Torsello, Davide - Pappová, Melinda: Social Networks in Movement. Time, interaction and interethnic spaces in Central Eastern Europe - Nostra Tempora 8. (Somorja-Dunaszerdahely, 2003)
Time and social networks
Identities in change 47 central role, and their loss can cause identity crisis (1994: 56). Erikson’s followers widened the model for social groups, saving from his theory the ethical classification of identity (considering the origins, the roots as positive values). From the 1960s across Europe, there was a general ethnic revival reacting against social alienation caused by accelerated centralization and modernization. Public attention turned towards local, ethnic cultures and the cultural heritage. The same period can be also characterized as the period of the revival of ethnic politics, placing the case of ethnic minorities into the centre of national discourses. Despite expectations, modernization did not bring about a decrease of ethnic differences and homogenisation, but the opposite; the revitalization of ethnic ties, and the birth of new ethnic awareness in the case of second and third generation people. The ethnic networks became revitalized, often providing a solution for everyday problems, so they carried practical value. On the level of ideologies a new type of politics emerged, an ethnic one. Summarising the definitions on ethnic identity, it can be stated that they crystallize around two main standpoints (Feischmidt 1997: 14): (1) We can speak about an essentialist or primordialistic approach, treating ethnic identity as a category standing out of any social or historical pre-determinations, concerning the ethnic substance. Essentialists see history as a continuous process, glossing over some experiences and conceptions through time and cultures. (2) The other approach is usually referred as constructivist, stating that the essentialist arguments are ahistorical. Constructivists do not put stress on the content of the category (ethnic), but emphasize its construction. When they speak about identity, they deal with the production and organization of social differences, with different “naming processes” in the society with its political, power mechanisms. While the essentialist models have in mind a static concept of culture which concerns all members of a group via their birth or inheritance, the constructivist model focuses on
