National Identity Building Research Articles

BUILDING RUSSIAN UNIVERSITY STUDENTS’ NATIONAL IDENTITY IN MULTICULTURAL SOCIETY (ANALYSIS OF MULTICULTURAL NATIONS’ EXPERIENCE)

Introduction. Development of the pedagogical toolkit for building national identity of young generation has a special significance in terms of modern globalization processes that weaken the national unity and national identity of many countries. Present-day Russian multicultural society is in the search of a meaningful content of the new Russian identity, which is supposed to serve as the basis of the country. In this regard, it is of vital importance to consider the effective experience of national identity development in countries characterized by an extended multicultural structure. The aim of the article is to study, put together and critically assess productive international approaches, methods and technologies for building of university students’ national identity acceptable in the Russian higher education system. Methodology and research methods. The methodology is based on the personal identity theory, the concept of national identity, the theory of ethno-cultural and national stereotypes and the theory of intercultural interaction. To conduct an empirical study, a survey method (questionnaire) and the methodology of content analysis were applied. The research methods used in the study include comparative, historical, and contrastive methods. Results and scientific novelty. The concept «national identity» has no common interpretation because of complexity of the term and rather short history of its use in the Russian pedagogical studies; thus, the authors have clarified the definition. Structural and content-related components of the national identity of students have been stated: cognitive, emotional and behavioral, which correlate with national consciousness, national feelings and nationally-based behavior. Practical methods and technologies that ensure a balanced development of ethnocultural and national components of university students’ national identity have been revealed, systematized and structured: inclusive and activity-oriented approach (USA), inclusive-mosaic approach (Canada), inclusive and value-oriented approach (Australia). Both positive and negative elements are specified in the characteristics of these approaches. Essentially different axiological mental and spiritual values of Russia and West countries are emphasized. It is stated that the best positive foreign experience (e. g. education of an active citizenship, polycultural tolerance, abilities to protect own rights, to interact with representatives of various cultures avoiding conflicts, etc.) appears to be non-contradictory to the specifics of the Russian national system of values, and can become the material for the development of programmes and means selection for building of national identity of young people in the Russian higher education institutions. Practical significance. An integrated pedagogical complex mechanism for building the national identity of students in a multicultural society is revealed. It consists of appealing to the national consciousness, national feelings and the nationally-based behavioral components of national identity through the application of interactive and reflexive multicultural technologies. Interactive and reflexive multicultural technologies contain technologies aimed at transforming the content of education; technologies aimed at multicultural transformation of students’ personalities; technologies for modeling a multicultural environment. An illustrative list of indicators of national identity building as qualities of future experts is provided.

Soviet Estonian bicycle film: sport, nation and race narratives

ABSTRACTThis article deals with Soviet Estonian bicycle films focusing on sport. Four films are selected for analysis: three documentaries by Hans Roosipuu and the fiction film Küljetuul/Side Wind (1983) by Raul Tammet. The films show a chronological development of the bicycle race film, starting with Hans Roosipuu's short film Ülekanne 56:13/Transmission 56:13 (1969) and ending with Raul Tammet's Side Wind, screened on television a few years before Glasnost was introduced in the Soviet Union. The analysis focuses on the issue of national identity building on the notion that sport was one of the few venues where Estonians could express their nationality. The analysis finds that the closer we get to the Glasnost period the more the films tend to highlight the Estonianness or concerns for Estonian bicycle riders. Moreover, in comparison with Western bicycle film, the Estonian films have didactic qualities based in the traditions of socialist realism and a tendency to elevate the bicycle race mechanic due to Soviet bicycling culture being less advanced. Also earlier than their Western counterpart, the Estonian bicycle films are concerned with the ‘green’ value of the bicycle in a drive to criticize the Soviet authorities. In doing this the Soviet Estonian bicycle films adheres to the dynamic of the Glasnost film.

Religion, National Identity and Nation Building: Muhammad Mitwalli Sha?rawi’s Concept of Islam and Its Ties to Modern Egyptian Politics

Muhammad Mitwalli Sha?r?w? (1911–1998) was a Muslim religious scholar (s. ?alim, p. ?ulama?) who worked in an official capacity for the Egyptian government, and gained celebrity through his televised Quranic interpretations. By the time Sha?r?w? began his television career, Al-Azhar, the premier institution for training Sunni ?ulama?, was fully integrated into the apparatus of the Egyptian Republic, which made it easy for the state to solicit the help of ?ulama? like Sha?r?w? in its nation-building project. Sha?r?w? used Islam to bring forth a new sense of belonging, but his language about national belonging clashed with his exclusivist religious language. By looking at the attempted construction of national identity over time, this article charts the negotiation between religion and politics in late twentieth century Egypt where religion was not ousted from public discussion, but was subject to institutionalized restrictions, and allowed continuities in order to support national inclusivity.

Editorial Foreword

Volume 8, issue no. 1 (2016) of Revista Română de Studii Baltice şi Nordice/ The Romanian Journal for Baltic and Nordic Studies (RRSBN) gathers articles dealing with history, literary history and literary studies. The first group of articles engaged with topics related to Nordic and Baltic history from the early Middle Ages to the Modern Age. Such is the article which opens the journal signed by Costel Coroban. His thesis is that Konungs skuggsjá (King’s Mirror or Speculum Regale), the piece of work elaborated in 1250 under King Hákon Hákonarson (1217-1263) for his son, future King Magnús lagabœtir (1263-1280), emphasizes piety as one of the essential features of a good Christian. Cases of arrogance and individualism have to be chastened and that was one of the essential attributes and duties of a sovereign. Roxana-Ema Dreve tackles the national identity building in Norway following the separation from Denmark and the creation of a union with Sweden. The article addresses the 1830s’ developments especially with regard to the puzzling debate on the spoken and written national languages and the polemics of Henrik Wergeland and Johan Sebastian Welhaven. Henrik Ibsen continues to inspire inquiries in fields such as literature, social sciences, culture, philosophy as he did when he lived. Gianina Druță studies Ibsen’s masterpiece Hedda Gabler inspired by Gilles Deleuze’s concepts such as deterritorialisation, antigenealogy, rhizome or alliance. Dalia Bukelevičiūtė opens new perspectives in the field of social and welfare of Lithuanian population in Latvia during the interwar period and points out to the unbalanced situation between the two neighboring states of Latvia and Lithuania. While the number of Latvians in Lithuania who needed social protection was meagre, the number of Lithuanians in Latvia was considerable. This posed difficulties to the Lithuanian Government confronted, on one hand, with the needs of Lithuanians, the higher expenses of social services in Latvia and the desire to keep up the Lithuanian identity of the population across the border. This resulted into a wavering policy of the Lithuanian Governments which, however, always returned to the Convention on social assistance concluded with the Latvian counterparts in 1924. This issue of our journal continues to tackle the perceptions of Nordic peoples on Romania, in this case Mihaela Mehedinţi-Beiean depicting the Nordic and Russian travellers’ recollections of corruption and political instability imbedded into the Phanariot system of the 18th century Romania. Finally, this issue brings to the fore a Norwegian personality with a significant role in the Romanian-Norwegian relations, author of chapters, articles and books dealing with this topic: Jardar Seim. Crina Leon successfully sails through the memories of Professor Seim’s first encounters of Romania and the developments of this interest into a research topic.

National identity politics and cultural recognition: the party system as context of choice

ABSTRACTThis paper looks into the determinants of cultural recognition in ethnically diverse democracies that are divided on national identity, arguing that political parties’ cultural ideologies are not entirely predetermined by their national identity position. It posits that, rather than just a tool for national identity building, cultural recognition in such societies is also a way for parties to show commitment to their ethnic electorate. In this sense, the ethnic segmentation of the party system provides political elites with a context of choice from which to formulate their stance on cultural recognition. The paper argues that, far from being divisive, national identity politics can have a strong influence in establishing consensus on national culture. Moreover, it suggests that looking at national identity and recognition politics from the perspective of electoral incentives can help us understand why culture regimes can appear to be unfair to some groups, yet remain legitimate politically.

The Bene-Ideal: China’s Cosmopolitan Vision of World Order

With the rise of China in modern global affairs, the construction of a Chinese international relations (IR) theory that accounts for both its distinctive vision of world order and its overall foreign policy position has become a topical issue. This essay proposes a cosmopolitan approach to Chinese IR centered on the concept of bene-ideal, by which I mean the cosmopolitan wish to embrace diversity and benefit others with one’s abundance. The bene-ideal framework will contribute at once to Chinese IR construction, foreign policy making, and national identity building.

National Identity Building in Mexican Historiography during the Nineteenth Century. An Attempt at Synthesis

National Identity Building in Mexican Historiography during the Nineteenth Century. An Attempt at Synthesis

The Chinese Dream: Imagining China

This article will discuss how the official discourse on the Chinese Dream is transformed in the meeting with the public in China. The Chinese Dream will be discussed both as a political framing discourse and as a public communication campaign in order to understand how the very selective responsiveness to the central theme of the Chinese Dream, the great rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation, influences the impact of the Dream discourse. An analysis of a selection of posts from Sina Weibo demonstrates how the Dream discourse contributes to national identity building, or in Benedict Anderson’s words (in Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism, 1991): to the imagined community that is China.

The Perception of the Greek in the Albanian National Identity-Building Process (1886-1938)

This paper presents the first findings of a longitudinal research to History School Textbooks in the Albanian-speaking Western Balkans, in Albania and outside it, from the Albanian National Awakening Movement to 2010s. The project aims at studying the Image of the 'Other' and its transformations during this time period and is, as far as we are aware, the first of its kind tracing all school history textbooks in a time-series spanning three centuries – Albania being a good example for a case-study. Longitudinal research on history textbooks, rarely pursued (Meyers 1976), seeks to add value to textbook research, as it provides an opportunity to trace the development of history-textbooks' production parallel to the history of a state and the construction of cultural 'remembering.' In doing so, the project, utilizing the idea of researching textbooks for traces of social controversy (Christophe 2010, Klerides 2010) and political conflict (Taylor, Guyver 2011), attempts to identify the role of textbooks in the historical origins and development of socio-political biases towards the 'Other' in Albania, a topic linked with cognitive aspects of collective memory (Beim 2007). One of the research project's facets is to investigate the image of the "Greek" in identifications and identification shifts of the study time and regions vis-a-vis majority/minority group, domestic and international developments, new states, bilateral and multilateral relations. We argue that the image of Greek as the ethnic "Other" in Albania school textbooks transforms in the frame of domestic developments in both countries and of bilateral relations. In this present paper we shall deal specifically with representation of Greek/Greece/Hellenes in the earliest recorded history textbooks in Albania until 1938, a period that corresponds with the first educational initiatives of Albania's national awakening movement (cultural awakening), the nascent Albanian state and its consolidation through mass educational movement until World War II. Our sampling units consist nine history textbooks including Naim Frasheri's Histori e Pergjithshme per Mesonjetoret e Para (General History for the First Schools) (1886, republished in 1920), the very first History textbook used in Albanian schools. In view of the noticeable differences between the various newer editions of older texts we deemed appropriate to code them, although this seemed to be the case more at Chekrezi 1935 as different from Cekrezi 1920, rather than the Frasheri example, where the two versions of the texts are identical. But we decided to include it nonetheless, since this book was reprinted and re-used in schools and one could argue it continued to have some impact.

Taxes, National Identity, and Nation Building: Evidence from France

What is the relationship between state capacity, national identity, and economic development? This paper argues that increases in state capacity can lower the collective action costs associated with political and economic exchange by encouraging the formation of a common identity. This hypothesis is tested by exploiting the fact that the French Monarchy was more successful in substituting its fiscal and legal institutions for those of the medieval seigneurial regime within an area of the country known as the Cinq Grosses Fermes (CGF). Highly disaggregated data on regional self-identification from the 1789 Cahiers de Doleances confirm that regions just inside the CGF were more likely than regions just outside the CGF to identify themselves with national, as opposed to local, institutions. We also show that regions inside the CGF that affiliated with national identity were more economically developed during the first half of the nineteenth century and more likely to contribute towards local public goods.

Rural tourism and national identity building in contemporary Europe: Evidence from Portugal

This article examines the relationship between rural tourism and national identity, with reference to a southern European country. Particular attention is devoted to the meaning making work that the state, national visitors and residents do at two of the most popular Historic Villages of Portugal. Drawing on ethnographic materials, the article sheds light on the links between historic conservation and “heritagization”, as defined by Poria and Ashworth, and demonstrates the force of the nation's medieval origins in the dominant discourses on Portuguese national identity. In addition, it shows that “felt history” has been target by the state to increase levels of consumption through rural tourism, but also triggers a sense of national pride among Portuguese visitors. The residents of Castelo Rodrigo and of Sortelha contest, but they also recycle the officially sanctioned interpretation of the sites as medieval to convey the fascinating distinctiveness of the local identity.

Managing Diversity and Difference in Africa: A Citizenship Approach

In most of their post colonial period, African and other Third World states are coping with ethnic diversity. Process of nation building and formation of national identity has presented immense challenges to these newly formed states. Liberal notion of state neutrality in dealing with its diversity in practice is a myth. These multiethnic states use the western notion of citizenship which is basically based on individualist notion of society. However African society has a character of communitarian conception of society. Their struggle to create a single national identity based on individualism ultimately become responsible for the exclusion of minority communities form the national polity. Hence paper will argues that in order to manage multi-ethnicity and multi-nationality within the notion of nation-states, an enhanced notion of inclusive citizenship is apparent for democratic polity.

Between the nation and the globe: education for global mindedness in Finland

This article explores some of the tensions at the interface of nationalist and global orientations in ideals of global mindedness and global citizenship looking specifically at the Finnish context. We engage with discussions related to the social–political and historical context of national identity in Finland and outline the conceptual framework of an educational initiative related to the development of global mindedness through experiences of international mobility and partnerships. This conceptual outline presents a set of theoretical distinctions through which we seek to challenge humanist and universalist approaches to the question of (the formation of) global mindedness by arguing that the issue is neither about cognition or understanding nor about empathy and relationships but ultimately has to do with modes of existence and exposure. Similar to discussions in other small states, the historical trajectory in Finland illustrates how the encounter between the nation and the globe poses particular challenges for education as it runs the risk of reverting to ethnocentric rather than globally minded forms of national identity building. We argue that this risk cannot be addressed with the promotion of a mere understanding of or mere empathy for the other as an educational or political antidote but rather requires an existential approach.

The Perceived Authenticity of Iconic Heritage Sites in Urban Tourism: the Case of Constitutional Hill, Johannesburg, South Africa

Cultural heritage sites play multiple roles in the development of urban tourism. Amongst these roles, the authentic properties of cultural heritage generate a sense of place, are the main source of authentic tourist experience and assume an important role in reaffirming cultural and national identity. This paper provides a contribution to authenticity discourse both theoretically and empirically. The study examines and re-evaluates the main sources of authenticity of tourist experience generated from South African iconic places which serve a dual function, as ‘must-see’ tourist attractions and as places of new post-1994 national African identity building. The focus is the Constitution Hill heritage site in Johannesburg. The research explores how authentic is the individual tourist experience of the site and whether differences exist in the way domestic and international tourists perceive the authenticity of the iconic place as representative of new South African identity. The results show that the majority of tourists perceive the place as authentic and derive an authentic experience from the visit. No statistically significant differences are observed between the experience of domestic versus international tourists’ experience of the site which was measured by four variables of authentic experience, namely, attraction, attention, outcomes and feelings.

National identity in fragile states: insights from tertiary students in Melanesia and Timor-Leste

The challenges of nation building in Melanesia and Timor-Leste have often been neglected in the regional focus on state-building challenges. High levels of ethno-linguistic diversity, combined with an array of regional, historical and cultural divisions, continue to present obstacles to the creation of a cohesive sense of national political community leading these nations to be labelled ‘fragile’. This paper presents the findings of a comparative study on the attitudes of tertiary students in Melanesia and Timor-Leste to national identity and nation building. A strong pan-Melanesian pattern of group identification was identified, common to Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. The ongoing importance of traditional authority and custom in informing conceptions of political community and identity was evident in all four case study sites, but was in each case matched by indicators of respect for modern state authority. The survey also reveals some significant gender differences in key attitudes towards national identity, including the role of traditional authorities. Most importantly, the study reveals high degrees of national pride, and faith in democratic principles and citizenship; but conversely, low levels of pride in contemporary democratic performance and inter-group tolerance.

THE BOUNDARIES OF ŠTOKAVIAN DIALECT AS THE BORDERS OF UNITED NATIONAL STATE OF ETHNO-LINGUISTIC SERBS

This research paper sets out to present linguistic aspect of ideological framework in making both Serbian national identity and national state building program created in the first half of 19th century by two different Serbian writers (Vuk Stefanović-Karadžić and Ilija Garašanin). In the following decades this “linguistic” framework of national identity became one of the cornerstones of Serbian national ideology and foreign policy. The question of national identity and creation of national state occupied the first place of agenda in the mind of the leading Serbian intellectuals and politicians in the first half of 19th century. Imbued by ideas of German Romanticism and French Revolution, Serbian patriotic public actors set up a goal to create an ideologicalpolitical framework for Serbian national liberation under foreign occupation – Roman Catholic Habsburg Monarchy and Islamic Ottoman Empire. The present work investigates the linguistic model of national identification of the South Slavs designed by Vuk Stefanović Karadžić in 1836 and the programme for the restructuring of the political map of the Balkan Peninsula drafted by Ilija Garašanin in 1844. This work is an attempt to reconstruct the understanding of Karadžić and Garašanin of those components of group consciousness which could affect the sense of belonging to the same community. There are three goals of this research paper: to investigate how language influenced Serbian national ideologies in the first half of the 19th century; to discuss how Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, the most influential Serbian 19th century philologist, and Ilija Garašanin, the most important Serbian 19th century politician, answer the fundamental question of Serbian nationalism from the perspective of the 19th century Romanticism: who are the Serbs and what are the borders of the united Serbian national state?; and to define the formation of structure of Serbian linguistic nationalism in the first half of the 19th century. Two research methods were applied were: the method of the text analysis of the prime historical sources and the method of comparison of different interpretations and understandings of the works by V. S. Karadžić and I. Garašanin. The main research results are that V. S. Karadžić’s understanding of the language in the conception of Serbian linguistic nationalism was primarily of ethnic nature and that I. Garašanin drafted a project of the united Serbian national state by implementing a linguistic model of Serb national identification developed by V. S. Karadžić. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7220/2335-2027.2.5

National identity building through patterns of an international third-person perception in news coverage

This article argues that news coverage plays an important role for national identity building in the way that it evaluates the own nation better than foreign nations (in-group/out-group bias). This notion is being transferred to the media as an element of national cultural identity. This article identifies analogies between national identity building through the mass media and the third-person perception, which states that people assume others to be more vulnerable to negative media influences. It is hypothesized that patterns of an international third-person perception occur in news coverage, i.e. the news media should present media influences in the own country to be weaker than in other countries. A first standardized content analysis ( N = 2204) of newspaper coverage from the US and Germany on elections in own and other countries supports this hypothesis. Consequences are discussed and directions for future research are pointed out.

Reassessing Food Safety, Risk and Globalization in China and Japan

In recent years, the number of food safety incidents in East Asia has led to increased concerns about threats to food safety in the region. Indeed, following the 2008 melamine scandal in China and the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant accident in Japan, these concerns are now at unprecedented levels. This article presents an overview of research in social and cultural anthropology, sociology and area studies on food safety and food sovereignty in China (excluding Taiwan) and Japan. One research area captures emerging research on consumer education initiatives and environmental networks that provide guidelines to food preparation skills and food choices. A second research area addresses providence and efforts of culinary heritage preservation that are linked to national identity building and revitalization, in particular in economically disadvantaged areas. As anthropologist Sidney Cheung has argued, recent trends in research on food have shifted from an analysis of food as a marker of social status towards environmental and health issues that are not linked to social status and have an impact on all consumers.

Early National Identity-building in John Kirk Townsend’s “Narrative of a Journey Across the Rocky Mountains”

In early nineteenth century, the American West was still full of unknown and unmapped terrain, teeming with undiscovered forms of life. John Kirk Townsend, a travel writer, naturalist-explorer, and nature writer in early-nineteenth-century America, traveled through the unexplored reaches of the American West. Penetrating into the unknown area of Western American continent, Townsend left a record of his scientific observation: Narrative of a across the Rocky Mountains, to the Columbia River, and a Visit to the Sandwich Islands, Chili,&c., with a Scientific Appendix (1839). Written in the form of a travel diary, Narrative of a Journey is among the most charming early-nineteenth-century accounts of the landscapes and fauna in America's western territories. This study explores John Kirk Townsend's Narrative of a Journey in the context of early national American identity-building. It discusses Townsend's engagement with the culture of American nationalism in early nineteenth century, both in literature and in science. Focusing on Townsend's Narrative of a Journey, this study examines the following questions: In his travel journal how does Townsend build American national identity by documenting the plants, animals, and landscapes in early-nineteenth-century western territories? How does Townsend narrate his scientific discovery about the utterly unknown prairie, species, and desert wilderness of the American West to shape a uniquely national and cultural identity for early America?

Crafting Mexico: Intellectuals, Artisans, and the State after the Revolution

Beginning in the 1920s and extending up until today, Mexican elites have encouraged cultural production (including a variety of popular art and crafts) in promoting a larger, unifying sense of national awareness. Some, like cultural theorist Néstor García Canclini, suggest that Mexico is unique in this, claiming that local artisans achieved a sense of “national identity” even before mass communication and the tourism industry achieved maturity (p. 16).The first part of Crafting Mexico discusses several early state-sponsored or commercial events that helped forge the new cultural nationalism. Here, Rick López explores the role that Mexican popular art played in developing a fresh aesthetic by detailing the many individuals and expanding bureaucratic infrastructure needed to support such an undertaking. The latter half of the book offers a close case study of artisanal work in the village of Olinalá, Guerrero, where craftspeople have fashioned beautiful lacquered boxes, chests, gourds, tableware, masks, and other objects for hundreds of years.In his first chapter, López recounts the history of Félix Palavicini’s (founder and director of El Universal, a Mexico City daily) 1921 India Bonita Contest. Palavicini hired journalist Rafael Pérez Taylor to search high and low for indias bonitas (also called gatitas, or “little kittens”). At first, somewhat surprisingly, they found few. Expanding their gaze beyond the capital and its immediate environs, Pérez Taylor and his crew followed up on photos of possible contestants sent in by newspaper readers. They also sought out candidates in provincial places such as Xalapa, Oaxaca City, and Guanajuato, as well as various “peasant huts and the cane fields” in assorted “picturesque populations” (p. 35).Revealing the exploitative motivation underlying the endeavor, López notes that “when the newspaper published the photos, the accompanying profiles regularly listed the name of the discoverer before the name of the girl herself ” (p. 35). Not surprisingly, elite efforts to advance indigenous culture and identity through the India Bonita project proved superficial, as elite “policing of the indigenous female body” had more to do with mestizo male ideas than anything else.López continues his careful look at state-led arts programming with the Noche Mexicana (Mexican Night) and the Exhibition of Popular Art, both organized to coincide with the 1921 centennial celebration. These events proved part of a global trend seeking to “recast native craft industries from symbols of peasant backwardness into integral components of national identity” (p. 65). At a critical moment in this history, when national identity (re)formation represented a key requirement for capitalist development, several key players in Mexico’s cultural industry took center stage, including President Álvaro Obregón’s foreign minister Alberto Pani, education minister José Vasconcelos, Noche Mexicana head Adolfo Best Maugard, anthropologist Manuel Gamio, artist-intellectual Gerardo Murillo (aka Dr. Atl), and painters Roberto Montenegro and Jorge Enciso, along with a veritable who’s who of postrevolutionary Mexico. As their ambition was nothing less than a near-complete remaking of Mexican national identity, these individuals often clashed. Objectives for both this and other endeavors would prove exceedingly difficult, and success elusive. As López points out, “in the end, the Exhibition of Popular Art and the Noche Mexicana recognized neither indigenous people nor artisans as agents possessed of their own volition and able to define themselves, their art, or their destinies” (p. 94). For elites determined to distinguish their generation from what had existed before the revolution, their idea of native peoples rather than living native people was most often the cornerstone for Mexican national identity building. Bridging this vast chasm would prove difficult, to say the least.When marketing popular art became profitable in the 1940s, some criticized the Mexican government for exploiting artists and encouraging the production of inexpensive, mass-marketed goods. These charges do seem to have helped cause a mild correction starting during the middle decades of the twentieth century. As López summarizes, “promoters of popular art grappled with the tension between their desires to protect handicrafts as patrimony, on the one hand, and their commitment to addressing the social and economic needs of artisans, on the other” (p. 192). Indeed, dealings between business, government, and popular artists — especially after the inception of Fonart (Fondo Nacional para el Fomento de las Artisanías) in the 1970s — were highly contested, with clear winners and losers depending on time and place. One artist in Olinalá stated bluntly, “los ricos win.” But other times, as López argues, there has been an occasional “triumph from below” (p. 263). Outcomes vary depending on a variety of factors. In the end, Crafting Mexico reminds us that quality scholarship does not resort to sweeping generalizations but rather assesses what is often a complex situation case by case. It is an impressive interdisciplinary study that adds much to our appreciation of modern Mexican culture and society.