This thesis looks into the role of identity in ethnic conflict from social-psychological and cognitive perspectives. / The literature of Social Psychology suggests that one strategy of social groups under pressure or threat is to revert to their collective identity and manipulate it in ways that yield a distinct positive value for group members. Focusing on the main proponent of this view, Social Identity Theory, and transposing its premises onto an ethnic level, an Ethnic Identity Theory is proposed that explains ethnic identity's utility for the positive self-esteem of members of an ethnic group during a time of crisis. / As far as the cognitive aspect is concerned, the focus moves on to the individual level of analysis. It explores the issue of how information may be represented in the human brain, and proposes that it is due to particular 'exclusive' cognitive strategies of knowledge categorization, storing and re-processing that ethnic conflict is enhanced. Borrowing from Artificial Intelligence literature on Schemata and Frame theory, ethnic identity is treated as a frame with multiple slots for various traits that comprise an ethnic identity. Such modeling helps illustrate how properties related to the architecture of these mental structures result in the constructed ethnic identities becoming more rigid---their individual traits acquiring singular importance and, once challenged, affecting the whole identity. / This study concludes by pointing that, if intransigence and inflexibility concerning ethnic identity traits begins on a cognitive micro-level, then, little progress towards peace should be expected in on-going ethnic conflicts, unless cognitively unbiased third parties are involved in peace-making, and unless their involvement includes action on a cognitive-learning level to change convictions about warring groups members' perception of their own as well as others' ethnic identities.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.33294 |
| Date | January 2000 |
| Creators | Kotsovilis, Spyridon Demetrius. |
| Contributors | Meadwell, Hudson (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Arts (Department of Political Science.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001778485, proquestno: MQ70602, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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