Regional Identity
vs
National Identity
in Europe
Regional
Identity
today
The EU has policies towards Regions, including a Development Fund
Regional Identity appears prominently today in modern Europe and the EU, in the era of Industrial and Enlightenment Europe, and in early modern Europe.
Attitudes from various central national authorities towards regionalism have varied throughout modern European history, but often regional identity has been perceived by the dominant national identity as a threatening and/or backward influence.
John Stuart Mill’s words are reflective of this….
Experience proves that it is possible for one nationality to merge and be absorbed in another: and when it was originally an inferior and more backward portion of the human race the absorption is greatly to its advantage.
Nobody can suppose that it is not more beneficial to a Breton, or a Basque of French Navarre, to be brought into the current of the ideas and feelings of a highly civilised and cultivated people — to be a member of the French nationality, admitted on equal terms to all the privileges of French citizenship, sharing the advantages of French protection, and the dignity and prestige of French power — than to sulk on his own rocks, the half-savage relic of past times, revolving in his own little mental orbit, without participation or interest in the general movement of the world.
The same remark applies to the Welshman or the Scottish Highlander as members of the British nation.
John Stuart Mill, “Of Nationality as connected with Representative Government”, 1861
From the AP European History Course Framework: National and European Identity
Definitions and perceptions of regional, cultural, national, and European identity have developed and been challenged over time, with varied and often profound effects on the political, social, and cultural order in Europe.
TOPIC 6.4 Social Effects of Industrialization: KC-3.2.II.B With migration from rural to urban areas in industrialized regions, cities experienced overcrowding, while affected rural areas suffered declines in available labor as well as weakened communities.
National, mini-National and Regional Identity
National
National
Dominant National
mini-National
Regional
Examples 1600s-1800s:
Spanish, French, British
Basque, Breton, Scottish
Navarre, Loire-Nantes, Gaelic Hebridies
Do local, regional and transnational identities trump nationalism?
In an online forum Dr Mathijs Pelkmans and Professor Michael Brute of the London School of Economics argue that:
1) State-centric nationalist or patriotic feelings may be diluted or weakened by local and regional identities.
2) These other types of identities are also grounded on a specific territory and can be sometimes considered as important as the national identities.
3) Localism and regionalism thrives in particular in societies with low geographical mobility where people attach great importance to the language, traditions, folklore, and other cultural manifestations of their village, town or county or region.
Recent work among some historians and writers in Britain, and elsewhere in Europe, has challenged a monolithic national narrative of a country’s history.
Modern historians tend to be focused on urban identities and can ignore geographic diversity, assuming that the modern metropolitan culture has always existed.
A re-focus on regionalism as a core identity highlights the fact that until mid 1800s rail and roads, in the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment cultures that encouraged centralization and “modernity”, coastal cultures far from political capitals thrived due to the primacy of sea travel.
Until the mid-1800s Europe’s coastal Atlantic fringe had thriving regional identities connected to Scandinavia, north Africa and the transatlantic.
Three case-studies:
The Gaelic Hebrides in Scotland;
Cheshire in England;
Navarre in the Basque Country.
Europe’s Atlantic fringe
The Gaelic Hebrides in Scotland
Identity based on Scots-Gaelic language and culture
Starting text for research: The Frayed Atlantic Edge, Dr David Gange, University of Birmingham
https://www.amazon.com/Frayed-Atlantic-Edge-Historians-Shetland-ebook/dp/B07JLVRXP9
Follow-on sites for research:
https://frayedatlanticedge.wordpress.com/
http://rootshebrides.com/is-the-hebrides-a-country
https://www.visitscotland.com/about/uniquely-scottish/gaelic/
Scots-Gaelic Medium Education was introduced by the Scottish Government in 2005:
https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/glowblogs/eslb/tag/gaelic-medium-education/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Gaelic_medium_education?scrlybrkr=6f7103d1
Cheshire in England
Identity based on Cheshire traditions and culture
Starting text for research: “Talk of Marriage” in Northwest England: Continuity and Change in Matrimonial Litigatio, 1560-1640, Dr Jennifer McNabb, University of Northern Iowa
https://quidditas.humwp.byu.edu/files/2018/12/31.pdf
Follow-on sites for research:
https://www.economist.com/britain/2000/07/13/regionalism-on-the-rise
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0264275115001419
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/668511?mobileUi=0&journalCode=mp
Navarre in the Basque Country, Spain
Identity based on Basque language and culture
Starting text for research:
http://www.geocurrents.info/geopolitics/the-paradoxes-of-basque-politics
Have the students explore resources and produce results of the inter-play since 1450 of the changing regional identity of Navarre as it relates to the changing mini-nationalism of the Basque country and the larger national identity of Spain since 1450.
General resources on mini-nationalism:
https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/0199242143.001.0001/acprof-9780199242146
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/15e6/0ee2fe31abdd6df26039e5f2af29bc62df5d.pdf
Local Identity in Popular Culture today - Amazon Prime 2020 movie “Fisherman’s Friends”