Search

Although all nationalisms share common features, each of them has also its own particular characteristics, determined by the historically specific context in which the nationalist ideology emerged and the specific circumstances in which it persists. Czech nationalism, like many aspects of Czech historical consciousness, crystalized during the period of conscious nation-building, referred to by the Czechs as the national revival and started at the end of the eighteenth century. For the Czechs, patriotism is a positive attitude to, or the awareness of belonging to, one's homeland. Most of them define it as a love of one's homeland that manifests itself in the willingness to do something positive for it. This can range from one's contribution to the development of national culture to a cultured lifestyle that respects national customs and traditions. Patriotism is probably a sentiment of considerable antiquity, and rooted in the Graeco-Rornan and Judaeo-Christian traditions of Western thought.

The most obvious expression of the search for the essence of national identity is the images people have of themselves and of other nations. When reflecting on themselves as a nation, Czechs refer either to certain national qualities or dispositions or to what they consider to be their national traditions. The self-images expressed through the characteristics which they ascribe to themselves and through the traditions which they claim as their own differ considerably. This raises the questions of why this should be so and how it can be cognitively tolerated and managed. The ultimate source of the Czech egalitarian ethos is the belief in the equality of individuals in nature. It is acceptable to ascribe an individual's failure to a lack of effort or hard work but bad form to ascribe it to a lack of intelligence, for this would amount to the admission of inherent inequality, which is culturally denied. We may not all be good at everything, but each of us is good at something, which proves our natural equality. I do not think that anyone was sorry when IQ tests disappeared in communist Czechoslovakia, having been declared an invention of bourgeois pseudo-science; the illusion of equality in nature could thereafter be maintained without being openly challenged. The little Czech as the typical representative of the Czech nation is the embodiment of ordinariness and healthy common sense. Whatever else he may lack, he does not lack intelligence.

When Ladislav Holy precipitately left Czechoslovakia for the UK in 1968 he was already one of the leading anthropologists in Central Europe. In the following decades he made important field studies in Africa. Since 1986 he has been engaged in research in the Czech Republic, and he brings to this timely study of national identity the skills of a seasoned researcher, a cosmopolitan perspective, and the insights of an insider. Drawing on historical and literary sources as well as ethnography, he analyses Czech discourses on national identity. He argues that there were specifically 'Czech' aspects to the communist regime and to the 'velvet revolution', and paying particular attention to symbolic representations of what it means to be Czech, he explores how notions of Czech identity were involved in the debates surrounding the fall of communism, and the emergence of a new social system.

Among the Berti of Northern Darfur (Sudan), as among many Muslim societies, the formal religious practices are predominantly the concern of men, while local, unorthodox customary rituals are performed mainly by women. It is usual to dismiss such local, popular practices as pre-Islamic survivals, but Professor Holy shows that the customary rituals constitute an integral part of the religious system of the Berti. Carefully analysing the symbolic statements made in Berti rituals, Professor Holy demonstrates that the distinction between the two classes of rituals is an expression of the gender relationships characteristic of the society. He also examines the social distribution of knowledge about Islam, and explains the role of the religious schools in sustaining religious ideas. The work is not only an ethnographic study of ritual, belief and gender in an African society. It also makes a significant contribution to current anthropological discussion of the interpretation and meaning of rituals and symbols.

Une part importante du processus de transformation que connaissent les anciens pays socialistes est liee a la legitimation du nouvel ordre post-socialiste et des Etats qui le composent. L'A. traite d'un aspect de ce processus tel qu'il se developpe a l'heure actuelle dans la Republique tcheque, a savoir, la legitimation de la creation d'un Etat tcheque independant, et de la voie par laquelle il a ete cree. La methode d'analyse est l'analyse de discours, celle du discours sur l'Etat tcheque qui a surgi peu de temps apres la chute du regime communiste en 1989, et qui a gagne de l'importance apres les elections de 1992. Si l'idee d'un Etat tcheque a acquis une telle force de persuasion, c'est qu'elle decoule de certaines premisses enracinees dans la culture tcheque, comme par exemple, la dichotomie conceptuelle entre ce qui est « naturellement constitue » et ce qui est « cree artificiellement ». Cette attention pour l'evocation de signifiants culturels partages, pour les metaphores centrales du discours et les symboles qui les expriment, est le propre de l'anthropologie, dont la demarche et les interets completent ceux des autres sciences sociales

G.J. Abbink, Serena Nanda, Cultural anthropology, Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Company (second edition), 1985, 398 pp. - H.J.M. Claessen, Patrick Vinton Kirch, The evolution of the Polynesian Chiefdoms, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge etc. Series: New Studies in Archaeology, edited by Colin Renfrew and Jeremy Sabloff, 1984. 314 pp., index, glossary, bibliography, maps, and figures. - H.J.M. Claessen, Jarich O. Oosten, The war of the gods. The social code in Indo-European myths, London etc.: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1985. 175 pp., bibl., figs. - H.J. Duller, P.W. Preston, New trends in development theory. Essays in development and social theory, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London 1985, 200 pages. - H.J. Duller, M. Stiefel, Production, equality and participation in rural China, UNRISD, Geneva & Red Press, London, 1983, 172 pp., W.F. Wertheim (eds.) - M. Grijns, Kirsten Hastrup, Basisboek culturele antropologie. Bewerkt door Yme Kuiper & Nellejet Zorgdrager. Groningen: Wolters-Noordhoff, 1983, 353 pp., Jan Ovesen (eds.) - Simon Kooijman, Jelle Miedema, De kabar 1855-1980. Sociale structuur en religie in de Vogelkop van West-Nieuw-Guinea. Dissertatie Katholieke Universiteit van Nijmegan, Dordrecht 1984: ICG printing BV. Gelijktijdig verschenen als Verhandelingen 105 van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, Leiden, Dordrecht 1984: Foris publications. - Adam Kuper, R.H. Barnes, Two crows denies it: A history of controversy in Omaha sociology, Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska press, 1984. - C.L.J. van der Meer, Steven Piker, A peasant community in changing Thailand, Anthropological research papers, no. 30, Arizona State University, 1983. - J. Miedema, Mark S. Mosko, Quadripartite structures: Categories, relations, and homologies in Bush Mekeo culture, Cambridge: University Press, 1985, XIII + 298 pp. - David S. Moyer, Rodney Needham, Against the tranquility of Axioms, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1983, xi + 182 pp. - Anke Niehof, Imke Swart, Die Traditionellen Grundlagen der Erziehung im Zentralen Java, Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1983. (130 pp.) - J.H.B. den Ouden, R.S. Khare, The untouchable as himself. Ideology, identity and pragmatism among the Lucknow Chamars, Cambridge studies in cultural systems, Cambridge University Press, 1984. - Rien Ploeg, James A. Boon, Other tribes, other scribes; symbolic anthropology in the comparitive study of cultures, histories, religions, and texts, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. xiv + 303 pp., appendixes. - Frank N. Pieke, Rubie S. Watson, Inequality among brothers: Class and kinship in South China, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. xiii + 193 pp., 3 maps. - Rien Ploeg, Durk Hak, Watching the seaside. Essays on maritime anthropology. A. H. J. Prins; Festschrift on the occasion of his retirement from the Chair of Anthropology, University of Groningen, University of Groningen, 1984, 251 pp., ill., diagr., Ybeltje Kroes, Hans Schneymann (eds.) - Rien Ploeg, Ladislav Holy, Actions, norms and representations. Foundations of anthropological inquiry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983. VIII + 134 pp., Milan Stuchlik (eds.) - Rien Ploeg, Nancy L. Hamblin, Animal use by the Cozumel Maya, Tucson, Arizona: The University of Arizona Press, 1984. 206 pp. - Ronald H. Poelmeijer, Lilly Eversdijk Smulders, Een jaar bij de yogiýs van India en Tibet, Deventer 1983. - Ype H. Poortinga, Dean Peabody, National characteristics, Cambridge/Paris: Camnbridge University Press/Editions de la Maison des Sciences de lýHomme, 1985. - Karen Portier, Khin Thitsa, Nuns, mediums and prostitutes in Chiengmai: A study of some marginal categories of women (41 pp.). - Karen Portier, Signe Howell, Chewong women in transition: The effects of monetization on a hunter-gatherer society in Malaysia (34 pp.). - Karen Portier, Maila Stivens, Sexual politics in Rembau: Female autonomy, matriliny and agrarian change in Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia (50 pp.) - R. de Ridder, Dennis Tedlock, The spoken word and the work of interpretation, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983. ix + 365 pp., 8 ill. - R. de Ridder, Dennis Tedlock, Popol Vuh, The definitive edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985. 380 pp., 32 ill. - G. van Roon, Dietmar Rothermund, Die Peripherie in der Weltwirtschaftskrise: Afrika, Asien und Lateinamerika 1929-1939, Paderborn: Ferdinand Schýningh, 1983, 295 pp. - Thilo C. Schadeberg, Gýnter Dabitz, Geschichte der erforschung der Nuba-Berge, Arbeiten aus dem Seminar fýr Výlkerkunde der Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universitýt Frankfurt am Main, Band 17, Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1985. 280 pp., maps, tables, illus. - L. van Vroonhoven, Ger van Roon, Derde Wereld in depressie, Leiden: Nijhoff, 1985, 139 p. - Wim van Zanten, Nigel Phillips, Sijobang, sung narrative poetry of West Sumatra, Cambridge Studies in Oral and Literate Culture, no. 1, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. xi + 255 pp., photos, texts and translations, short glossary of Minangkabau words, Bibliography, index.

The increasing tendency to ascribe important theoretical significance to the recent anthropological analyses to which Goody refers is a trend which is clearly observable not only in writings on kinship but in almost any other anthropological subject as well. It is a conscious or intuitive reflection on the present stage of the development of the anthropological discipline. This is a

G.J. Abbink, Serena Nanda, Cultural anthropology, Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Company (second edition), 1985, 398 pp. - H.J.M. Claessen, Patrick Vinton Kirch, The evolution of the Polynesian Chiefdoms, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge etc. Series: New Studies in Archaeology, edited by Colin Renfrew and Jeremy Sabloff, 1984. 314 pp., index, glossary, bibliography, maps, and figures. - H.J.M. Claessen, Jarich O. Oosten, The war of the gods. The social code in Indo-European myths, London etc.: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1985. 175 pp., bibl., figs. - H.J. Duller, P.W. Preston, New trends in development theory. Essays in development and social theory, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London 1985, 200 pages. - H.J. Duller, M. Stiefel, Production, equality and participation in rural China, UNRISD, Geneva & Red Press, London, 1983, 172 pp., W.F. Wertheim (eds.) - M. Grijns, Kirsten Hastrup, Basisboek culturele antropologie. Bewerkt door Yme Kuiper & Nellejet Zorgdrager. Groningen: Wolters-Noordhoff, 1983, 353 pp., Jan Ovesen (eds.) - Simon Kooijman, Jelle Miedema, De kabar 1855-1980. Sociale structuur en religie in de Vogelkop van West-Nieuw-Guinea. Dissertatie Katholieke Universiteit van Nijmegan, Dordrecht 1984: ICG printing BV. Gelijktijdig verschenen als Verhandelingen 105 van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, Leiden, Dordrecht 1984: Foris publications. - Adam Kuper, R.H. Barnes, Two crows denies it: A history of controversy in Omaha sociology, Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska press, 1984. - C.L.J. van der Meer, Steven Piker, A peasant community in changing Thailand, Anthropological research papers, no. 30, Arizona State University, 1983. - J. Miedema, Mark S. Mosko, Quadripartite structures: Categories, relations, and homologies in Bush Mekeo culture, Cambridge: University Press, 1985, XIII + 298 pp. - David S. Moyer, Rodney Needham, Against the tranquility of Axioms, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1983, xi + 182 pp. - Anke Niehof, Imke Swart, Die Traditionellen Grundlagen der Erziehung im Zentralen Java, Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1983. (130 pp.) - J.H.B. den Ouden, R.S. Khare, The untouchable as himself. Ideology, identity and pragmatism among the Lucknow Chamars, Cambridge studies in cultural systems, Cambridge University Press, 1984. - Rien Ploeg, James A. Boon, Other tribes, other scribes; symbolic anthropology in the comparitive study of cultures, histories, religions, and texts, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. xiv + 303 pp., appendixes. - Frank N. Pieke, Rubie S. Watson, Inequality among brothers: Class and kinship in South China, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. xiii + 193 pp., 3 maps. - Rien Ploeg, Durk Hak, Watching the seaside. Essays on maritime anthropology. A. H. J. Prins; Festschrift on the occasion of his retirement from the Chair of Anthropology, University of Groningen, University of Groningen, 1984, 251 pp., ill., diagr., Ybeltje Kroes, Hans Schneymann (eds.) - Rien Ploeg, Ladislav Holy, Actions, norms and representations. Foundations of anthropological inquiry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983. VIII + 134 pp., Milan Stuchlik (eds.) - Rien Ploeg, Nancy L. Hamblin, Animal use by the Cozumel Maya, Tucson, Arizona: The University of Arizona Press, 1984. 206 pp. - Ronald H. Poelmeijer, Lilly Eversdijk Smulders, Een jaar bij de yogiýs van India en Tibet, Deventer 1983. - Ype H. Poortinga, Dean Peabody, National characteristics, Cambridge/Paris: Camnbridge University Press/Editions de la Maison des Sciences de lýHomme, 1985. - Karen Portier, Khin Thitsa, Nuns, mediums and prostitutes in Chiengmai: A study of some marginal categories of women (41 pp.). - Karen Portier, Signe Howell, Chewong women in transition: The effects of monetization on a hunter-gatherer society in Malaysia (34 pp.). - Karen Portier, Maila Stivens, Sexual politics in Rembau: Female autonomy, matriliny and agrarian change in Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia (50 pp.) - R. de Ridder, Dennis Tedlock, The spoken word and the work of interpretation, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983. ix + 365 pp., 8 ill. - R. de Ridder, Dennis Tedlock, Popol Vuh, The definitive edition of the Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985. 380 pp., 32 ill. - G. van Roon, Dietmar Rothermund, Die Peripherie in der Weltwirtschaftskrise: Afrika, Asien und Lateinamerika 1929-1939, Paderborn: Ferdinand Schýningh, 1983, 295 pp. - Thilo C. Schadeberg, Gýnter Dabitz, Geschichte der erforschung der Nuba-Berge, Arbeiten aus dem Seminar fýr Výlkerkunde der Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universitýt Frankfurt am Main, Band 17, Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1985. 280 pp., maps, tables, illus. - L. van Vroonhoven, Ger van Roon, Derde Wereld in depressie, Leiden: Nijhoff, 1985, 139 p. - Wim van Zanten, Nigel Phillips, Sijobang, sung narrative poetry of West Sumatra, Cambridge Studies in Oral and Literate Culture, no. 1, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. xi + 255 pp., photos, texts and translations, short glossary of Minangkabau words, Bibliography, index.