Reimagining Culture: Histories, Identities and the Gaelic Renaissance

Description

Since the 1960s, policies to 'revive' minority cultures and languages have flourished. But what does it mean to have a 'cultural identity'? And are minorities as deeply attached to their languages and traditions as revival policies suppose? This book is a sophisticated analysis of responses to the 'Gaelic renaissance' in a Scottish Hebridean community. Its description of everyday conceptions of belonging and interpretations of cultural policy takes us into the world of Gaelic playgroups, crofting, local history, religion and community development. Historically and theoretically informed, this book challenges many of the ways in which we conventionally think about ethnic and national identity. This accessible and engaging account of life in this remote region of Europe provides an original and timely contribution to questions of considerable currency in a broad range of social science disciplines.

Sharon Macdonald, Social Anthropology, University of Manchester

'This book is [...] a simply remarkable, straightforward and really detailed lookat how a Gaelic community works.' Stornaway Gazette 'Overall, this is a book which will be of interest to those researching the Highlands in the twentieth century. Although the focus is strongly local, the discussion is securely grounded in historical background and social science references.' The Scottish Historical Review Sharon Macdonald has written a timely and important book that deserves serious attention from anyone interested in the anthropology of Europe.' Anthropological Quarterly 'Thank heavens, then, for Sharon Macdonald and Berg, who can claim credit for this excellent book...It is built on a profound knowledge of and ethnographic familiarity with Hebridean cultures, to which he (Edwin Ardener) aspired, but it also rises above the parochial to comment meaningfully on contemporary currents in Scottish nationalism and politics and, yet more generally, on the complex interrelationships of language and culture. Macdonald is steeped in her field. She writes with authority of crofting strategy, literature, Presbyterianism, and domestic relationships. She moves easily from discussion of the politics of the local co-operative enterprise to the politics of language and linguistic revival. Her account is all the more telling for its modesty and self deprecating allusions, for the lucidity of its style, and for the obvious affection and respect in which she holds the people about whom she writes...The depth of scholarship which lies beneath Macdonald's version of this narrative, and the craft with which it is told, are unmistakable. This is a very mature piece of anthropology indeed. Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford (JASO)