Turning the sock inside out: history of Basque studies from a transnational perspective

Abstract

ABSTRACT Historiography on area studies has too often adopted national and homeland traditions as an unproblematic framework of analysis, rather than regarding them as nourished by transnational relationships at different levels. Transnational mobility spaces are defined by crossing and inter-crossing movements, rather than by territories and borders, and represent a particularly appropriate approach for rethinking the historical evolution of those area studies linked to stateless nations and sub-state homelands, such as Basque studies. In this article, it is contended that the history of Basque studies gains clarity and understanding when a transnational perspective is adopted and the following three mechanisms that decisively generated the flows of people and ideas between homeland and diasporas are analysed: 1) the deployment of transnational scholarly networks; 2) mobility linked to exile and the intellectual diaspora; and 3) transnational scholarly exchanges and scholarships.