Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Ethnicity

The term ethnicity refers to the social and cultural forms of identification and self-identification; it is an identification with the particular ethnic group. On the basis of identification the sense of belonging to the particular ethnic entity is formed and comprehended.
In English language the term ethnicity has wider meaning. It is used to describe not only the modern links of personality with the nation, but imagined bonds between the common past and culture are also covered under this notion[1].
In political theory, the term ethnicity is used to characterize a group, with a strong coherence and solidarity. The group is an unity of people, possessing of common interests and origins. Quiet often these features are latently scrutinized. Thus, an ethnic group is not merely a cohesion of humans, but it is an unity of closely related people, with common history and consciousness[2].
As Valery Tishkov notes, the term ethnicity is an indefinite and vague term in an Anglo-Saxson World and perhaps this vagueness contributes to it’s constant replication. Problem arises immediately, after an unsuccessful attempt to define the meaning of ethnicity, facing a wide range of definitions. As the term itself is comprised of numerous subjective and objective elements, this adds to it’s dynamic character[3].
O.Patchekov offers: It will be quiet usefull to reject the term ethnicity wherever it is possible, or dismiss it in particular situations, where it won’t help us to portray reality adequately. This proposition has some justification: ethnicity, closely tied with nationalism, is a political phenomenon, thus bearing a lot of inner threats.[4]
[1]Wikipedia http://www.wikipedia.org/
[2]Rupesinghe K. Tishkov V. Ethnicity and Power in the Contemporary World
[3]Rupesinghe K. Tishkov V. Ethnicity and Power in the Contemporary World
[4]Patchenkov O. Ethnically based conflicts on post-socialist space (internet misamarTi sanaxavia).

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