture, but also there is a number of negative associations: power of crowd, lie, betrayal, disorder, instability, everything is allowed and humiliation. We believe that such answers reveal a reaction in part of the society to painful reforms of the 1990s. There were also associations like: The thing that we failed to build in our country, which may display disappointment in the course of reforms. Democracy was, by Swedish respondents, only positively understood as the right to vote, responsiveness, all people are equal, etc. The second phase results were used for composing a list for the ranking experiment where we planned to include only simple values that are understood similarly in the two cultures (according to our discussion in the Russian-Swedish research group), as complex ones cannot be compared directly through ranking. 31 (of the most frequently mentioned in the first phase of the study and as components of complex values) simple values were included in this list. The idea of the ranking experiment in the third phase was to find out the degree of importance of each value within the list of the 31 values presented to the respondents. For the analysis of the value ranking we worked with two types of data: the absolute place on the scale from 1 to 31, and the means of values indicating their relevance. Presented together in the table they indicate tendencies in placements. To exemplify this we display some of the results for both men and women together:


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__________________________________________________________________ Table 3: Ranking results for Russian respondents (both genders) Relevant placement (mean)

Absolute placement

Value nomination

1.

Love

7.25

2.

Health

7.85

3.

Friendship

8.57

4.

Family and children

8.71

5.

Personal development

10.00

29.

Gender equality

23.49

30.

Love for one's country

23.50

31.

Democracy

27.55

Table 4: Ranking results for Swedish respondents (both genders) Absolute placement

Value nomination

Relevant (mean)

1.

Love

5.64

2.

Family

7.51

3.

Friendship

8.19

4.

Health

9.62

5.

mutual respect

10.90

29.

Culture and history, trad.

24.08

30.

Faith and religion

26.99

31.

Love for one's country

27.60

placement

In Table 1 we displayed the most frequently mentioned values. The comparison between Table 1 and Table 3 shows that for instance Material wealth has changed its position as the leading value to an absolute position of number 12 in Russia (mean value = 14.8) and number 28 (mean value = 23.3) in Sweden in the ranking results displayed in Table 3. On the other hand, Love, being one of the least mentioned value nominations for Swedish respondents in Table 1, is now top of the list of ranking values in Table 4. One possible way to interpret these results is that the leading position of Material wealth in the first phase may be explained by that it represents a b ig cluster of reactions, while intangible values are divided by the respondents into a larger number of specific categories. If these categories, as in the case of Material wealth, had been clustered together, it is possible that they

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__________________________________________________________________ could have outweighed material values in the frequency of mentioning. The top ranking values are much alike in Sweden and Russia. However, this is not the case for the lowest ranking values. Table 5: Index of similarity/difference between Russia and Sweden Value Unity, solidarity, agreement Love Mutual help, support Friendship Environment Leisure, entertainment Job Family and children Patience Health Culture, history Tranquility, calmness, peace of mind Justice Patriotism Honesty Social security (provided by the state) Open-mindedness, readiness to accept others Consideration, compassion, sympathy Fatih and religion Education Politeness Faithfulness, loyalty Peace Self-sufficency, independency Equality Personal development Mutual Respect Human rights Democracy Gender equality Material Wealth

Ks 0.723 0.712 0.712 0.708 0.691 0.691 0.681 0.670 0.663 0.659 0.642 0.639 0.639 0.639 0.635 0.618 0.618 0.611 0.607 0.597 0.586 0.586 0.576 0.576 0.576 0.565 0.545 0.503 0.471 0.439 0.419

The values that were least frequently mentioned in the first phase, displayed in Table 1 (in some of the cases incorporated, due to limitations of this chapters length, into the category Other responses), retained their low positions in the ranking. T his consistency proves that they do play the least important role. In addition, we may note that in the ranking experiment values found at the top of the list are all personal values. As presented earlier in the chapter we applied the theory of graded representation to estimate the similarity/difference index. A high index of similarity was obtained, for example, for Love (Ks = 0.712) and Mutual help (Ks =


188

__________________________________________________________________ 0.712), whereas it is low for Material wealth (Ks 0.419), Gender equality, women’s rights (Ks = 0.439) and Democracy (Ks = 0471). The concepts below are listed according to decreasing similarity index between the two cultures. As shown in Table 5 above there are still differences between the respondents in the two countries. Not in terms of interpersonal values, they are to a high degree equally viewed as important, but in terms of how collective values (related to society/state/institutions) are ranked. Democracy and Gender equality are two collective values where differences are profound. 4. Concluding Remarks Analysis of the obtained experimental material shows adequacy of the methodology chosen. The first phase of the study allowed us to select such value nominations which are actual and significant for the respondents of the both nationalities. The following phases of the study allowed us to understand that the value system of the Swedish and Russian societies taken, as an example, can be presented as a sum of value concepts organised by a minimum two structures: • •

Hierarchy organized according to the degree of value being more/less abstract-concrete (for example: ‘Democracy Elections’) Linear graded structure that fixes relative importance (positive/negative) of each value nomination within the system.

Our analysis also showed that the methodology that was used makes it possible to evaluate the degree of similarity or difference between Russian and Swedish value concepts which in dictionaries may be considered as equivalents. As stated in the beginning of this chapter, Russia has during the last two decades experienced a societal transformation from a totalitarian society towards democracy with a novel value system in development. Sweden, on the other hand, has a history of a ‘third way’ (the Swedish model), in terms of relative stable societal values over time, democracy and a mixed economy. This makes comparisons of value systems between the two countries interesting, as we have shown in this chapter. In coming chapters we will elaborate further on these results, especially on the topic of democracy and gender equality.

Notes 1

R. Williams, ‘Change and Stability in Values and Value Systems: A Sociological Perspective’, Understanding Human Values, Simon and Schuster, 2000, pp. 16, 2021, 23.

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__________________________________________________________________ 2

S. Schwartz and W. Bilsky, ‘Toward a U niversal Psychological Structure of Human Values’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 53 (3), September 1987, pp. 550-582. 3 M. Rokeach The Nature of Human Values, The Free Press, New York, 1973. 4 G. Almond et al., Comparative Politics Today: A World View, Pearson, 2010, 9th Ed, p. 377. 5 D. Hancock, Politics in Europe: An Introduction to the Politics of the United Kingdom, France, German, Italy, Sweden, Russia, Poland and t he European Union, Sage Publications Inc., 2006. 6 G. Murphy ‘Comprehending Complex Concepts’, Cognitive Science, Vol. 12, Iss. 4, October-November 1988, pp. 529-582. 7 V. Shabes, Event and Text, Vysshaya Shkola, Moscow, 1989, pp. 24-32. 8 H.J. Zimmerman, Fuzzy Set Theory and I ts Applications, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001. 9 T. Sørensen ‘A Method of Establishing Groups of Equal Amplitude in Plant Sociology Based on Similarity of Species and Its Application to Analyses of the Vegetation on Danish Commons’, Biologiske Skrifter/Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskab, Vol. 5 (4), 1957, pp. 1-34.

Bibliography Almond, G. et al., Comparative Politics Today: A World View. Pearson, 2010. Hancock, D., Politics in Europe: An Introduction to the Politics of the United Kingdom, France, German, Italy, Sweden, Russia, Poland and t he European Union. Sage Publications Inc., 2006. Murphy, G., ‘Comprehending Complex Concepts’. Cognitive Science. Vol. 12, Iss. 4, October-November 1988, pp. 529-582. Rokeach, M., The Nature of Human Values. The Free Press, New York, 1973. Schwartz, S. and Bilsky, W., ‘Toward a U niversal Psychological Structure of Human Values’. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol. 53 (3), September 1987, pp. 550-582. Shabes,V.J., Event and Text. Vysshaya Shkola, Moscow, 1989.

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__________________________________________________________________ Sørensen, T., ‘A Method of Establishing Groups of Equal Amplitude in Plant Sociology Based on Similarity of Species and Its Application to Analyses of the Vegetation on Danish Commons’. Biologiske Skrifter/Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskab. Vol. 5 (4), 1957, pp. 1-34. Williams, R., ‘Change and Stability in Values and Value Systems: A Sociological Perspective’. Understanding Human Values. Simon and Schuster, 2000. Zimmerman, H.J., Fuzzy Set Theory and Its Applications. Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001 Fourth Ed. V. Shabes is Doctor of Linguistics, Full Professor at the Department of Romanic Languages, Herzen State Pedagogical University, Russia. His main academic interests lie in the theory of mental representation and experimental cognitive linguistics. G. Bostedt is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Department of Education, Mid-Sweden University. His main areas of research are currently on how to understand local governance, student influence in schools and social science didactics. E. Troshchenkova is Associate Professor at the Department of English, St.Petersburg State University. Her interests are in cognitive science and psycholinguistics, especially sociocultural mental representations and communicative strategies of manipulation and metarepresentation. L. Ivarsson, PhD, Assistance Professor in Education at the Department of Education, Mid Sweden Uiversity, Sweden. She is interested in learning processes, reading and writing development, and international co-operation. U. Damber is Senior Lecturer in pedagogy and a teacher educator at Mid Sweden University. Her main research area is literacy, including didactics and diversity. T. Potapova is Senior Lecturer at the Department of English for Economy and Law students, St.-Petersburg State University. While being interested mainly in psycholinguistic research of graded lexical paradigms and problems of understanding within and between genders, the current research where she participates together with colleagues is devoted to analysis of special features of value systems of Russians and Swedes and their comparative analysis.