The Anthropology of Europe

Identities and Boundaries in Conflict

Cris Shore, Victoria A. Goddard, Josep R. Llobera, Cris Shore, Victoria A. Goddard, Josep R. Llobera

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9780854969043
• eBook ISBN: 9781000323290
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Peace & Global Development
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This is the first study of Europe post-1989 from an anthropological perspective. Thirteen distinguished authors examine the social, cultural and political implications of European integration with particular emphasis on changing European identities, concepts of citizenship and levels of participation. Their aim is to suggest an agenda for future research capable of addressing developing trends in contemporary Europe.

The book is divided into two parts. The first deals with major theoretical issues that have characterized the anthropological study of Europe and includes a detailed introductory chapter which charts the history of anthropology in Europe and considers the prospects for an anthropology of Europe. This is followed by key themes in the study of European society and culture including kinship, gender, nationalism, immigration and changing patterns of production. The second section develops these themes further using different theoretical perspectives to explain complex issues such as nationalism, ethnic identities, and sectarian conflicts. Nine case studies cover a wide range of contemporary topics including European integration and Irish nationalism, the transmission of ethnic identity, and identity and conflict in the former Yugoslavia and post-colonial Gibraltar.

This book fills a gap in the literature on European integration and will be of interest to anthropologists and sociologists as well as students of Political Science, Communications and European Studies.

Chapter 1
Introduction: The Anthropology of Europe

Victoria A. Goddard, Josep R. Llobera and Cris Shore

It would be impossible, in a short introduction, to do justice to the breadth and complexity of anthropological studies in Europe in the post-war period.¹ What follows is simply an attempt to map out the broad developments that have shaped the scope and character of anthropological work in Western Europe. For heuristic purposes only, a rough periodization is given, setting out the general context within which the main themes of this introduction are explored. In particular, we focus on the category of the 'Mediterranean' as a culture-area and the slow and erratic emergence of 'Europe' as a distinctive object of anthropological investigation. As we point out, much of the controversy surrounding these issues is bound up in wider questions of method (particularly the centrality of field work), and the epistemological legacy of small-community studies which anthropologists have struggled to transcend. We ask, what have been the achievements of the past four decades of anthropological forays into Europe? When addressing this question we have focused predominantly on the Anglo-Saxon tradition of anthropology. There is an element of arbitrariness in our selection; but while recognizing that there is no single approach to doing anthropology in Europe, we have tried to outline some of the problems associated with an anthropology of Europe. We have therefore concentrated on those works which we deem to be significant in defining the area of study.

1. We would like to thank Dr Jane Cowan for her helpful comments on an earlier draft of this chapter.

The Early Post-War Context: Cold War and the Modernization Paradigm

The political geography of the post-war world arid the changing climate of East-West relations had profound implications for the development of the social sciences in Europe and the USA. These factors not only influenced the context within which social theory developed, but also shaped the agenda for researchers. Political considerations were particularly important. As Almond and Verba (1963) pointed out, the phenomena of Fascism and Communism in Europe had raised a number of questions regarding the character of European societies and cultures, not least the potential of their democratic institutions and values.

The devastation inflicted on European economies by the Second World War brought an urgent need for policies and funding mechanisms to fuel recovery. One response to this was the Bretton Woods Agreement of 1944. This created the International Monetary Foundation (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (or World Bank), both of which were designed to guide an impoverished Europe towards economic recovery. But United States involvement in promoting European defence and development was not innocent of political interest or doctrine. The popularity of the modernization paradigm can only be understood in relation to the political profile of Europe at the time – a Europe sharply divided between East and West, 'Communism' and 'Free World'. The Cold War division of Europe was significant in itself, but in addition it fuelled policies (particularly US policies) aimed at containing or eradicating the dangers of the spread of Communism (cf. Crockatt 1987; Shore 1990). The uncertainty regarding the democratic character and stability of European institutions expressed by Almond and others favoured the expansion of anthropological studies into Europe, particularly into its vulnerable underbelly, the Southern European countries of Italy, Spain and Greece.

The problems encountered by national governments and international organizations in implementing strategies for development in line with modernization theory presented anthropologists with a challenge. They were uniquely placed to understand the cultural differences that were identified as a crucial obstacle to the smooth operation of change in the direction of a market economy. Traditional societies and peasant values were central concerns of study at this time, particularly in the United States, where anthropologists saw their work as having practical application (Redfield 1971 [1956]; Foster 1973 [1962]; Friedl 1958). The growing interest in peasant societies prompted a number of ethnographic studies, focused initially on Central and South America and on Southern Europe, but rapidly coming to include other areas, and more general discussions and a dialogue between anthropologists and other specialists.² It was within this context that Banfield proposed that 'amoral familism', a cognitive orientation prevalent among peasants in Lucania, Southern Italy, was a significant factor in maintaining the persistent backwardness in the region (Banfield 1958).³ Psychological tests utilized by Banfield were also resorted to by other researchers, such as Anne Parsons (1967) in her study of the urban poor of Naples. The anthropologist was concerned not only with defining cultural institutions and values, but also with the enculturation of individuals. In some instances this was linked to the recognition of wider sets of allegiances and a wider cultural context (Benedict 1946a,b; Friedl 1959; Lowie 1954).

2. See in particular Wolf (1966a). The work of specialists in Eastern Europe became central to discussions during the late sixties and seventies, in particular the work of Chayanov.

3. Peasant society and culture were seen as a focus which broke down the distinctiveness of ethnographic areas, in that common problems were identified within peasant societies in different geographical areas. In these early years there was a particularly important cross-fertilization of ideas between Southern Europe and Latin America. Several anthropologists (e.g Pitt-Rivers, Foster, Redfield) had worked in both areas, and the two regions were seen to converge not only in respect of the significance of peasantries in much of the areas concerned but also in terms of cultural values and traditions. This was probably understood in terms of the historical heritage of the Hispano-Lusitanian empires in the New World.

Although the dominant themes at this time were peasant orientations rather than national cultures (but see Lowie 1954) and 'community', meaning small, homogeneous and relatively self-contained groups, there was an increasing awareness of the links between such 'communities' and wider entities and processes. It is in recognition of these connections that, in the Mexican context, Redfield proposed the 'folk-urban continuum' and the distinction between the 'great tradition' and the 'little tradition' (Redfield 1971 [1956]). Redfield recognized the increasing globalization of relations and the growing limitations of the community-as-isolate model. Indeed, he saw anthropologists as instrumental in bringing about these transformations by informing policy decisions (1971 [1956]9).⁴

4. There were other attempts at analysing the links between the local and the national, such as that of Barnes, trained in the British tradition of structural functionalism, who approached the study of a Norwegian fishing-agricultural village through the concept of 'social fields' (Barnes 1954; Redfield 1973: 26). He was concerned to trace the relationships between the village and the wider context, which was accomplished through the 'country-wide network'. Networks in complex societies were expected to be wider and looser than those characteristic of the isolated community, but in spite of this they offered a solution to the problem of defining a field of study in a complex social context and of tracing the links between the village and the wider framework. In fact, networks were used in various ways and in different contexts, ranging from the study of kinship and marriage in Britain (Bott 1955, 1957) to the study of stratification and of patron-client relations (Wolf 1966; Boissevain 1966; 1974).

There was some convergence at this time between the work of US and British anthropologists, although in Britain, owing to its position within the post-colonial world, most anthropologists were not fired with the same enthusiasm over the applicability of their research as were their North American counterparts. Here the agenda was less clear, and the concern with 'applied anthropology' was less prominent at this point. However, the continuing (though increasingly beleaguered) influence of the structural-functionalist paradigm did result in some interesting parallels between cultural and social anthropology- particularly when the focus of study was European societies. A number of European scholars, heavily influenced by the Oxford brand of social anthropology, set about creating and defining a new area of study. In the course of their discussions, while retaining a strong interest in social structure, and particularly in kinship and marriage, these anthropologists, in liaison with researchers working in North Africa and the Middle East proposed an approach which focused primarily on cultural values.

The 1960s: The Invention of ‘The Mediterranean’

In 1959 a conference was held at the European headquarters of the Wenner-Grenn Foundation. Here, a group of anthropologists first discussed the values of Mediterranean honour and shame.⁵ This was followed up in 1963 with a number of conferences convened by the Social Sciences Centre in Athens and sponsored by the Greek government and subsidized by UNESCO. The discussions of these conferences revolved around the 'continuity and persistence of Mediterranean modes of thought'. Peristiany (1974 [1966]) clearly saw these meetings as the initial steps in the formulation of a problematic that could define and orientate a Mediterranean field of investigation, based on his belief that the cultural parallels encountered within the area made for the possibility of systematic comparisons.⁶

5. The proceedings of the 1959 conference were published in Pitt-Rivers (1963).

6. Cowan suggests that Peristiany, being an Oxford-trained Greek Cypriot, might have had a particular interest in the question of cultural continuity. Many Greek intellectuals, particularly folklorists, were concerned with this (Jane Cowan, personal communication).

Mediterranean values were deemed to constitute a valid object of study because, although preoccupations with reputation might be universal, in this particular instance we are dealing with a social system based on face-to-face personal relations: small-scale societies. It is the nature of the social system then that differentiates the Mediterranean from other European systems, in that 'social mobility and urbanization have completely altered our outlook' (Peristiany 1974 [1966]:12). Redfield's concerns regarding the community and the erosion of self-reliance and homogeneity by processes of change is echoed here, as change – and modernization in particular – is seen to break down face-to-face communities and their corresponding value systems.

The essays contained in Peristaanys (1974 [1966]) edited volume are enlightening because of their geographic distribution. All of course focus on honour, and the Southern shores of the Mediterranean are represented, as well as the Northern shores (though to a lesser extent than in his later collection on Mediterranean family structures). Despite numerous fieldwork studies which had been carried out throughout Europe, there is a noticeable shift of emphasis away from 'Europe' and towards 'the Mediterranean'. But the relationship with a European entity was not entirely forsaken.

Pitt-Rivers, who in many respects represents a landmark in the development of an anthropology of Europe, in particular maintained a polite and distant dialogue with systems and values which could characterize a more broadly defined European culture. The first part of his essay is intended as a general discussion of the concept of honour, and there is little attempt to discuss the North African or Middle Eastern cases (1966). Instead, Pitt-Rivers tries to discover the general structure of the notion of honour in the literature of Western Europe, stressing the continuities whilst recognizing the variations. 'Honour' is a term which is common in all the languages of Europe, and Pitt-Rivers makes a point of drawing numerous historical examples from Northern Europe and Spain, as well as Andalusia, which is the site of his own fieldwork and the focus of the second half of his essay. In spite of his more general treatment of honour, his discussion reinforces the view, already stated by Peristiany, of honour as a code relevant to a social system which had largely been superseded in North-Western Europe; a value-system associated largely with aristocrats, clergy and poets of former times.⁷

7. The point is echoed by Blok (1981).

His Andalusian case-study is more convincing. This provides a sophisticated and penetrating analysis of the different meanings honour and shame can have within a single village, pointing out the contradictory nature of value systems in general.⁸ Of particular interest are his comments regarding the community. Pitt-Rivers recognizes that 'community' is a complex and shifting fiction. The difficulty, as he sees it, is that values are effective and coercive only in the event of consensus and in a context which permits of control of information and persons. The pueblo is seen as a community of equals, within which the system of values operates coercively upon the individual. But the setioritos, young unmarried men (as well as the women) of the upper class, escape these constraints. They move and operate within the community, but because of their class position they are not of the community. They are therefore situated beyond the reach of pueblo public opinion and moral sanctions. Thus, Pitt-Rivers draws attention to another key featue of Mediterranean and European societies: their complex class structure. Pitt-Rivers suggests that the mobility of the upper classes, combined with urban life in Spain to expose individuals to cosmopolitan influences, and these influences are incompatible with the values of honour and shame. This constitutes a way of defining the area of expertise of the anthropologist: the area of study appears to correlate with the relative progress of modernization and of the 'great tradition', restricting research to smaller populations where 'traditional' values might persist.

8. Pitt-Rivers acknowledges his debt to Caro Baroja. Caro Baroja describes himself as a social historian and ethnologist trained within a very different school from the Oxford group, with whom he nevertheless collaborated extensively in the 1950s. He wrote the introduction to the Spanish translation of Peristiany's collection on honour, and contributed an interesting historical account of the concept of honour to the same vo...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Notes on Contributors
• 1 Introduction: The Anthropology of Europe
• 2 Towards an Anthropology of European Communities?
• 3 From the Mediterranean to Europe: Honour, Kinship and Gender
• 4 Anthropological Approaches to the Study of Nationalism in Europe. The Work of Van Gennep and Mauss
• 5 'Fortress Europe' and the Foreigners Within: Germany's Turks
• 6 Nationalism and European Community Integration: The Republic of Ireland
• 7 Xenophobia, Fantasy and the Nation: The Logic of Ethnic Violence in Former Yugoslavia
• 8 The Play of Identity: Gibraltar and Its Migrants
• 9 Ethnic Identity, Gender and Life Cycle in North Catalonia
• 10 Gender Relations and Social Change in Europe: On Support and Care
• 11 The Commercial Realization of the Community Boundary
• 12 The Spanish Experience and Its Implications for a Citizen's Europe
• 13 Citizens' Europe and the Construction of European Identity
• Index