Narratives Of National Identity Research Articles

PLATFORMS OF EXPANSIONISM: A COMPARISON OF RUSSIA'S NARRATIVES FOR UKRAINE AND SERBIA'S NARRATIVES FOR KOSOVO

Following the invasion of Crimea by Russia, there has been a significant shift in academic focus towards the study of Ukraine. Russia's efforts to establish a new warfront in the Western Balkans have drawn attention to the developments in the region. This paper offers a comparative analysis of the narratives put forth by Russia concerning Ukraine and Serbia's perspectives on Kosovo. Both Russia and Serbia have constructed fake narratives that present their geopolitical disputes as issues of historical and national identity and territorial integrity. In the case of Russia, the narratives regarding Ukraine underscore a shared history, the protection of ethnic Russians, while contesting Ukrainian sovereignty. Similarly, Serbia's narratives about Kosovo emphasize the cultural and historical significance of Kosovo, drawing its fake narrative for Kosovo as integral to Serbian identity and rejecting its independence as illegitimate and imposed by foreign powers. By delving into official discourse and media representations, this study aims to explore three core narratives used as expansionist platforms: historical and national identity narratives, the narrative of victimization and the narratives on the legitimacy of statehood and sovereignty and how these narratives are utilized within domestic and international spheres to gain internal and international support, legitimize policies, and perpetuate a sense of victimhood. The paper contends that although the contexts differ, the strategic deployment of historical grievances, ethnic unity, and anti-Western sentiment forms a common platform in the expansionist approaches of Russia and Serbia.

Against observation: the panoramic legacy of Sergei Loznitsa

ABSTRACT Critical reception of Ukrainian director Sergei Loznitsa’s documentary films typically concludes that the director privileges observational techniques to depict historical events and political movements, resulting in conflicting judgements on his films’ significance and reducing Loznitsa’s own involvement in the depicted events. This article addresses the techniques and visual grammar of Loznitsa’s 2014 film Maidan and challenges the film’s status as an example of the observational documentary mode. This article proposes approaching Maidan through a recognition of the influence of the panorama on realist representation from its inception in the late eighteenth century to its transformation of cinema in the twentieth century, showing how Loznitsa has developed a panoramic filmmaking language since his early short films. Maidan contrasts the ideas of objectivity and passivity typically assigned to observational films by constructing a historical narrative about the events that occurred in Kyiv’s Maidan Nezalezhnosti during the Euromaidan movement of 2013–2014. This renegotiation of Loznitsa’s filmmaking mode reveals Maidan’s unique contribution to non-fiction representational forms as well as to narratives of national identity within the post-Soviet context.

“The Real Kazakh is a Dombyra”?: Musical Instruments and Nation Branding in 21st-Century Kazakhstan

ABSTRACT Although both the two-string plucked lute dombyra and two-stringed horsehair fiddle qyl-qobyz possess strong ties to the nomadic heritage of the Kazakhs, the dombyra embodies a much more public, accessible, and officially endorsed musical representation of Kazakh-ness than the mysterious and complicated qyl-qobyz. This article will explore the characteristics that have come to define the dombyra and qyl-qobyz in the Kazakh national imagination, and how musical instruments participate in “nation branding” by reinforcing a desirable image of the nation-state – and by extension promoting a particular narrative of national identity – while also complicating that image by embodying complex and occasionally difficult histories.

Numbers as Fact-Icons: The Public Power of ‘6402’ in Post-War Colombia

In 2021, the Peace Court of Colombia revealed that the national army had systematically executed 6402 innocent civilians, falsely presenting them as members of illegal armed groups. This revelation catapulted the number ‘6402’ into a prominent position within the country’s public discourse. I reconstruct the first six months of the figure’s dissemination, encompassing its coverage in both traditional and social media. In this analysis, I put forth a novel cultural-sociological conceptualization of numbers as ‘fact-icons’, departing from conventional views that regard statistics as purely technical entities. For wide segments of the Colombian public, ‘6402’ became a continuing political emblem not only because it reflected the magnitude of a real atrocity, but also due to factors of a more symbolic kind. First, the publication of the figure was constructed as a collective experience of ‘epiphany’ by journalists and media commentators. Second, it was infused with deep narratives of national identity by social movement activists. Lastly, it became a focal point of effervescent collective action through stylized aesthetic representations within the realm of popular art.

Home movies as technologies of belonging and resistance

This article examines the significance of home movies as tools of resistance and belonging, particularly for African American families during the Civil Rights era. Focusing on archival collections from the South Side Home Movie Project (SSHMP), African American Home Movie Archive (AAHMA), and the National Museum of African American History & Culture (NMAAHC), the study reveals how African American families, through their cinematic documentation of visits to national parks and other leisure activities, challenged prevailing narratives of national identity. Despite encountering rampant discrimination, these families captured moments of joy and relaxation, highlighting their resilience and assertion of their rightful place within the American narrative. These historical home movies are profound testimonials of Black identity, resilience, and belonging in the face of adversity. Examining these films enriches our understanding of cultural memory, national identity, and the role of African American home movies in presenting a more nuanced American history.

Narratives of memory and national identity; analyzing agency in contemporary Holocaust memory initiatives

ABSTRACT Constructing narratives of memory has long been acknowledged as a major component of nationalism and nation building. In Israel the memory of the Holocaust is widely seen as constituting one of these major components and is at the core of Israeli national identity. Since the early 2000s, the imminent passing of Holocaust survivors has resulted in an intense preoccupation with the question of the future of this memory. This preoccupation has produced new commemorative initiatives engaging with interactive digital platforms. In our article we explore the role of human agency in successfully conjuring up alternative or forgotten memories that dramatically transform contemporary remembrance landscapes by analyzing two recent commemorative projects in Israel, Zikaron Besalon and Eva’s story. Informed by the understanding of the centrality of temporal orientations to the dynamics of social interaction in our analysis we adopt a temporal framework.

National identity in the exhibition of the Silesian museum: A case study based on the methodology of dispositive analysis

This study presents research on the exhibition Encyclopaedia of Silesia at the Silesian Museum in Opava. The aim of the research was to identify the form of Czech national identity that is constructed and reconstructed by this exhibition, by focusing on the elements and narratives through which Czech national identity is presented and constructed. It also examines whether these elements replicate the prevailing ideas and stereotypes related to this identity in society. The research takes the form of a case study based on dispositional analysis, and showed that the narrative of Czech national identity appears in the exhibition. This confirmed that national identity can emerge not only in national museums but also in other types of museum – in this case a regional museum in which national and regional identities are intertwined.

How Soon We Forget: National Myth-Making and Recognition of the Armenian Genocide

ABSTRACT Scholars in genocide studies have covered much ground in identifying causes and consequences of genocides. But much less has been done in the area of genocide recognitions: Why have countries recognized some genocides but not others? Strategic and economic relations with perpetrator states, or the influence of diasporan ethnic minorities are often assumed as causes, but we propose that conceptions of national identity may underlie these other factors. We explore a case that other factors do not readily explain: Given New Zealand’s previous bold stances on human rights, its strong self-identity as a human rights supporter, its recognition of some genocides, and its active and vociferous support of Armenians before, during and after the genocide, why does it refuse to recognize the Armenian genocide? We explore New Zealand’s reversal of attitudes by analyzing its public and official discourse in three time periods – first at the time of the Armenian genocide; second, in the late twentieth century when new narratives of national identity, enthusiasm for trade relations with Turkey, and the Anzac myth were established, and third, in the contemporary era, in which successive governments continue to refuse recognition. While we think the anticipated closer economic relations with Turkey during the second timeframe helped drive the shift, we theorize that New Zealand’s current refusal to recognize the genocide is grounded in the construction of its national identity during the second period – particularly in the establishment of the Anzac myth. This involved a changing portrayal of “the Turks” from enemy to fellow victims of the evils of war and imperial invasion, and modern-day Turkey as the sacred “home” of New Zealand’s war dead.

“Life Would Never Feel This Good Again”: The Use of Pastiche in Edgar Wright’s The World’s End (2013)

This article explores the ways in which pastiche, the past, and national iden- tity are portrayed and navigated in the concluding film of Edgar Wright’s The Cornetto Trilogy: The World’s End (2013). By focusing on the relationship between the use of the past and pastiche, it will be considered how they are employed to negotiate the notion of national identity. Through its comedic strategies and tropes, the film rebels against a ho- mogenised version of Englishness based on mythical assumptions of the past and striving toward perfection. The dissection of the cinematic structure of pastiche will reveal a tem- poral framework questioning contemporary narratives of national identity. Moreover, the exploration of nostalgia and the past as places of retreat, as well as pastiche as a device of comedic criticism, enable Wright to offer a portrait of Englishness as struggling to recover its identity amidst a turbulent and apocalyptic time.

Sweden – a nation of seafarers or peasants? Swedish naval officers and national identity as revealed in the magazine Vår Flotta, 1905–1939

Swedish national identity reflects a tradition of independent freeholding peasants, even though the majority of the population lives along the coasts. The sea has often been neglected in studies analysing Swedish national identity. This article analyses one of many Swedish narratives of national identity – namely, that found in the monthly magazine Vår Flotta: Tidskrift för Sjövapnet (Our Fleet: Magazine for the Navy). The narrative of the magazine strongly emphasized the importance of the sea to Sweden. The sea, with its strong symbolism, was a vital part of the magazine's national narrative. According to Vår Flotta, the sea and its control would determine Sweden's fate as it had historically. The navy had saved Sweden from being dragged into a war or being invaded by foreign powers. A close connection to the sea, facing its dangers, would also allow the true Swedish national qualities to develop: bravery, calmness, confidence, cleanliness and a willingness to make sacrifices for the greater good. The national-identity narrative in the magazine remained fairly constant across the 35 years studied in this article.

Nativized exoticism in “el país de todas las sangres”

ABSTRACT In this paper I develop a perspective of nativized exoticism to describe how discourses around Peruvian Chineseness as both assimilated and exotic promote a multicultural mestizo national narrative that nevertheless overlooks questions of representation and the subject gaze. Using a qualitative approach, my argument connects micro-level analysis of spoken and mediated discourse to the broader contemporary and sociohistorical context. Findings extend existing work on processes of racialization in diaspora and the image of Asians as “perpetual foreigners” as well as imagined societies (Anderson, B. 2006. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso) and myths of equalizing mestizaje in Latin America. Findings further connect cotidian discourses to broader issues of appropriation and materiality within the national identity narrative.

Experiences of Microaggression by Black Professionals in Social Services in Portugal

ABSTRACT The study explores the experiences of microaggression by Black professionals in the social service field in Portugal. In depth interviews were conducted with seven participants and the data was analyzed thematically. Critical race theory and the conceptual framework of “microaggression” as a specific form of implicit racism is used to elucidate the everyday experiences and consequences of microaggression. The themes under experiences of microaggression in the workplace indicate how Black professionals are perceived as the racial Other, the triad of microaggression from the supervisor, subordinates and coworkers, white fragility, pressure to assimilate, ethno-racial matching, gendered racism and the organizational culture that perpetuates microaggression. The results indicate how “lusotropical” narratives of Portuguese national identity as a “good” colonizer led to the denial of racism which perpetuates microaggression. The research also highlights the consequences of microaggression, particularly the intergenerational trauma associated with racism and shaped by colonial systems of cultural oppression. This study recommends engaging in radical social work action that challenges oppression at both an individual and structural level through ideological critique and collective political movements for anti oppressive social policy changes.

Deconstructing media narratives of the Indo-Pacific strategy: Exploring India’s ontological security and national identity in the Times of India

India’s attempt to forge a distinct role for itself in the global order started soon after independence in 1947. Since this watershed event, India’s policymakers have gradually recast their initial strategy of nonalignment, as they realized that Nehruvian “soft” power was not adequate for creating an especially dynamic presence in an increasingly volatile international environment. In response to this realization, India embarked on a journey of transforming its diplomatic benchmarks. In 2017, to counter China’s assertiveness across the region, India joined then-U.S. President Donald Trump’s advocacy in launching the Indo-Pacific strategy. Transforming the nation’s diplomatic benchmarks while maintaining a coherent narrative of national identity was the main challenge. This paper examines the role that media narratives play in maintaining that coherent national identity. To do so, we analyzed 47 reports by the Times of India (TOI) on the Indo-Pacific strategy in order to reveal how elite media strategically framed the nation’s regional policy, thereby ensuring its ontological security—its sense of continuity and order—while conveying its global aspirations.

Representing Russia's Orient: From Ethnography to Art Song by Adalyat Issiyeva (review)

Reviewed by: Representing Russia's Orient: From Ethnography to Art Song by Adalyat Issiyeva David Salkowski Representing Russia's Orient: From Ethnography to Art Song. By Adalyat Issiyeva. (AMS Studies in Music.) New York: Oxford University Press, 2021. [xxi, 406 p. ISBN 9780190051365 (hardback), $61; also available as e-book, ISBN and price vary.] Music examples, illustrations, maps, bibliography, index. Of the many important terms Adalyat Issiyeva introduces to the nonspecialist reader in this remarkable book, perhaps the central one is inorodets, [End Page 621] meaning literally a person "of different descent" (p. 10). Applied to ethnic non-Russians in the Russian Empire, the term highlights one of the fundamental contexts underlying this study: the vast landmass of the Russian Empire was inhabited by a multitude of ethnic, cultural, and linguistic groups who were regarded as "others" by European Russians. Issiyeva cites a surprisingly candid Russian military officer who notes the irony that it is the local community (in this case, the Chuvash people), not the minority, governing Russians, who were the "others" (p. 68). This paradox of imperial incorporation and the way Russians negotiated it through scholarly and cultural production animates the pages of this impressive study. While on its surface Issiyeva's work is an investigation of musical representations of imperial "others" in nineteenth-century Russian music, it accomplishes far more, giving a deep, fluid, and incisive analysis of the relationship between empire and ethnographic knowledge. Through meticulous and detailed work with sometimes obscure sources, she provides an account of the development of (musical) ethnography in imperial Russia. This in turn establishes essential context for understanding the better-known names of Russian music, as they are themselves products of a multi-ethnic, expanding empire. The subtitle of the book reflects both its structure and a greater trajectory of knowledge production. Issiyeva's first three chapters concern the representation of the Russian Empire's non-Russian ethnicities within folk song and ethnographic studies about the folk music of Russia's Asian subjects. The second group of three analyzes the ways in which this knowledge of imperial "others" was metabolized by composers and institutions into art song, a genre that, as Issiyeva notes, has often been overlooked by scholars of Russian nationalism and orientalism, in comparison to opera and symphonic music (p. 6). In chapter 1, Issiyeva focuses on representations of imperial others in a number of folk genres, including the bylinas (an epic oral form of poetry), soldier songs, and children's songs. This story rhymes with larger European narratives of seeking national identity in the folk traditions of an imagined past while also speaking to the specific challenges of imperial governance. A particularly compelling example is found in Alexander Nikulin's Collection of Songs Compiled for Children, published in two editions in Polish-speaking Vilna (present-day Vilnius, Lithuania) in 1870 and 1881 (Sbornik pesen sostavlennyi dlia detei Aleksandrom Nikulinym [Vilnius: A. G. Syrkina, 1870] and Sbornik pesen sostavlennyi Alexandrom Nikulinym, odobrennyi Uchenym Komitetom Narodnogo Prosvyashcheniia dlia upotrebleniia v shkolakh Vilenskogo Uchebnogo Okruga [Vilnius: A. G. Syrkina, 1881]). Issiyeva notes that from the first edition to the second—which spans a decade of uprisings and repressions in the imperially controlled Kingdom of Poland—an innocuous children's collection expands into an ideological tool (pp. 37–38). These Russian-language songs, approved for use in Polish schools, use stereotypes of Caucasian subjects to demonize the "bad" imperial other (the "evil Chechen" of Mikhail Lermontov's "Cossack Lullaby") and model the proper integration of the "good" subject, exemplified by assimilated Georgians in the song "Appeal." Issiyeva notes that the melody of this latter song contains references to both Mikhail Glinka's art song "Do Not Sing for Me Thy Song of Georgia" and an aria from A. Verstovskiĭ's Askold's Grave (p. 39), thus folding these "good" neighbors into an imperial frame on a musical level. [End Page 622] In chapter 2, Issiyeva demonstrates the role of scholars in supplying knowledge of local customs and traditions in Russian Asia to imperial officials as well as the ethnographic work generated by certain military officials themselves. This chapter also shines important light on the history of ethnography outside Europe. For instance...

‘Here in the US’: Identity narratives, national beliefs and corporate governance values in Big Tech Hearing discourse

Starting from the idea that understanding Big Tech ideologies is a prerequisite for assessing how major tech corporations see a (re)organization of society, this paper offers an analysis of the opening statements of the CEOs of four of these corporations during 2020 antitrust hearings before the U.S. House Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee. These statements were ‘critical discourse moments’ that foregrounded the beliefs of the CEOs in the collision between their discourse and that of government and politics. Using a critical perspective on discourse analysis as a main research approach, this research found that the opening statements blended (inter)national imaginaries, identity narratives and corporate values. Together, these factors communicated the notion of an ideal society in which tech companies awarded themselves a dual role: (1) national conductors towards what we call ‘techno/opportunity’ for individuals, and (2) politically neutral agents in the service of American world dominance. In this sense, ‘competition’ was reconstructed as a practice that, on a national level, must occur within Big Tech instead of between tech corporations and other actors. On an international level competition existed between ideologically opposed nation states where corporations were envisioned as representatives of these states.

Indonesian Nationalism in Three Acts: The Intertwined Narratives of National Identity and the Subaltern Woman in Three Iconic Indonesian Novels

This article examines the evolution of the intertwined narratives of nation and womanhood in three iconic Indonesian novels: Belenggu (1940), Sri Sumarah (1975), and Durga Umayi (1991), each of which, respectively, depicts female protagonists wrestling with life challenges during three different historical epochs of the Indonesian nation-state. I argue that these novels portray three distinct conceptions of an evolving Indonesian nationalism as reflected through the struggles of these characters. The first of these, Belenggu, highlights the hybrid nature of emerging Indonesian nationalism through the symbolic deployment of hybrid music–keroncong–as a central trope. The second novel, Sri Sumarah, depicts the culturally idealized qualities of a submissive woman–embodied in its titular character–and the gendered nature of nationalism. The third, Durga Umayi, kaleidoscopically maps the biography of its heroine onto the triumphs and defeats of the nation as experienced from the perspective of the subaltern subject, thus depicting the project of nation-building as seen, experienced, and lived from an inferior social position. Taken together these three novels dramatize three different stages of Indonesia as “imagined community”: from the promise and the peril of the early years as an emerging nation-state, to its division along ideological lines before and after the 1965 coup, and ultimately to the failed promises attending the spread of neoliberalism and globalization in subsequent decades.

Contemporary Latvian Design in Symbiosis with Local Handicraft Tradition

AbstractThe contemporary musealization of Latvian design objects or the inclusion of high-quality examples in the Latvian National Museum Holdings began in 2005. Established three years later in 2008, the Latvian Design of the Year Award has since then attracted attention to this field, prompting further theoretical discourse. The publicly available narrative on 21st century Latvian design often points out the strong influence of local crafts and ethnic cultural heritage. An important impetus in contemporary, ethnically conscious design is the culture of the Song and Dance Celebration, within which the outfits of festival participants are created. This article identifies the application of traditional Latvian crafts in the works of Latvian artists and designers, visualizing the ideas and forms of ethnic identity. The analysis focuses on the general context of Latvian design: institutions supported by the Ministry of Culture, the Latvian Design of the Year Award and FOLD, the digital magazine of creative industries. Sources used include opinion articles and the public messages of companies. To facilitate theoretical understanding of the topic, it was important to take into account the theory of national identity and the museum narrative as well as the history of European design, especially at the turn of the 20th/21st centuries. It should be noted that the history of applied art and design in Latvia during the 20th century is still in the research stage. A historical insight into the construction of the Latvian traditional craft narrative, which began at the end of the 19th century, is also provided so as to promote greater comprehension of Latvian design. Essentially, it is a narrative of national identity, deliberately constructed through the craft practices, raw materials and compositional techniques characteristic of peasant culture.

Belonging to the nation: Negotiating narratives of national identity in Aotearoa New Zealand

One of the most important yet complex contemporary political projects of belonging relate to rapidly diversifying societies. While prior research has tended to focus on how young people work to fit into the nation, this study sought to examine the processes by which ethnic minority young people (re)produced, reimagined and challenged narratives of national belonging. Underpinned by feminist theoretical understandings of citizenship and everyday nation, the study examined how young people (n = 180) attending four superdiverse high schools in Aotearoa New Zealand deliberated and negotiated the parameters of who belonged to the nation. The use of a qualitative participatory strategy – self-directed peer focus groups – opened up opportunities for young people to debate and contest complex ideas about belonging and national identity. Ethnic minority participants expressed widespread dissatisfaction with traditional narrow, monocultural narratives of national identity and drew on illustrations from their own everyday encounters with diverse others to offer more inclusive alternatives. Many employed affective notions of national belonging that centred on ‘feeling’ like, or choosing to be a ‘Kiwi’, rather than being chosen. Their deliberations and dialogue demonstrated agentic ways in which ethnic minority young people were ‘rewriting’ the narratives of national belonging to ensure that they and their peers were located as legitimate citizens of the nation, and in doing so, revealed the formation of their citizenship subjectivities.

“Glossed over and missing”: Preservice teachers learn about slavery in Canada

ABSTRACT The more than 200 years of chattel slavery in Canada is an example of the country’s occluded history predicated on structural racism. This study of preservice elementary teachers in a social studies methods course helps to reveal how the history of Black enslavement in Canada has been effectively erased from the national consciousness. Using a symbolic interactionism/grounded theory methodology, I seek to make meaning from more than 70 preservice teachers’ written responses to a reading on slavery and abolition in Canada. This study’s findings help reveal some of the challenges to, and possibilities for, interrogating historical consciousness and national identity narratives as a process of learning within the contexts of methods courses.

Bharatanatyam and Buddhist diplomacy: inter-Asia significations in Santha Bhaskar’s Anweshana: The Search for Nalanda

ABSTRACT This paper considers a work of the Indian classical dance form Bharatanatyam performed as a vehicle for inter-Asian soft-diplomatic ventures in Singapore. Widely practiced by Singapore’s ethnic Tamil-Hindu minority, Bharatanatyam took a brief “Buddhist turn” in the early 2010s. In stark contrast to Bharatanatyam’s standard recourse to Hindu mythology, several high-profile stage productions including Anweshana (2011), have featured Buddhist themes, iconography and narratives. I put forward a conceptual model of choreographic reassembly that centers on the choreographer’s efforts at negotiating the regulatory regimes that contour Singaporean cultural production. As Buddhist themes in Bharatanatyam render Indianness as fungible within Buddhist and Hindu religious paradigms, dance becomes a vital site to read how Singapore’s racial minority subjects position themselves in relation to shifting narratives of ethnicity, religion and national identity.