University of Mississippi eGrove Honors College (Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors Theses Honors College) 2019 Generational Expressions of Basque Nationalism Mollie Bradford University of Mississippi Follow this and additional works at: https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis Part of the International and Area Studies Commons, and the Spanish and Portuguese Language and Literature Commons Recommended Citation Bradford, Mollie, "Generational Expressions of Basque Nationalism" (2019). Honors Theses. 1234. https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/1234 This Undergraduate Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Honors College (Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College) at eGrove. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of eGrove. For more information, please contact [email protected]. GENERATIONAL EXPRESSIONS OF BASQUE NATIONALISM © 2019 By Mollie Bradford A thesis presented in partial fulfillment of the requirements for completion Of the Bachelor of Arts degree in International Studies Croft Institute for International Studies Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College The University of Mississippi University, Mississippi May 2019 Approved: __________________________________ Advisor: Dr. Ana Velitchkova __________________________________ Reader: Dr. Oliver Dinius __________________________________ Reader: Dr. Miguel Centellas i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would first like to thank Dr. Ana Velitchkova for her encouragement and wise advice throughout the whole thesis process. Without her, I would have no thesis. I would also like to thank my second reader, Dr. Oliver Dinius, and my third reader, Dr. Miguel Centellas, for their guidance in taking my thesis to the next level. Thank you to my family and friends for patiently standing by me in my stress and in my joy, constantly encouraging and supporting me. Finally, I would like to thank the Croft Institute for International Studies and the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College for being my homes the past four years. I would also like to thank them for providing funding for my research. ii ABSTRACT This work studies the difference in the expressions of Basque nationalism between the Basque youth and the older generations of the Basque population in the Basque Country of Spain, or Euskadi. I hypothesized that the Basque youth would express nationalism banally, or in everyday activities, while the older generations would be intentional and active in their expressions, due to the older generations’ experiences with the Franco regime and ETA, the Basque terrorist group. I researched using articles from a Basque newspaper, Euskal Irrati Telebista. I chose key words and searched through articles written in 2017. I also conducted a survey to ask questions pertaining to the respondents’ Basque identities, to measure nationalism as an aspect of one’s identity. I coded the articles and the survey responses. In conclusion, I found that both the groups were active, rather than banal, in Basque nationalist expressions, though the methods and topics of their nationalist expressions varied. Media was much more important to the youth, appealing to the influence of technology and digital capitalism. I also found that ETA and Franco did not impact the older generations’ expressions of nationalism nor their promotion of nationalism to the Basque youth. Independence was addressed more often among the older generations than the youth. Both groups found culture, language, violence, activism, and politics to be important in Euskadi. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Research Question………………………………………………………………...1 II. Introduction……………………………………………………………………….2 III. Theories of Nationalism…………………………………………………………..6 IV. Methodology……………………………………………………………………..21 V. Findings………………………………………………………………………….27 A. Newspaper Articles………………………………………………………27 B. Survey……………………………………………………………………43 VI. Discussion………………………………………………………………………..55 VII. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………….59 VIII. Limitations……………………………………………………………………….61 IX. Bibliography……………………………………………………………………..62 X. Appendix…………………………………………………………………………64 iv RESEARCH QUESTION How do the Basque youth express their Basque nationalism as opposed to older generations in the modern-day? This study will compare the nationalism amongst the common Basque youth to the nationalism expressed by the older generations in today’s time. Many of the older generations lived during the Franco regime and all lived during ETA’s attacks. Therefore, I am specifically interested in how those experiences potentially shaped their Basque identities, or lack thereof, when compared to the younger generation who did not experience much, or any, of Franco and ETA. I expect the youth’s lack of experience with repression and terrorism has allowed the youth the freedom to be banal in nationalist expressions. I hypothesize that the Basque youth will express their nationalism banally, or in everyday, mundane activities (Billig 1995, p. 6), while the older generations will actively express their nationalism. 1 INTRODUCTION As globalization has increased, nationalist feelings have resurged, due to fear of homogenization of culture (Dutceac 2004, p. 24). Regionalism works in opposition to globalization by appealing to national ties and identities (Kacowicz 1999, p. 4). The European Union has attempted to integrate European citizens into a European nation. However, instead of unifying as European citizens, this attempted integration has caused the citizens identify with their national identities more (Polyakova & Fligstein, 2015, p. 2). The refugee crisis and the subsequent fear of terrorism has led to an increase in nationalism as nations attempt to protect their citizens and borders (Postelnicescu 2016, p. 203). Thus, nationalism should still be relevant in today’s time in the Basque Country, or Euskadi. Primordialism and constructivism are two concepts used to define nationalism. Primordialism argues that nationalism has been a given in a society since the beginning of time, unchanging and holding power in the society (Smith 2000, p. 21). It further argues that the roots are ethnic, through blood ties, rather than socially. Constructivism argues that nationalism is a modern theory that can change, depending on the social context (Good & Stroup 2015, p. 1-2). I argue that Basque nationalism is constructivist. Expressions and motivations for Basque nationalism have changed over the decades. Generations express nationalism differently. As technology has developed and its influence has increased in society, methods of communication and nationalist expression 2 have evolved. Therefore, Basque nationalism has changed over time and will continue to do so. Nationalism is an aspect of one’s identity. One can have both a personal identity as well as a public identity, though both are interconnected and affect one another (Owens et al. 2010, p. 480). Personal identities are formed based on one’s membership in a social group. A public identity allows one’s personal identity to be shared with others, creating a community of people with similar identities. Thus, if one personally identifies as Basque, his or her identification will be expressed publicly in the form of nationalist expression. In my research, I used the newspaper articles to measure public national identity and the survey responses to measure personal national identity. The newspapers illustrated the expressions of a public identity. As I was researching nationalism, I found evidence of Basque public identity expressed through festivals, protests, political platforms, etc. The surveys provided evidence of Basque national personal identities, through explanations of how the respondents identify and their motivations for attending festivals, using Euskera, etc. As nationalism is an aspect of one’s identity, then personal identity with a nation will manifest itself in public identities through nationalist expressions. Through my analysis of the EiTB newspaper articles and the survey responses, I have found that both the youth and the older generations actively express nationalism, rather than banally. However, they express nationalism in different ways. The youth are most impacted by media use, signifying the change in society with the rise of technology and use of digital capitalism to spread nationalism. The importance of media can be seen both in their own use of media and its use by the older generations to reach the youth. 3 Culture is an important aspect to both the youth and the older generations. Contrary to my expectation that the Franco regime and ETA’s terrorism would affect the nationalist expressions of the older generations, most of the older generations stated that they are not affected by either factor today. While both groups express nationalism actively, the youth are more affected by media than the older generations. Historical Background The Basque Country of Spain, Euskadi, has long been an enigma. The origin of the Basque language, Euskera, is untraceable. The culture is different from the rest of Spain, which can be seen through celebration of festivals, holidays, and history unique to Euskadi. For centuries, the Basque people, as well as the other regions of Spain, were ruled under the “political system of…fueros…which means the right and capacity to organize from within the community” (Edles 1999, p. 322), allowing them to govern themselves autonomously within Spain. The Progressivist constitution abolished the fueros in 1837, but the Basque Country did not lose its political autonomy