Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-9q27g Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-17T05:54:39.492Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Subversive Celebrations: Holidays as Sites of Minority Identity Contestation in Repressive Regimes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 October 2020

Lisel Hintz  and
Allison L. Quatrini Open the ORCID record for Allison L. Quatrini [Opens in a new window]
Lisel Hintz
Affiliation:
School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland
Allison L. Quatrini*
Affiliation:
Behavioral Sciences Collegium, Eckerd College, St. Petersburg, Florida
*
*Corresponding author. Email: quatrial@eckerd.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

What role do nationally celebrated holidays play for groups that are not considered—or do not consider themselves—to be part of the majority nation of a state? What function do holidays specific to minority group cultures serve under regimes that discriminate against those groups? This article explores holidays as a forum for contestation for the national identity proposals promulgated by the state in repressive regimes. We argue that national holidays are meaningful sites of identity contestation for four reasons: the role of holidays in heightening identity salience, the malleability of identity narratives, the relative lack of institutional barriers to acts of celebration, and the significance of refusing to participate in celebrations. We collected the data through interviews and participant observation of the Hui in China and the Kurds in Turkey. We employ ethnographic observation and intertextual analysis to compare these identity narratives. We find that the Hui legitimize their group’s existence by co-opting the traditional Spring Festival, or by outwardly insisting they are not celebrating while still engaging in festivities. In contrast, Turkey’s Kurds resist the government’s co-optation of the spring celebration of Newroz as a Turkish national holiday.

Keywords

repressive regimesidentity contestationholidaysTurkeyChina
Type
Article
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 49 , Issue 2: Special Issue on Conceptualizing and Operationalizing Identity, Race, Ethnicity, and Nationality by Law , March 2021 , pp. 289 - 307
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Association for the Study of Nationalities

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References

Adams, Laura. 2010. The Spectacular State: Culture and National Identity in Uzbekistan. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
An, Baijie. 2014. “Top Leaders Extend Spring Festival Greetings.” China Daily, January 30, 2014. http://europe.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2014-01/30/content_17265500.htm. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Rev. ed. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Atak, Kivanç and Bayram, İsmail Emre. 2017. “Protest Policing a la Turca.” Social Forces 95 (4): 1667–1694.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Atwill, David. 2003. “Blinkered Visions: Islamic Identity, Hui Ethnicity, and the Panthay Rebellion in Southwest China, 1856–1873.” The Journal of Asian Studies 62 (4): 1079–1108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aydın, Delal. 2013. “Mobilizing the Kurds in Turkey: Newroz as a Myth.” In The Kurdish Question in Turkey, edited by Güneş, C. and Zeydanlıoğlu, W., 84–104. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Bagımsız İletişim Ağı. 2012. “Gazeteler Newroz’u Nasıl Gördü.” March 19, 2012.Google Scholar
BBC Monitoring. 2004. “Jailed Turkish Rebel Kurd Leader Says Prepared to Die for Cause.”Google Scholar
Beissinger, Mark. 2002. Nationalist Mobilization and the Collapse of the Soviet State. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bieber, Florian. 2018. “Patterns of Competitive Authoritarianism in the Western Balkans.” East European Politics 34 (3): 337–354.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, Nathan. 2012. When Victory Is Not an Option: Islamist Movements in Arab Politics. Ithica, NY: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brubaker, Rogers. 1996. Nationalism Reframed: Nation and the National Question in the New Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butt, Ahsan. 2016. “Street Power: Friday Prayers, Islamist Protests, and Islamization in Pakistan.” Politics and Religion 9 (1): 1–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cakan, Seyhmus, and Butler, Daren. 2016. “Pro-Kurdish Leader Urges Peace Talks with Turkey, Four Soldiers Killed.” Reuters, March 21, 2016.Google Scholar
Çelik, Ayşe Betül. 2015. “ ‘I Miss My Village!’ Forced Kurdish Migrants in Istanbul and Their Representation in Associations.” New Perspectives on Turkey 32: 137–163.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chatterjee, Choi. 2002. Celebrating Women: Gender, Festival Culture, and Bolshevik Ideology, 1910–1939. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.Google Scholar
Chuah, Osman. 2004. “Muslims in China: The Social and Economic Situation of the Hui Chinese.” Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 24: 155–162.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Colta, Alexandra. 2017. “Document Human Rights Film Festival.” Alphaville: Journal of Film and Screen Media 14: 239–244.Google Scholar
Cumhuriyet Gazetesi. 1996. “Cumhurbaşkanı Demirel Ankara’da Koşu Başlatacak.” March 21, 1996. https://www.cumhuriyetarsivi.com/katalog/192/sayfa/1996/3/21/3.xhtml. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Derneği, İnsan Hakları. 2012. “2012 Newrozu’nda Yaşanan Hak İhlalleri Raporu.” Human Rights Association. http://www.ihd.org.tr/2012-newrozunda-yasanan-hak-ihlalleri-raporu/.Google Scholar
Dezan Shira and Associates. 2019. “China’s 2019 Holiday Schedule.” China Briefing, March 22, 2019. https://www.china-briefing.com/news/chinas-2019-holiday-schedule/. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Diamond, Larry. 2010. “Why Are There No Arab Democracies?” Journal of Democracy 21 (1): 93–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dillon, Michael. 1999. China’s Muslim Hui Community: Migration, Settlement, and Sects. London: Curzon Press.Google Scholar
Dillon, Michael. 2013 China’s Muslim Hui Community: Migration, Settlement, and Sects, 2nd edition. London: Curzon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dubé, François N., Hongxia, Zhao, Haijuan, Yang, and Lijun, Huang. 2016. “Halal Certification System as a Resource for Firm Internationalisation: Comparison of China and Malaysia.” International Journal of Asia Pacific Studies 12 (1): 125–141.Google Scholar
Eckstein, Susan., ed. 2001. Power and Popular Protest: Latin American Social Movements. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Esen, Berk., and Gümüşçü, Şebnem. 2016. “Rising Competitive Authoritarianism in Turkey.” Third World Quarterly 37 (9): 1581–1606.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evrensel. 2016. “HDP, Newroz programını açıkladı, Final Cizre’de.” March 5, 2016. https://www.evrensel.net/haber/274227/hdp-2016-newroz-programini-acikladi-final-cizrede. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
First Five-Year Plan.” Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 1 (3): 447–473.Google Scholar
Gambetti, Zeynep. 2009. “Politics of Place/Space: The Spatial Dynamics of the Kurdish and Zapatista Movements.” New Perspectives on Turkey 41: 43–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gan, Nectar. 2018. “How China Is Trying to Impose Islam with Chinese Characteristics in the Hui Muslim Heartland.” South China Morning Post, May 14, 2018. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/policies-politics/article/2145939/how-china-trying-impose-islam-chinese-characteristics. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Garcia, Zenel. 2016. “Resistance and Assimilation: Transforming Security Roles of China’s Largest Muslim Minorities.” Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 36 (2): 282–293.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gladney, Dru. 1991. Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People’s Republic. Harvard East Asian Monographs 149. Cambridge, MA: Council on East Asian Studies.Google Scholar
Gourlay, William. 2018. “Oppression, Solidarity, and Resistance: The Forging of Kurdish Identity in Turkey.” Ethnopolitics 17 (20): 130–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gunter, Michael. 2010. Historical Dictionary of the Kurds. Lanham: The Scarecrow Press.Google Scholar
Hanspeter, Kriesi., Koopmans, Ruud, Duyvendak, Jan Willem, and Giugni, Marco, eds. 2015. New Social Movements in Western Europe. Oxford: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hintz, Lisel. 2018. Identity Politics Inside Out: National Identity Contestation and Foreign Policy in Turkey. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnston, Hank. 2006. “‘Let’s Get Small’: The Dynamics of (Small) Contention in Repressive States.” International Journal of Conflict and Violence 6 (1): 55–74.Google Scholar
Johnston, Hank. 2012. “State Violence and Oppositional Protest in High Capacity Authoritarian Regimes.” Mobilization: An International Quarterly 11 (2): 195–212.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaczorowski, Karol P. 2017. “Kurdish Identity in Turkey and Educational Opportunities in Istanbul.” In Living in Two Homes, edited by Espinoza-Herold, M. and Contini, R., 137–165. Bingley: Emerald Publishing.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kamer, Hatice. 2016. “Diyarbakır’da Newroz’a Katılım Geçmişe Kıyasla Az.” BBC Türkçe, March 21 2016. http://www.bbc.com/turkce/multimedya/2016/03/160320_nevruz_alan_hatice. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Kaplan, Sam. 2006. The Pedagogical State: Education and the Politics of National Culture in Post-1980 Turkey. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Koch, Natalie. 2016. “Is Nationalism Just for Nationals? Civic Nationalism for Noncitizens and Celebrating National Day in Qatar and the UAE.” Political Geography 54: 43–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koch, Natalie. 2018. The Geopolitics of Spectacle: Space, Synecdoche, and the New Capitals of Asia. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Natalie, Koch. 2013. “Introduction – Field Methods in ‘Closed Contexts’: Undertaking Research in Authoritarian States and Places,” Area 45 (4): 390–395.Google Scholar
Korkmaz, Serhat. 2012. “Newroz Kutlamalarında 1014 Gozaltı.” Bagımsız İletişim Ağı, April 2, 2012. http://bianet.org/bianet/ifade-ozgurlugu/137364-newroz-kutlamalarinda-1014-gozalti. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Kuran, Timur. 1991. “Now Out of Never: The Element of Surprise in the East European Revolutions of 1989.” World Politics 44 (1): 7–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lane, Christel. 1981. The Rites of Rulers: Ritual in Industrial Society—The Soviet Case. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven and Way, Lucan. 2002. “The Rise of Competitive Authoritarianism.” Journal of Democracy 13 (2): 51–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lipman, Jonathan. 2004. “White Hats, Oil Cakes, and Common Blood: The Hui in the Contemporary Chinese State.” In Governing China’s Multiethnic Frontiers, edited by Rossabi, M., 19–52. Seattle: University of Washington Press.Google Scholar
Qiao, Long. 2019. “Chinese Officials Force Muslims to Drink, Eat Pork at Festival.” Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Radio Free Asia, February 6, 2019. https://www.rfa.org/english/news/uyghur/festival-02062019140637.html. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Manion, Melanie. 2014. “Authoritarian Parochialism: Local Congressional Representation in China.” The China Quarterly 218: 311–338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mazzarella, William. 2015. “Totalitarian Tears: Does the Crowd Really Mean It?” Cultural Anthropology 30 (1): 91–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitchell, Timothy. 1990. “Everyday Metaphors of Power.” Theory and Society 19 (5): 545–577.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Connor, Francis, and Baser, Bahar. 2018. “Communal Violence and Ethnic Polarization Before and After the 2015 Elections in Turkey.” Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18 (1): 53–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Öcalan, Abdullah. 2007. The Roots of Civilisation. Vol. 1, Prison Writings, edited and translated by Happel, K.. London: Pluto Press.Google Scholar
Özbudun, Ergun. 2015. “Turkey’s Judiciary and the Drift toward Competitive Authoritarianism.” The International Spectator – Italian Journal of International Affairs 50 (2): 42–55.Google Scholar
Gündem, Özgür. 2012. “Newroz, Nevruz, Ergenekon.” http://ozgurgundem.biz/haber/35300/newroz-nevruz-ergenekon (site discontinued). (Accessed August 2016.)Google Scholar
Ozouf, Mona. 1988. Festivals and the French Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Özyürek, Esra. 2006. Nostalgia for the Modern: State Secularism and Everyday Politics in Turkey. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Pei, Minxin. 2012. “Is CCP Rule Fragile or Resilient?” Journal of Democracy 23 (1): 27–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Perry, Joe. 2005. “Nazifying Christmas: Political Culture and Popular Celebration in the Third Reich.” Central European History 38 (4): 572–605.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Petrone, Karen. 2000. Life Has Become More Joyful, Comrades: Celebrations in the Time of Stalin. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Podeh, Eli. 2010. “From Indifference to Obsession: The Role of National State Celebrations in Iraq, 1921–2003.” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 37 (2): 179–206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Xiao, Qiang. 2019. “The Road to Digital Unfreedom: President Xi’s Surveillance State.” Journal of Democracy 30 (1): 53–67.Google Scholar
Rolf, Malte. 2000. “Constructing a Soviet Time: Bolshevik Festivals and Their Rivals During the First Five-Year Plan.” Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 1 (3): 447–473.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rolf, Malte. 2013. Soviet Mass Festivals, 1917-1991. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.Google Scholar
Schwedler, Jillian. 2005. “Cop Rock: Protest, Identity, and Dancing Riot Police in Jordan.” Social Movement Studies 4 (2): 155–175.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scott, James. 1985. Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Sharma, Suraj. 2016. “Analysis: Newroz, A New Year in Turkey Tarnished by Old Tensions.” Middle East Eye, March 20, 2016. http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/nowruz-turkey-iran-131835027. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Shusterman, Noah. 2010. Religion and the Politics of Time: Holidays in France from Louis XIV to Napoleon. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University Press.Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony. D. 1986. The Ethnic Origins of Nations. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Svet, Ala. 2013. “Staging the Transnistrian Identity within the Heritage of Soviet Holidays.” History and Anthropology 24 (1): 98–116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tarrow, Sidney. 1998. Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tezcür, Güneş Murat. 2015. “Violence and the Onset of the Kurdish Insurgency.” Nationalities Papers 43 (2): 248–266.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tezcür, Güneş Murat. 2016. “Ordinary People, Extraordinary Risks: Participation in an Ethnic Rebellion.” American Political Science Review 110 (2): 247–264.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tilly, Charles. 2007. Democracy. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tilly, Charles and Tarrow, Sidney. 2015. Contentious Politics. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Timeturk. 2012. “Nevruz kutlamalarında 1014 gözaltında.” April 2, 2012. http://www.timeturk.com/tr/2012/04/02/nevruz-kutlamalarinda-1014-gozalti.html. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Tremblay, Pinar. 2019. “Why Did Pro-Government Media Fail Erdogan?” Al Monitor, April 23, 2019. https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/04/turkey-why-did-pro-government-media-fail-erdogan.html. (June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Ünver, Akin H. 2016. “Schrödinger’s Kurds: Transnational Kurdish Geopolitics in the Age of Shifting Borders.” Journal of International Affairs 69 (20): 65–100.Google Scholar
Van Bruinessen, Martin. 1996. “Kurds, Turks and the Alevi Revival in Turkey.” In “Minorities in the Middle East: Power and the Politics of Difference, edited by Hartmann, Geoff, Barsalou, Judy, Beinin, Joel, Carapico, Sheila, Doumani, Beshara, Dunne, Bruce, Ethelston, Sally et al. Special Issue, Middle East Report 200: 7–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Von Geldern, James. 1993. Bolshevik Festivals, 1917–1920. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Leung, Wai Ying. 2016. “Is China Moving to Restrict Religious Freedom for the Hui Muslims?” China Change, May 13, 2016. https://chinachange.org/2016/05/13/is-china-moving-to-restrict-religious-freedom-for-the-hui-muslims/. (Accessed June 9,2020.)Google Scholar
Watts, Nicole. 2010. Activists in Office: Kurdish Politics and Protest in Turkey. Seattle: University of Washington Press.Google Scholar
Wedeen, Lisa. 1999. Ambiguities of Domination: Politics, Rhetoric, and Symbols in Contemporary Syria. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Wedeen, Lisa. 2008. Peripheral Visions: Publics, Power, and Performance in Yemen. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wyrtzen, Jonathan. 2013. “Performing the Nation in Anti-Colonial Protest in Interwar Morocco.” Nations and Nationalism 19 (4): 615–634.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Xinhua. 2019. “Xi Extends Spring Festival Greetings, Expressing Confidence for the Future.” February 3, 2019. http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-02/03/c_137797525.htm. (Accessed June 9, 2020.)Google Scholar
Yanık, Lerna. 2006. “Nevruz or Newroz? Deconstructing the Invention of a Contested Tradition in Contemporary Turkey.” Middle Eastern Studies 42 (2): 285–302.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Güncel, Yüksekova. 2012. “2012 Newroz’u 127 Merkezde Kutlanacak.” March 10, 2012. https://www.yuksekovaguncel.org/roportaj/dunyaya-aciliyorroportaj/gonullu-fotografciroportaj/hedefteki-vekil-konusturoportaj/ocalandan-yardim-alinabilirroportaj/ozbek-ayrimcilik-yapmiyoruzroportaj/ceto-ozel-ile-roportajroportaj/pervin-buldan-ile-roportajroportaj/futbol-sevgisi-bir-butun-h29672.html. (Accessed June 17, 2020.)Google Scholar
Yurchak, Alexei. 2006. Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Zeydanlıoğlu, W. 2012. “Turkey’s Kurdish Language Policy.” International Journal of the Sociology of Language 217: 99–125.Google Scholar
Gong, Xiao. 2014. University student. Interviewed by author, April 28. Beijing.Google Scholar
Güzeldere, Ekrem. 2013. Academic. Interviewd by author, 18 August. Istanbul.Google Scholar
Jie, Xiao. 2015. University student. Interviewed by author, May 1. Beijing.Google Scholar
Liu, Xiao. 2013. University student. Interviewed by author, September 6. Beijing.Google Scholar
Luo, Xiao. 2014. Beijing resident. Interviewed by author, January 31. Beijing.Google Scholar
Ma, Lili. 2013. Chinese language teacher. Interviewed by author, November 26. Beijing.Google Scholar
Ma, Lili. 2014. Chinese language teacher. Interviewed by author, January 15. Beijing.Google Scholar
Ma, Taitai. 2014. Beijing resident. Interviewed by author, January 31, Beijing.Google Scholar
Oktar, Mehmet. 2016. Service industry employee. Interviewed by author, July 13. Muğla.Google Scholar
Peng, Xiao. 2013. University student. Interviewed by author, October 2. Beijing.Google Scholar
Toprak, Hüseyin. 2016. Service industry employee. Interviewed by author, July 11. Muğla.Google Scholar
Wang, Xiao. 2013. Journalist. Interviewed by author, December 21. Beijing.Google Scholar
Gong, Xiao. 2014. University student. Interviewed by author, April 28. Beijing.Google Scholar
Güzeldere, Ekrem. 2013. Academic. Interviewd by author, 18 August. Istanbul.Google Scholar
Jie, Xiao. 2015. University student. Interviewed by author, May 1. Beijing.Google Scholar
Liu, Xiao. 2013. University student. Interviewed by author, September 6. Beijing.Google Scholar
Luo, Xiao. 2014. Beijing resident. Interviewed by author, January 31. Beijing.Google Scholar
Ma, Lili. 2013. Chinese language teacher. Interviewed by author, November 26. Beijing.Google Scholar
Ma, Lili. 2014. Chinese language teacher. Interviewed by author, January 15. Beijing.Google Scholar
Ma, Taitai. 2014. Beijing resident. Interviewed by author, January 31, Beijing.Google Scholar
Oktar, Mehmet. 2016. Service industry employee. Interviewed by author, July 13. Muğla.Google Scholar
Peng, Xiao. 2013. University student. Interviewed by author, October 2. Beijing.Google Scholar
Toprak, Hüseyin. 2016. Service industry employee. Interviewed by author, July 11. Muğla.Google Scholar
Wang, Xiao. 2013. Journalist. Interviewed by author, December 21. Beijing.Google Scholar