Cultural Constructions and the Formation of Collective Identity in

							Cultural Dynamics in Social Movements: Collective
Identities and the Emergence of Divisive Distinctions
Vinci Daro, Gretchen Fox, and Dorothy Holland
Draft: March 21, 2006


     The American sociological literature on social movements primarily attributes

significance to cultural production or meaning making through the concepts of identity

and frames of interpretation. Culture is associated with identity and, in a sense, set off

from interests. Desires to further one’s (group’s) interests—to better one’s (group’s)

material resources and social position—is analytically distinguished from motivations to

validate one’s identity. Pursuing interests in a strategic and rational manner is contrasted

to acting in relation to the cultural meanings that define who one cares about being and

where one’s group fits in the world.1 Several recent review articles remark upon the

underdevelopment of the cultural dimensions of movement identities, especially

collective identity or the bases for investment of self in a movement (e.g., Polletta and

Jasper 2001:299), and the continuing tendency of theoreticians to attend more to the

instrumentality than the cultural dynamics of movement identities (e.g., McDonald

2002:111).2 Here, we draw upon ethnographic studies of social movements to encourage

appreciation of the wide range of cultural processesthat movement participants engage as

they constructthemselves as political actors. We use material from our own research on

the environmental movement in the United States, the global justice movement, First


1
  “Group” is used very loosely here to mean a range of associations of people from well organized groups,
to networks, to imagined communities.
2
   The dichotomy between rationality and culture is useful only to a point.




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Nations activism in Canada, and women’s activism in Nepal to illustrate ways in which

attention to cultural processes can expand understandings of the emergence of collective

identity and its fissures.

     Our primary theoretical guidance derives from social practice theory. Bourdieu

(1977, 1990), as anthropology’s initial, premier architect of practice theory,

conceptualizes cultural practices and discourses, and thus institutions of the family,

systems of gender privilege, and other social formations, as always in process, both as

subject and object, in social and institutional interaction. Social practice theory

emphasizes analogous points about the unfinished constitution of the actor, similarly

considering social and cultural constructions of the actor and the authoring of self

(individual and group) always to be in flux in fields of power (Holland and Lave 2001).

This approach resonates with certain other scholars (e.g., Melucci ref, Hunt et al ref,

Stryker et al 2000) who, taking a constructivist view of movement formation, are

developing complex understandings of movement actors (individual and collective) and

mapping out the significance of meaning-making3 and its relationship to identity

processes, and to other important aspects of movements and activism.

     In this article, we build upon these several theories to discuss the emergence of

divisive distinctions within and without social movements. As our ethnographic cases

show, distinctions that emerge among movements complicate the recruitment and

maintenance of adherents, and pose challenges to the coordination of action. We argue



3
  We use the concept of meaning-making to incorporate the sociological concepts of “framing” and
“interpretive work.”




                                                                                                   2
that the emergence of such distinctions is a cultural process that can inhibit or disrupt the

ongoing formation of collective identity.


    (Title A) Problems with the Concept of Collective Identity4
        McDonald (2002)5 traces the historical development and solidification of what he

terms the “new orthodoxy” of collective identity in ‘American’ sociology. Covering a

twenty five or so year period, he contrasts ‘European’ interests in new social movements

as emphasizing changing cultural codes with ‘American’ interests directed to achieving

political goals.6 American researchers did eventually pay attention to lesbian and other

communities that organized themselves around identity politics, but nonetheless the two

approaches have remained distinct. Touraine, Melucci, and other European theorists’

never managed to convince their American counterparts to adopt a more process-oriented

focus on meaning-making in situations of conflict and distress as the basis of collective

identity. Instead, identity in the new orthodoxy of the American school is narrowly

defined as based on shared experiences and common traits and is subtly assimilated to the

resource mobilization and political process models. McDonald (2002:110) summarizes

this development:

           “In the process [of incorporating culture into the ‘political process’ or ‘strategy’
       model], identity became understood as a resource to be mobilized (Tilly 1993-1994)
       or a factor reducing the costs of organization (Tarrow 1994), increasingly defined as
       the characteristic of a community, ‘the shared definition of a group that derives from
       its members’ common interests, experiences and solidarity’ (Taylor and Whittier

4
    NOTE: Incorporate article from Ethnicities as well.
5
  We draw liberally from McDonald (2002) and Polletta and Jasper (2001) as up to date accounts of
received wisdom and challenges to conceptualizations of collective identity.
6
 McDonald use of single quotes to set off American and European signals his recognition that he is
creating ideal types and omitting a great deal of complexity and hybridity.




                                                                                                     3
      1992:105, emphasis added [by McDonald]), or a functional equivalent of ideology
      (1192: 104; Taylor 2000). …’identity’ has come to be defined as ‘collective identity’,
      and a new orthodoxy has emerged, translating into the textbooks: ‘Collective action
      cannot occur in the absence of a “we” characterized by common traits and specific
      solidarity…A collective actor cannot exist without reference to experiences, symbols
      and myths, which form the basis of its individuality’ (Della Porta and Diani 1999:87,
      92, emphasis added [by McDonald].


       At issue for McDonald, and for us, are the limitations of this restricted understanding

of collective identity. While these inclusions of expressive actions and commitments

beyond the material interests of the rational actor do constitute an important advance on

earlier exclusive attention to strategic organizational action, the American approach

embeds two serious limitations.

       First, political process is but one possible engagement of social movements.

McDonald, for example, convincingly argues that the key dilemma for activists in

contemporary global conflicts is one of forming a “relationship to the self”.7 Theirs is an

interpretation of global conflicts that goes far beyond political process. In another

example, in a recent chapter by the geographers Gibson-Graham (2005:130), they

conceptualize a movement to build community economies. In this case, the struggle is

“to engage with others to transform local economies here and now, in an everyday ethical

and political practice of constructing ‘community economies’ in the face of globalization

[emphasis theirs].” And in one of our own cases, Nepali women engaged not only in

party politics, but in the cultural politics of community conflicts where they tried to

introduce gender equality as a matter of morality. To limit the study of movements to


7
    Note: Use McDonald’s phrase and perhaps a paraphrase.




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involvement in political process is to seriously limit the cultural constructions of conflicts

and tensions that are considered. Interpretations of the motivating conflicts of a

movement draw from widely circulating cultural imaginaries and from past histories of

activism to name and respond to current conditions, or, using Bakhtin’s concept of

practice, to “answer” current “addresses” (Holland and Lave 2001). While a particular

set of researchers may have good reasons for restricting their studies to movements’

engagements with governments, this restriction diverts attention from other cultural

processes that significantly shape collective identity.

       The second serious limitation of what McDonald refers to as the new orthodoxy is

that it favors relatively narrow content-specific definitions of “collective identity”. For

example, ‘common traits’, as delineated in the textbook passage quoted by McDonald

above, is but one possible basis for commitment around which an identity may form.8 In

another example, Lichterman (1996), delineates an alternative he found among Green

activists, which he refers to as “personalized commitment” wherein the participants are

not so much committed to an organization- its roles, positions and actions- as they are to

principles and tenets of action, independent of any particular organization. McDonald’s

case of activists involved in globalization conflicts is particularly strong in showing that

cultural constructions of collective identity can range far afield from the prototype he

quotes from the textbook. The activists McDonald studied championed horizontal

organization, worked through ephemeral affinity groups versus enduring organizations,

embraced acephalous organizing, rejected representational governance, and, most


8
    Include a quote from Stryker et al about the possible bases of Meadian identity?




                                                                                               5
important, eschewed efforts to achieve homogeneity of goals and demands and insisted

instead on the likelihood and desirability of participants having different experiences and

traits. His case is testimony to the point that the orthodox model of collective identity is

unprepared for these newer forms of activism in network societies (2002:pp). It also

demonstrates the inadvisability of narrow, content-specific definitions of collective

identity.


Reconceptualizing Collective Identity as a Process Dependent on Historically and
Culturally Specific Constructions
    Collective identity is a complex process, always taking place under specific

historical and cultural conditions. While identity processes within movements do at

times produce a social identification whose content can be described, identity is better

conceptualized as a process than as a content-laden outcome, and focusing only on a

particular (and not inevitable) moment in the process can lead to significant blind spots.

A new term, such as “collective self-making”, that indexes a theory of collective identity

construction and its consequences, would be useful.

    In fact, a number of steps have already been taken toward such a reconceptualization.

Although McDonald, for example, makes gestures toward abandoning “collective

identity”, he also moves toward a remedy of increasing the inclusivity of the concept to

accommodate a broader range of cultural and historical interpretations of the conflicts

addressed, and of the bases recognized for shared action and identity. The activists in

McDonald’s case are clearly not committed to older forms of organization nor do they

evoke a common set of experiences or equally champion the same causes (e.g.,

environmental, feminist, peace). Nonetheless, they do appear to be staunchly committed



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to horizontality, inclusivity and other processes and principles of direct action and to

judge and evaluate their own and others’ behavior according to those principles9. In a

move to jettison the bath water (culturally and historically restricted definitions of

conflicts and bases for shared identity) but keep the baby (collective identity), McDonald

embraces Touraine’s more abstract, process oriented focus. For Touraine, collective

identity emerges from the contentious, collective working out of and commitment to

resolutions of major dilemmas and conflicts over social positioning and subjectivity.

They form in the effort to make meaning “in a field of tensions where actors confront

dilemmas, and where processes of social creativity may occur.” (McDonald 2002:110).

Participants’ engagement is not so much with the outcome of the process of working out

the contentious issues, but with involvement with the process itself.

     A number of additional points on the emerging reconceptualization of collective

identity are also available in Polletta and Jasper’s (2001) recent review. These include

the ideas that: 1) collective identities are continually forming in practice and thus in the

interplay among actors (2001:285; and McDonald 2002:111)10; 2) identities guide

movement goals and actions (Polletta and Jasper 2001:285); 3) “collective identities are

expressed in cultural materials—names, narratives, symbols, verbal styles, rituals,

clothing, and so on” (Polletta and Jasper 2001:285.); 4) “Free spaces” are important for

the development of oppositional identities (Evans and Boyle 1986; and Polletta and

9
  These are perfectly acceptable markers of Meadian definitions of identity that Stryker et al (2000) of that
school have applied to movements. See Holland and Lachicotte (in press) for an argument that Meadian
definitions of identity are different from and more productive for understanding movements than the more
pervasive understanding of identity as an Eriksonian concept.
10
   This point leads to the now pervasive claim that identities are relational, contingent and socially
constructed (McDonald 2002:111 drawing on McAdams, et al.) (We would add for clarity, and culturally
constructed.)




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Jasper 2001:287); and 5) cultural or interpretive frames developed in the movement

propose definitions of “us” and “them”, and efforts are necessary to maintain these social

identifications (Polletta and Jasper 2001:291-292)

        Guided by social practice theory that emphasizes cultural production11 and the

proclivity of humans to make meaning from the conditions they face, these points

constitute a basis for reconceptualizing collective identity: Social movements and

activism constitute a collective opening up of “free” semiotic spaces (Evans and Boyle

1986) between enduring structures of power and privilege and the individuals caught up

in those webs. Collective identity is an important potential development in such spaces.

In responding to dilemmas thrown up at them from social, political and economic

circumstances, participants are ‘answering,’ in Bakhtin’s sense, ‘adresses’ that call for a

relatively coherent sense of themselves--of their group, network, or imagined

community-- as standing for a category, practice, institution, place, goal or future vision.

This meaning-making about the collective and what it stands for may focus on the

organization that is formed, on the practices that are associated with the collective, on its

history and social position, on the individual experiences of the members, on the tactical

preferences adopted by the group, and/or by the places with which it is associated. It

produces tangible artifacts—names, songs, manifestos, emblems, images, narratives,

buildings, body decorations, embodied expressions—associated with the movement, and

can be used to evoke and mobilize these senses of the collective.

11
     An emphasis on cultural production does not deny the importance of organizational capacities and

practice.




                                                                                                        8
    Collective identity, no matter which of these potential bases of group and individual

self definition become important, is a key means by which collections of people

interacting together gain a modicum of agency. Movement participants creatively

refigure currently circulating constructions as well as past histories of activism to develop

cultural artifacts that evoke senses of a collective self. Through this refiguring, they gain

the ability to voluntarily self-organize in a somewhat durable manner over time to carry

out joint activities and act together in the name of their commitments. As conveyed in

the points above, these collective identities continue to develop in practice in fields of

power along with interpretations of the crucial conflicts and dilemmas at stake in the

movement and in relation to forms of action mastered by the group or network.


(Title A) Ethnographic Studies
     Ethnographic studies are particularly well suited to research on social movements as

emerging, processual, developing formations. We examine aspects of four cases from

our research that allow us to extend further the reconceptualization of collective identity

and to begin to pose research questions appropriate to the more culturally-oriented,

emerging paradigm of collective identity. In the cases we consider, we have chosen, for

the sake of space, to focus on the emergence of disruptive distinctions. The first case

encourages us to attend to the materiality of meaning making, with a focus on the way in

which cultural artifacts can take on a life of their, own introducing divisive distinctions

into the collective identity processes involved in a Nepali women’s movement. The

second considers some of the multiple fields of power in which collective identities of

global justice activists are challenged by distinctions imposed or blurred by actors




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external to the movement, and the third examines a case in which the collective identity

formed through First Nations activism is challenged by a signal success of the movement.

Together these cases underscore the significance of cultural processes whereby divisive

distinctions emerge, engendering multiple odds against the formation of collective

identities.


(Title B) Women’s Activism in Rural Nepal: Cultural Artifacts, the Materiality of
Meaning, and the Emergence of Distinctions (Title B) Multiple Fields of Power
(2000 words)

(Title B) Gap and Mug Shots in the Global Justice Movement (1500 words)

(Title B) Mi’kmaq Case: Renaming the Conflict, Refiguring Movement Identities
and the Emergence of Distinctions Among Fishermen


        Close attention to the processes through which collective identities are

constructed and contested provides a particularly useful approach to understanding how

shifts in movements occur locally - “on the ground” – and within larger, dialogic contexts

of history and power. As actors develop and experience identities in relation to

movements—as activists, or, perhaps, in opposition to a movement—so, too, is the shape

of the movement transformed. During the course of a movement, internal and external

forces can alter its (often already-blurry) boundaries, creating new distinctions between

who is “in” the movement, and who is not and, as in this case, between members of the

movement. Distinctions are important in the formation of collective identities because

they can enable or constrain action, and influence the tactics and ideologies of the

movement. The case of Mi’kmaq fishermen’s struggles against the Canadian state for

recognition of their treaty rights is an instance where movement identities and meanings




                                                                                            10
come into question when the nature of the struggle is suddenly altered by a legal victory

recognizing Mi’kmaq rights.

        For centuries, Mi’kmaq people have struggled against colonial governments

(French, British, and now Canadian) for access to and control over land and natural

resources in their traditional territories, which extend over the present-day Atlantic

Canadian provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and portions

of Newfoundland and Quebec (Coates 2000; and Prins 1996). These enduring struggles

shaped Mi’kmaq/state relations, and guided the actions and discourses through which

Mi’kmaq collective identities emerged in the context of a social movement for aboriginal

and treaty rights. These sentiments and mobilizations of collective Mi’kmaq identity

have been especially strong in the four decades since the American Indian Movement and

other civil rights era social movements galvanized distinctions between “us” (Mi’kmaq)

and “them” (the state) (Prins 1996). The local landscape of the movement was

dramatically altered, however, in 1999, and this has put the Mi’kmaq people in the

position of refiguring the collective basis for their action.

        A 1999 ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada, known as the Marshall decision,

upheld Mi’kmaq people’s rights to fish for profit without federally-issued licenses, based

on a series of 18th century treaties made between the Mi’kmaq and the British (Coates

2000). This decision was the culmination of decades of activism and organizing by

Mi’kmaq people, and represented an important victory for aboriginal people throughout

Canada in their ongoing conflicts with the state. The trial, in which Donald Marshall, Jr.,

a Mi’kmaq man from Nova Scotia, argued for the continued validity of Mi’kmaq treaty




                                                                                         11
rights, became a an event around which the social movement for Mi’kmaq fishing rights

coalesced, and around which movement identities were figured. The boundaries of the

movement were defined in a particular way in this moment: Mi’kmaq activists insisted

that the treaties conveyed communally-held rights to fish for profit12, while those

opposed to the movement asserted that these rights had been extinguished long ago

(Coates 2001). Ironically, however, while this legal ruling was a signal victory for the

movement, it also initiated a dramatic reorganization of the conditions of the movement

for Mi’kmaq rights (and of collective identity formation), shifting its boundaries, and

profoundly affecting the spaces where Mi’kmaq fishermen figured their identities in

relation to traditional cultural values, and new economic opportunities. This

ethnographic case study examines how Mi’kmaq people in the reserve community13 of

Salt Harbour are reframing their movement identities as the main objective of activism

shifts from securing treaty rights to what is emerging as a larger goal of developing self-

sustaining fisheries and decreasing reliance of the state for funding and other support.

Although it is unclear at this early stage what new collective sense of the basis of the

movement will emerge, there are some possibilities that the movement will be redefined

to reflect pan-Indian goals of self-determination and autonomy.



<Title C> New Distinctions




12
   Mi’kmaq rights to fish for subsistence and ceremonial purposes had been upheld by previous court
rulings (Coates 2000).
13
   Canadian First Nations reserves are more or less analogous to Native American reservations in the
United States.




                                                                                                       12
         I (Fox) conducted ethnographic fieldwork in Salt Harbour in 2005, primarily

talking with fishermen about their experiences with fishing and with the state before and

after the Marshall decision.14 One issue repeatedly emerged in these conversations—that

of new divisions occurring within the community over different approaches to fishing.

The rhetoric and sentiments guiding long-term treaty conflicts have focused on fisheries

as an essential component of Mi’kmaq collective cultural life, and fishing as a defining

identity of Mi’kmaq men15.

         In the Marshall ruling, the Supreme Court of Canada recognized the Mi’kmaq

right to commercial fishing as a communally-held right; however, in a capitalist industry

that places value on high catch numbers and ignores communal needs and concerns, some

Mi’kmaq fishermen are seeing the benefits of working for individual—rather than

collective—gain (R v. Marshall 1999).16             The climate of the commercial fisheries is

changing in Salt Harbour, and, in turn, so are collective and individual ideas about what it

means to be a fisherman in the community today.17 Whereas before the Marshall




14
  Unless otherwise indicated, descriptions of contemporary Mi’kmaq communities and fisheries in this
paper come from these interviews.
15
  I use the term “fishermen”—as opposed to fisherpersons—because that is the term used by the Mi’kmaq
people I interviewed. In the summer of 2005, there was one woman boat captain in the community where I
was doing research, and several others occasionally worked as crew on boats captained by their husbands,
brothers, cousins or friends. Although not addressed in this case study, the way that gender identities are
being refigured in the post-Marshall years is topic meriting research attention.

16
  According to the director of the community fisheries office, the average Salt Harbour fisherman makes
about $20,000 (Canadian dollars) per year from the fisheries, though some fishermen can pull in from
$80,000-$180,000.
17
  It is important to note that these shifts in the identities of some Mi’kmaq fishermen does not mean that
the movement has ceased to be relevant to them in other arenas. Indeed, Mi’kmaq struggles for treaty




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decision, Mi’kmaq fishermen’s collective identities were oriented to the cultural and

subsistence practices of small-scale, non-commercial fishing, it appears that tensions

between individual and collective orientations to fishing are a central point of contention

in the community today, and are informing the construction of new collective identities

based as fishermen actively renegotiate their participation in local and large-scale

enduring struggles for fishing rights.

        Supporters of communally-oriented fisheries at Salt Harbour constructed their

post-Marshall collective identity through discourses of sharing and “traditional” Mi’kmaq

meanings and practices, while still making room for commercial fisheries in this vision.

For instance, two older, retired fishermen said that revenue from commercial fisheries

should be used to create a community freezer where community members would be able

to access nutritional food year round, at no cost. In another example, a fisherman noted

that increased participation in commercial fisheries has freed up subsistence fishing

licenses. He suggested that the Band Council could hire people to fish these licenses, and

the catch could be given to community members unable to fish. The emergent collective

identity of communally-oriented fishermen seems to be based on a commitment to

strengthening and maintaining a cultural ethic of communalism in Mi’kmaq communities

(rather than on a formal organization of communally-oriented fishermen, or on a shared

insistence on historical fishing methods, for instance, as has been the case in some

Western Canadian First Nations groups) and is being constructed at the intersection of




rights were (and are) but one snapshot of the ongoing conflict between First Nations peoples and the
Canadian state for rights to land, resources, and self-determination.




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cultural and historical meanings about fishing and communal life, and new knowledge

and practices emerging in the post-Marshall era.

       Just as communally-minded fishermen from Salt Harbour are refiguring what it

means to them to be a Mi’kmaq fisherman in the post-Marshall years, others in the

community are also reworking a collective identity to include individuals exercising

collectively-held, culturally-based treaty rights.   These distinctions arising between

fishermen point to difficulties in reformulating collective identities in the post-Marshall

years. For instance, individually-oriented fishermen’s reworking of the cultural aspects

of fishing to include the right to fish, but not necessarily the practice or meaning of

fishing indicates that culture may no longer be a salient basis for constructing Mi’kmaq

fisherman identities. As one young fisherman emphatically expressed, “There’s no

culture in this business.” As Mi’kmaq commercial fishermen compete with each other

and with their non-Native neighbors for a share of the lucrative commercial fishing

industry, market-based competition appears to be influencing local economic orientations

as well as fishing practices. Nevertheless, despite their individualistic approach to

commercial fisheries, the individualistically-oriented fishermen I interviewed are

committed to improving the quality of life for Salt Harbour residents. Like their

approaches to fishing, though, their attitudes toward community advancement are largely

based on accumulating market-based wealth, rather than on communally-based wealth

distribution. For instance, these fishermen’s contribution to enhancing the quality of life

in the community included, in their accounts, buying new clothing, trucks, furniture and

televisions for their own families—luxuries and comforts out of reach before they began




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fishing commercially. Moreover, they emphasize that commercial fishing provides jobs

which allow many men to remain in the community, rather than having to leave to find

work. It appears that these more individualistically-oriented fishermen are constructing

collective identities based on shared perceptions of the economic and community benefits

of individual profits from market-based fisheries.

        It is clear that, though the Marshall decision upheld Mi’kmaq collective rights to

fisheries, it has also affected the space of activism in which Mi’kmaq figure their long-

term conflicts with the state. Mi’kmaq are in the process of reconstructing new collective

identities. Some of the identities produced in this space, though rooted in enduring,

collective cultural struggles, are characterized by individualism; while others support a

collectivist ethic which incorporates the technologies and practices of the commercial

fisheries into its goals. There may appear to be an inherent contradiction between long-

term treaty struggles based on collective rights and culture, and current trends toward

individual rights, but such contradictions are not uncommon as Mi’kmaq people continue

to work to situate themselves in complex and shifting fields of power, politics and

economy. Further, the knowledge work informing these practices should not be

construed as simply modernist versus traditional; though I use the labels communal and

individualistic to describe fishing practices and identities, the distinctions are not that

simple. People in the community described different approaches to the fisheries terms of

individualism and community-mindedness; however, the practices and identities

emerging are hybrid, with both communally- and individualistically-focused fisherman

identities shaping and being shaped by historically-embedded conflicts, as well as by




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newly emerging practices and sentiments. It is possible that these two emerging

fishermen identities will cease to be salient in Salt Harbour as the post-Marshall era

proceeds, or that they will be refigured around different goals, meanings and practices.

The Marshall decision is transforming the social conditions surrounding the fisheries in

Atlantic Canada, and in the process, has created a new and contentious space for

negotiating what it means to be a fisherman.



Title A) Conclusions (about 600) [At this stage, the conclusion are notes only.]

        In contrast to related theories taking a constructivist approach to social movements,

(e.g., Hunt, et al., Stryker, et al, and Melucci), social practice theory emphasizes the

formation of movements in practice, and, as such, is more attentive to issues of power.

Specifically, social practice theory is concerned with the bonds between and the

positionality of knowledge and identities and with the “ownership” of knowledge

(Bakhtin ref) in movements.18 Whereas the other approaches focus more on “negotiation”

and intentional processes, social practice theory conceives of spaces of authoring

developing within and around movements where unpredictable, emotional, and

heteroglossic local contentious practices culturally construct the movements themselves.

Attention to cultural processes whereby divisive distinctions emerge is but one example

of how a social practice theory approach fosters This picture is useful for an appreciation

of the fluid and ongoing process of collective identity construction among social
18
     We join our colleagues in this issue of Mobilization who draw a close relationship between meaning

making and knowledge production (thereby disavowing the expert/non-expert split).




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movements. We would like to propose the following questions for further research:

emergence of new social distinctions within and without the movement.


1. How are collective identities constructed through contentious
practice, and embedded in larger fields of power, politics and economy?
[this seems very broad- is there something more specific either of you
had in mind?]
2. How can we understand the effects of "outsider threats" on
collective identities (and, by extension, on movements)?




[I would like to think up at least one other research question- something more explicitly
about the erosion (vs. emergence) of distinctions as a cultural process that both engenders
and inhibits/restricts collective identities.]


(Title A) Bibliography (about 600)




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