Description
Book Synopsis The twin concepts of “Culture” and “Identity” are inescapable in any discussion of European Integration and yet over the last ten years their meaning has become increasingly contested. By combining an anthropological and political perspective, the authors challenge the traditional boundaries within the issue of the construction of Europe. In the first part, historians and anthropologists from various national traditions discuss the process of the construction of Europe and its implications for cultural identities. The second section examines a number of topics at the core of the process of Europeanization and presents up-to-date information on each of these issues: political parties, regions, football, cities, the Euro, ethnicity, heritage and European cinema. Emphasis is be placed on the political structuring of cultural identities by contrasting top-down and bottom-up processes that define the tensions between the unity and diversity of the European Community.
Trade Review “Despite the variety of approaches and themes developed, the book successfully bridges this interdisciplinarity and provides a coherent flow of analysis of European identity which, as the title best illustrates, still remains a puzzle to be explored. The book therefore highlights the complexity of constructing European identity from political and cultural means…Overall it intellectually alerts the reader to some of the most significant challenges facing European identity and will be very useful to experts in the field.” · Political Studies Review
Table of Contents Acknowledgments
Editorial Note
Introduction
Marion Demossier
PART I: EUROPEAN POLITICAL CONSTRUCTS
Chapter 1. The formation of national identities
Anne-Marie Thiesse
Chapter 2. ‘More than its fair share of history’. Europe and its recent past.
Richard Vinen
Chapter 3. The political structuring of cultural identities in Europe
Marion Demossier
Chapter 4. European identity in a transnational era
Ralph Grillo
PART II: CULTURAL AND POLITICAL IDENTITIES IN TRANSITION
Chapter 5. Heritage versus tradition, cultural resources for a new Europe
Ullrich Kockel
Chapter 6. Dinosaur, shipwreck, or museum piece? The unstable identity of European cinema
Wendy Everett
Chapter 7. Through the looking glass of football
Christian Bromberger
PART III: TOWARDS A EUROPEAN IDENTITY: CHALLENGES TO EXISTING FORMS OF BELONGING AND CULTURAL VALUES
Chapter 8. Party, identity and europeanisation, an asymetrical relationship?
David Hanley
Chapter 9. Remapping regionalism in Europe
Peter Wagstaff
Chapter 10. Cultural identities and the European city
Susan Milner
Bibliography
Index
