Description
Book SynopsisExamines the polarized fields of nationalist politics - in Cluj, Transylvania, and the wider region - and also the more fluid terrain on which ethnicity and nationhood are experienced, enacted, and understood in everyday life. This book addresses fundamental questions about ethnicity: where it is, when it matters, and how it works.
Trade ReviewOne of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2007 "By drilling deep into the mundane conversations, cares, and relationships among citizens of Cluj-Napoca...[the authors] set out to examine precisely how ethnicity matters...[An] important and conceptually innovative book."--Robert Levgold, Foreign Affairs "Provides a reality check for those who continue to operate under the myths of the past, while offering valuable insights into the mundane inner workings of everyday ethnicity in the old borderlands of the Russian, Turkish, and Austro-Hungarian empires...The most important contribution of the book is its ability to demystify nationhood in East Central Europe."--Robert A. Saunders, Transitions "This fascinating, richly detailed, and highly informative study of Cluj in the mixed Hungarian-Romanian Transylvanian part of Romania is based on fieldwork conducted between 1995 and 2001...This is a must read for anyone interested in ethnic or national identity in eastern Europe or, indeed, in any area contested by groups using ethnic or nationalist symbols to announce their presence and promote their interests."--D. Ashley, Choice "This substantial volume, with its vivid portrayal of the shifting dimensions of ethnicity in Romanian-Transylvanian city of Cluj-Napoca... is a welcome addition both to theory challenging romantic, essentialist identity models as well as to our knowledge of the inner workings of central European life... Given its strong arguments and impressive array of data about the resourceful, performative, everyday qualities of ethnicity, this book deserves a wide readership."--David A. Kideckel, Slavic Review "We can only rejoice that through the writing of this book Rogers Brubaker reads anew the theories of nationalism to which he has contributed in the past with the aid of convincing field arguments."--Monica Heintz, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Society "Brubaker et al. have written a splendid and highly recommendable book, adding substantial new insights to innumerable other works on ethnicity. Their method of combining observations with theory and discussing the significance of ethnicity in a wide range of situations in everyday life proves illuminating, not only to and understanding of ethnicity in Cluj, but also in providing insight and a framework for approaching numerous other cases as well."--Jorgen Kuhl, Political Studies Review "The authors of this pathbreaking book will have done the historiography of the region a tremendous service if historians, as they should, take up the challenge it poses them."--Mark Pittaway, Journal of Modern History "Rogers Brubaker and his collaborators have succeeded in writing a readable, informative, and provocative book... Valuable in a number of ways: first in its direct, readable, and clear style, which is remarkable given so many co-authors; second in its artful way of using technical terms and concepts from socio-linguistics to make sense of complex interpersonal interactions; and third in its organization, which makes the book useful for both introductory and advanced courses in history, sociology, and anthropology."--Thomas C. Wolfe, Austrian History Yearbook "National Politics and Everyday Ethnicity in a Transylvanian Town has the potential to prompt a fundamental shift in how we both conceptualize and study ethnicity. In the light of its contributions, researchers interested in ethnicity would do well to examine the interstices of social life as well as its formal institutions, and to ask questions that privilege local meanings, rather than reifying narratives that are themselves me tools of ethnic mobilization."--Jessica Allina-Pisano, Perspectives on Politics "Nationalist Politics and Everyday Ethnicity was an excellent read... I have added this book to my students' reading list, and heartily recommend it to anyone who has an interest in any of the themes Brubaker and his colleagues set out to address."--Teresa Staniewicz, American Journal of Sociology
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations xi Preface, by Rogers Brubaker xiii Acknowledgments xix A Note on Names, Transcriptions, and Citations xxi List of Abbreviations xxiii Introduction 1 Part One: Nationalist Politics, Past and Present 23 Chapter 1: The National Question in East Central Europe 27 Empire and Nation 30 Historical and Ethnocultural Claims in the Habsburg Lands 34 Ethnic Intermixing and National Conflict 37 Nationalist Claims and Counterclaims 39 The National Question Recast 43 World War II and After 50 Chapter 2: Transylvania as an Ethnic Borderland 56 The Three Nationes 57 1848: The Emergence of Modern Nationalism 60 Dualist Hungary as a Nationalizing State 63 Nationalization Reversed 68 War and Regime Change 76 The Return to the "Nation" 82 Chapter 3: From Kolozsvar to Cluj-Napoca 89 Kolozsvar in Nationalizing Hungary 91 From Kolozsvar to Cluj 97 Once Again in Hungary 101 The Transition to Communist Rule 105 The Romanianization of Cluj 109 Chapter 4: Cluj after Ceausescu 119 The Re-emergence of Ethnopolitical Contention 122 The Struggle over Separate Schools in Cluj and Targu-Mures 127 Gheorghe Funar and the Nationalization of Public Space 136 Reproducing Ethnicity: A Hungarian University in Cluj? 146 Counting and Categorizing 151 Conclusion 160 Part Two: Everyday Ethnicity 167 Chapter 5: Portraits 173 Mari and Family 173 Emilia 176 Karcsi and Agi 178 Ana 182 Zsolt and Kati 184 Claudiu and Lucian 188 Chapter 6: Preoccupations 191 Getting By 191 Everyday Coping Strategies 197 Getting Ahead 201 Accounting for Success 205 Conclusion 206 Chapter 7: Categories 207 Asymmetries 211 Cues 217 Doing Things with Categories 224 Ethnic and Regional Categories 231 Conclusion 237 Chapter 8: Languages 239 Interaction with Strangers 243 Private Talk in Public Places 246 Language Choice in Mixed Company 251 Language Mixing in Intraethnic Settings 259 Conclusion 262 Chapter 9: Institutions 265 Schools 269 Churches 277 Workplaces 283 Associations 287 Media 290 Conclusion 295 Chapter 10: Mixings 301 Disagreement and Conflict 303 Avoidance 307 Joking and Teasing 309 Choices 311 Conclusion 314 Chapter 11: Migrations 316 "Aici nu se mai poate" 316 Stigmatized Citizenship 321 The Ambivalent Homeland 326 Chapter 12: Politics 333 Funar 339 DAHR 343 Autonomy 346 Status Law 350 Conclusion 357 Epilogue 365 Appendix A: An Example of the Interactional Emergence of Nationalism 375 Appendix B: A Note on Data 380 Bibliography 387 Index 429
