Reclaiming Basque: Language, Nation, and Cultural Activism (The Basque Series) - Hardcover

Urla, Jacqueline

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0874178754 ISBN 13: 9780874178753

Publisher: University of Nevada Press, 2012

Synopsis

The Basque language, Euskara, is one of Europe’s most ancient tongues and a vital part of today’s lively Basque culture. Reclaiming Basque examines the ideology, methods, and discourse of the Basque-language revitalization movement over the course of the past century and the way this effort has unfolded alongside the simultaneous Basque nationalist struggle for autonomy. Jacqueline Urla employs extensive long-term fieldwork and close examination of a vast range of documents to uncover the strategies that have been used to preserve and revive Basque and the various controversies that have arisen among language advocates. Reclaiming Basque offers a new perspective on language activism as a dynamic and evolving social movement. It addresses the complex issue of what it means to speak Basque in the contemporary Basque Country, as well as the roles of minority languages, language policies, and cultural identity in a globalized world.

About this title

About the Author

Jacqueline Urla is a professor of anthropology and the director of the Modern European Studies Program at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She has published numerous articles and essays on Basque culture and language and is the coeditor of Deviant Bodies: Critical Perspectives on Difference in Science and Popular Culture.

Review

“This is the best study of the politics of Basque language use that we have in English.” —Sharryn Kasmir, author of The Myth of Mondragón: Cooperatives, Politics, and Working-Class Life in a Basque Town

“Reclaiming Basque is a landmark study of one of the most fascinating and controversial social movements in Europe today, offering new theoretical insights not only about the Basque Country but also about the complex relationships between nationhood and language.” —Justin Crumbaugh, author of Destination Dictatorship: The Spectacle of Spain’s Tourist Boom and the Reinvention of Difference

“This important book, written by the leading authority in her field, will be an essential addition to my own personal library.” —Sandra Ott, author of War, Judgment, and Memory in the Basque Borderlands, 1914–1945

“Jaqueline Urla has written an extraordinary book. The result of 25 years of continuous engagement with the Basque language movement and its struggle to normalize the standing and use of the Basque language, Euskara, the book is a unique contribution to our knowledge of social, political, cultural, and economic mechanisms involved in minority language revival.” —The Council for European Studies

“Reclaiming Basque is an excellent study of a culture that seeks its own voice, free from the banners of France and Spain.” —The Midwest Book Review

“Jaqueline Urla has written an extraordinary book. The result of 25 years of continuous engagement with the Basque language movement and its struggle to normalize the standing and use of the Basque language, Euskara, the book is a unique contribution to our knowledge of social, political, cultural, and economic mechanisms involved in minority language revival.”—The Council for European Studies (The Council for European Studies)

“Reclaiming Basque is an excellent study of a culture that seeks its own voice, free from the banners of France and Spain.”—The Midwest Book Review (The Midwest Book Review)

“In this superb ethnographic work of the heart and mind, Urla brings Basque language activism into new focus, analyzing it principally within Foucault’s framework of governmentality, the management of the social and the self that arose with modernity.”—Kathrine A. Woolard, University of California (Kathrine A. Woolard, University of California)

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Nevada Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0874178754
• ISBN 13: 9780874178753
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 292