Module 6: What is Ethnicity? Affiliation

Reading: Barth, "Introduction"

Ethnicity is social identification based on the presumption of shared history and a common cultural inheritance. There are three major approaches to ethnicity: the isolationist/primordial approach, the interaction/instrumental approach, and the power/domination approach. First, take a sheet of paper and write down what you think ethnicity is, what your ethnicity is, and when (if ever) you have felt your ethnicity most acutely. We'll save this for later.

The earliest approach to ethnicity in anthropology was the isolationist/primordial approach. In this approach, ethnic groups were defined as distinct cultures, groups of people with distinctive customs and outlooks. These intergroup differences developed because of geographical differences and isolation. We can imagine, as Barth (1969:11) says, "each group developing its cultural and social form in relative isolation, mainly in response to ecological factors.” In this view, each group can be studied in isolation from the others. The focus will be on the distinctive characteristics of the culture. What cultural traits might be distinctive? Foods, music, clothing, folk tales, dialect, etc. In archaeology, the focus would be on how these traits are evident in material culture, such as? Pottery, house styles, burial styles, etc. In the isolationist/ primordial approach, emphasis is upon cultural content, what each ethnic group consists of.

In this approach, what would happen when members of different ethnic groups come together, for instance, as in the U.S.? In the isolationist/primordial approach, the coming together of ethnic groups might result in cultural blending, and cultural differences might eventually disappear. This is the idea of the American "melting pot,” where immigrants come from many different countries and learn to become "American.” What would assimilation look like archaeologically? Sharp differences early in the archaeological record would gradually disappear over time. Are there examples of this in Deetz? Yes, diverse house styles in the United States, 1620-1660, depending on the region of England that colonists come from. Over time, these traditions were transformed into American forms showing American regional diversity (p. 131). So in some situations, this view can hold true, and it is interesting to think about what these circumstances might be.

[If someone says that the coming together of ethnic groups would result in conflict, you can go into this discussion of "tribalism.” Otherwise, save for later in the course: Yes, we might anticipate ethnic conflict, based upon deep-seated loyalties to our own culture as "proper” ("natural” ethnocentrism). This presumption of conflict based upon "natural” ethnocentrism is sometimes called "tribalism,” a term that naturalizes ethnic and national conflict—that is, attributes it to "human nature”. This is not a very satisfactory analysis of ethnic conflict, because it doesn't explain why groups can sometimes live together in peace, or at least without evident conflict, and be consumed by bloody ethnic conflict at other times. If humans can both live at peace with neighbors who are different and engage in ethnic violence and discrimination, then both must be equally "human nature,” and how humans react to ethnic difference must be a consequence of circumstance rather than instinct. Beware of the word "tribalism” when you hear it in a news broadcast or read it in a paper! It should be a red flag that real social analysis is missing!]

But in many cases, the isolationist model is inadequate. The isolationist model emphasizes the importance of isolation and cultural difference in creating and maintaining ethnic identities. But in many cases, neither of these conditions are met. Situations of contact and exchange between ethnic groups seem not to diminish the strength of ethnic differences. Distinctive ethnic identities are maintained even though the groups are in contact, in interaction, over a long period of time. For example, the Pathans, Kohistanis, and Baluch in Pakistan, or Fur and Baggara households in the Sudan, lived in contact over long periods of time, centuries, without surrendering their ethnic distinctiveness. And this is true even when individuals frequently change their membership from one group to the other. In several of these cases, people know the other group’s culture so well that individuals will give up their membership in one ethnic group and join the other ethnic group, yet the ethnic groups persist as culturally recognized distinctive entities.

Also, groups with a shared culture may insist on their ethnic difference. For example, the Hutu and Tutsi in Rwanda share the same language, look the same, probably are the same, except that when Belgium set up a colonial government in Rwanda, it decided that people who herded cattle (the minority) were a different and superior race than those who were agriculturalists (the Hutu, the majority). So they assigned people from cattle-herding groups, the Tutsi, privileged positions in the colonial government. This creation of privileges between two artificially created groups led to political competition, and eventually a genocide, in which the Hutu slaughtered as many as 800,000 Tutsi in 1994. The differences between Hutus and Tutsis were not based on isolation. They were not based on cultural difference. But they were "ethnic differences,” with real and terrible consequences.

The isolationist/primordial approach emphasizing isolation and cultural difference is a kind of common-sense, naïve approach to ethnic differences, the kind of understanding that develops among members of the dominant group based upon their lack of experience with discrimination. This is a "top-down” view.

Next time we'll deal with the interaction/instrumental and power/domination approaches, approaches that provide some explanations of things like long-term ethnic consciousness and ethnic conflict.