Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 2005. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 222-239). Also available for download via the World Wide Web; free to University of Oregon users.

In this thesis I ask whether food can be used to express Catalan national identity, and if so, in what ways this occurs. In doing so, I consider the lived realities of nationalist movements, rather than simply the ideas and political claims that inform such movements. The Catalan Autonomous Community in northeast Spain is an ideal place to research this issue, due to the strengthening of nationalist sentiments there in light of the rise in support for independence from Spain. I wished to see whether this had any effect on the connections between food and national identity (or gastronationalism). National identity and food are connected in many diverse and varied ways. Food culture allows us to reflect on national identity as a whole. Themes which commonly appear in nationalist discourse, such as cultural specificity, historicism, or landscape (to name but a few), also inform discussions of national food identity. In the present case, while other markers of identity (e.g. language) are also important, ideals of Catalan nationalism may take the guise of Catalan gastronationalism as well. The current pro-independence movement has had the effect of making Catalans more aware of their cultural symbols, including cuisine, which is now one of many such symbols that can be mobilized for the expression of national identity.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / This paper provides a case study of TV3. TV3 is a regional television channel which broadcasts throughout the territory of Catalonia (North-East of Spain) exclusively in Catalan, a minority language. The population in Catalonia is six millions and 80 percent declares to speak Catalan. Also the paper's goal is to develop options for the future oper ation of this regional television organization. To accomplish this, information has been gathered about the operations of four other television organizations with similar characteristics to TV3. These television organizations and their broadcasting language are: ETB, Euskera, (Basque Country ,Spain); TVG, Galician, (Galicia Spain); S4C, Welsh, (Wales, United Kingdom); and SRC, French (Quebec, Canada). From these five different cases, the researcher extracts trends in program production, programming, foreign acquisitions and impact of broadcasts in the reestablishment of the minority language. Tl:e conclusions of this work state: 1) a favorable contribution of the regional broadcasts to the support of the minority language; 2) the tendency of regional television channels to program similarly to nation-wide networks due to competition in reaching the same audience; and 3) the tendency to change traditional production source (the television networks themselves) for a diversified source (independent producers). Finally, there are recommendations to increase: 1) the number of children's programs broadcast; 2) the governmental action to encourage independent production; 3) the number of television channels. / 2031-01-01

This project examines questions of national identity and democracy in television through the analysis of the production processes of audience discussion programmes. The study of television debates, as public spaces through which members of particular communities discuss topics of common concern, shed some light on two different questions. On the one hand, this project explores whether the (re)construction of national and cultural identity intervenes in the process of programme-making within stateless nations. On the other hand, audience discussion programmes are examined to assess whether they can function as democratic spheres of social representation in the media. These two strands of research are developed through ethnographic insights into two television debates: Scottish Women - produced by the commercial company Scottish Television (STV), and La Vida en un Xip - transmitted through the. Catalan public television channel TV3 and produced by the production company DCo.S.A. A comparative study of these two programmes and their respective broadcasting contexts is provided. Also, the distinctive political status of Scotland and Catalonia within their respective states - Britain and Spain - and the European and international contexts, is examined in relation to the media. The current debates concerning nationalism, the nation and national identity are discussed on the basis of culture as the essential element of the nation-building process. This study explores the process of cultural identity fonnation in Scotland and Catalonia and the role of their respective media structures as potential actors in the (re)construction of collective identities. Thus, the analysis of television production is regarded as a key instrument with which to assessh ow this medium intervenesi n such processes. Audience discussion programmes are examined as television formats with the potential for providing a democratic public sphere in the media. An expansion of the concept of the public sphere, its transformation and its role in contemporary societies is, therefore, essential to develop this argument. Also, the relation between television debates and the community is explored through a survey carried out amongst participants of Scottish Women and La Vida en un Xip. This work provides media studies with some keys to evaluate the role of television debates in the delicate political make-up of two nations without a state, Scotland and Catalonia. Questions of national and cultural identity are crucial to the policy-making of their respective broadcasting, industries. Yet, such questions are difficult to distinguish and define in their programming. The comparative analysis of the two case studies reveals that every person involved in television making reflects to a certain extent his/her own perceptions of the country, and therefore, television debates mirror the ambiguities that may lie behind them. This study provides some clues to reformulate the concept of the 'public sphere' on the basis of a 'dissection' of television production procedures. The findings also reveal the economic, political and social criteria that develop audience discussion programmes into spheres of entertainment rather than rational communicative environments in which a public sphere could function. The concepts of national identity and the public sphere are framed in the context of contemporary societies, in which post-modem values are eroding the role and interest of the individual in the political process.

No description available.

Explanations of sub-state nationalism that draw on the effects of patterns of uneven economic development suffer from two conceptual problems: (1) they fail to explain why state actors are not able to adopt and implement long-term strategies to correct these effects and (2) they fail to account for the range of ideologies that can be used by sub-state actors to mobilize against the state. In this dissertation, I use an institutional analysis to overcome these problems by specifying the structural conditions under which a range of counterhegemonic groups can emerge to challenge state nationalism. The analysis is applied to a case study of interwar Catalonia, which examines three separate campaigns for political autonomy. 1906--1908; 1917--1919; and 1930--1932. Two modes of analysis are used. First, an institutional analysis is used to determine the structural conditions for the emergence of counterhegemonic movements. I argue that levels of institutional incorporation in a state can determine both the conditions under which a counterhegemonic group can emerge and the range of ideologies that can be used to organize against the state. Institutional incorporation refers to the variable level of institutions that together constitute the corporate structure of the state. The institutional analysis is applied to Southern Europe generally and Spain specifically, in order to identify the political groups in early twentieth-century Catalonia which challenged state nationalism by mobilizing around alternative state projects. Second, a rational actor approach is used to examine the strategic interactions of two sets of political actors in Catalonia, nationalists and republicans, in order to specify the conditions under which they attempted to gain political power and obtain political autonomy for Catalonia on three separate occasions. The combination of an institutional approach at the macro-level and a rational actor approach at the micro-level brings to light the importan

This dissertation explores the relationship between immigration, diversity and minority nationalism. Through a study of Catalonia and its relationship with the Spanish state, the dissertation assesses how immigration and the growing social diversity that accompanies it, can challenge, undermine, or reinforce the political claims and objectives of minority nationalists, in particular, their goal of promoting a distinct and self-determining national community. It focuses on an effort by Catalan political and civil society leaders to construct a “national consensus” on immigration, the 2008 National Agreement on Immigration, which provided a 20-year plan for adapting Catalan government services and Catalan society to the pressures and demands of its increasingly diverse population, while at the same time providing mechanisms for the integration of newcomers into the Catalan language and national community. The analysis centres on the text of the National Agreement on Immigration as well as recent Catalan immigration plans and policy documents, in addition to the broader debate surrounding the National Agreement among Catalonia’s major political parties. The dissertation reveals that the National Agreement on Immigration represented both a significant re-framing of Catalan national identity and an attempt to expand the power and autonomy of the Catalan government by the various signatories to the accord. It concludes that the National Agreement represented an important component of a pivotal era in Catalan politics, one that has the potential to radically redefine the region’s relationship with both Spain and Europe, and in which questions surrounding immigration and diversity are increasingly intersecting with broader debates surrounding economic instability and the prospect of Catalan independence. / Graduate

O presente trabalho objetiva analisar a ascensão de movimentos nacionalistas periféricos na Europa, no período pós-Guerra Fria, em um contexto de intensificação do processo de integração observado na União Europeia nas últimas três décadas, além de estabelecer comparações entre as três nações sem Estado que mais avançaram na luta independentista no século XXI: Flandres, Escócia e Catalunha. Também serão analisadas as circunstâncias que levaram à realização de ações de descentralização política nos três Estados que contêm as nações aqui estudadas: Bélgica, Reino Unido e Espanha e por que estas medidas de acomodação de minorias nacionais não surtiram o efeito esperado, já que, em vez mitigar a luta por autonomia e/ou soberania por parte destes movimentos subestatais, a fortaleceram. A pertinência do tema se revela à medida que recrudescem estes movimentos, não só na Europa, mas em todo o mundo, denotando a crise que vive o Estado democrático liberal no que concerne ao binômio: reconhecimento das minorias nacionais e manutenção da integridade territorial dos Estados que as contêm. Além disso, a força dos nacionalismos revela o quanto os processos de globalização e integração regional vêm sofrendo reveses neste século. Dentro da perspectiva da Geografia Política, é fundamental que o tema do nacionalismo seja fortemente analisado, já que se vislumbra um cenário de reorganização do espaço mundial, em função das fragmentações territoriais que podem ocorrer a partir do recrudescimento dos movimentos nacionalistas periféricos. Este quadro já foi visto em outros momentos da História, como nos períodos pós-Primeira Guerra Mundial e pós-Guerra Fria, com as desintegrações de Impérios no primeiro caso, e com o desmantelamento da União Soviética e Iugoslávia, no segundo caso. / This current paper aims to analyze the rise of peripheral nationalist movements in Europe in the post-Cold War period, in a context of intensification of the integration process observed in the European Union in the last three decades, as well as comparisons between the three stateless nations more advanced in the struggle for independence in the 21st century: Flanders, Scotland and Catalonia. It will also analyze the circumstances that led to political decentralization actions in the three States that contain the nations studied here: Belgium, the United Kingdom and Spain and why these measures of accommodation of national minorities did not have the expected effect, since instead of mitigating the struggle for autonomy and/or sovereignty on part of these sub-state movements, they have strengthened it. The relevance of the theme is evident as these movements intensify, not only in Europe, but throughout the world, denoting the crisis that the liberal democratic State is experiencing in terms of the binomial: recognition of national minorities and the maintenance of the territorial integrity of States which contain them. Moreover, the strength of nationalism reveals how the processes of globalization and regional integration have suffered setbacks in this century. Within the perspective of Political Geography, it is fundamental that the theme of nationalism be strongly analyzed, since a scenario of reorganization of the world space can be seen, due to the territorial fragmentations that can occur from the resurgence of peripheral nationalist movements. This picture has been seen at other times in history, such as post-World War I and post-Cold War periods, with the disintegrations of empires in the first case, and with the dismantling of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia in the second case.

The first wave of stateless nationalist mobilisation triggered decentralisation processes in several Western European states. Political autonomy provided European stateless nations with sub-state institutions with significant competences to manage their own affairs. Multinational federalism scholars have long debated whether political decentralisation to accommodate stateless nations appeases demands for secession or rather exacerbates them. Autonomous institutions created a new sub-state political system which political entrepreneurs, most significantly Stateless Nationalist and Regionalist Parties, are able to exploit to put forward demands for further empowerment of sub-state institutions. In the last decade territorial demands have been progressively raised by political parties in some Western European stateless nations, thus casting doubt on the effectiveness of political decentralisation as a valid mechanism to prevent secession. Scotland voted on independence on September 2014 whereas Catalan nationalist parties have been attempting to hold their own referendum since 2013. By looking specifically at the effects of political party competition at the sub-state level, this research aims at providing an explanation for the dynamics of territorial demands that have led to a high saliency of the territorial question in many Western European multinational states. An in-depth qualitative analysis of party competition in Catalonia aims to provide a successful explanation for the escalation of territorial demands in that country, also taking into account the role played by central institutions and the increasing support that secession shown amongst the population. The Catalan case is compared to Flanders and Scotland to test whether the dynamics of party competition can tell us a bit more about the ongoing territorial demands put forward by political parties in these three countries. The territorial accommodation of multinational states have tended to be analysed from an institutionalist perspective whereas multi-level party competition has kept a blind eye on constitutional change. This research aims at contributing to the growing literature of sub-state party politics and its capacities to explain constitutional change processes.

Thesis (M.A.). / Written for the Dept. of Art History and Communication Studies. Title from title page of PDF (viewed 2008/03/12). Includes bibliographical references.