Burdened with a heritage of both Spanish and British colonization and imperialism, Guyana is today caught between its colonial past, its efforts to achieve the consciousness of nationhood, and the need of its diverse subgroups to maintain their own identity. Stains on My Name, War in My Veins chronicles the complex struggles of the citizens of Guyana to form a unified national culture against the pulls of ethnic, religious, and class identities.
Drawing on oral histories and a close study of daily life in rural Guyana, Brackette E. Williams examines how and why individuals and groups in their quest for recognition as a “nation” reproduce ethnic chauvinism, racial stereotyping, and religious bigotry. By placing her ethnographic study in a broader historical context, the author develops a theoretical understanding of the relations among various dimensions of personal identity in the process of nation building.
- Contents
- List of Tables and Figures
- Preface
- I Country and Community
- 1. On the Politics of Cultural Struggle
- In the Pot of Physical Proximity
- The Heat of Social and Cultural Interchanges
- Hegemony and the Homogenizing Process
- The Politics of Cultural Struggle in the Conception of a Guyanese People
- 2. Cockalorum: Spatial Boundaries, Economic Limits, and Cultural Constraints
- Making a Living: Economic Options as First-Order Limitations
- Making Life: Ethnic Stereotypes as Second-Order Limitations
- Making a Living to Make Life: Ethnicity, Freedom, and Independence
- 3. Status Stratification and Status Signaling
- Status and Social Geography
- Status Categories: From Truly Big to Small Small
- Strategic Interpretations of Status-Signaling Criteria
- 4. The Art of Becoming “Somebody”
- Living Well: Egalitarianism, Hierarchy, and Competition
- Eh-eh, ‘e T’ink ‘e Wan Big Wan, Nuh?
- Face: Since Beg Pa’don Come a Fashun Small Boy Mash (step on) Big Maan Foot
- Name: The Dirt That Falls on the Heads of the Parents Rests on the Shoulders of the Children
- II Ideology, Ethnicity, and Anglo-European Hegemony
- 5. Ideology and the Formation of Anglo-European Hegemony
- Heterogeneity, Economic Structure, and Stereotypes
- Economic Structure and Ethnic Diversity: Anglo-European Rationalizations of Linkages between Ethnic Identity, Contribution, a
- Hegemonic Process in Stereotyping
- 6. Anglo-European Hegemony and the Culture of Domination
- Subordinate Appropriation of Stereotyping: “Givers” and “Takers”
- Egalitarian and Hierarchical Images of the Sociocultural and Political Order
- 7. The “Ethnic Production” of Class Stratification
- “Getting a Shock”: Ethnicity and Status Disjunctions
- Social Mobility and the Manipulation of Cultural Content and “Ownership”
- Race, Class, and the Standards of Civilized Conduct
- III Ethnicity, Class, and Cultural Production
- 8. Religion, Class, Culture, and the Ghost of Hegemony
- Religious Diversity, Christianity, and the Symbols of Class Status
- Intraethnic Status and Religious Diversity
- Religion, Status, and the Ghost of Hegemonic Dominance
- The Ghost is an Ever-Present Presence
- 9. “Bamboo” Weddings and the Ghost of Hegemonic Dominance
- Case I: Christianity, Hinduism, and Communal Morality in Presentations of Class Status
- Case II: Hinduism and Islam in Ethnic Group Rank Presentations
- Case III: Sanatan Dharma and Arya Samaj in Ethnic Group Rank Presentations
- Ritualizing the Politics of Cultural Struggle in the Invention of Orthodoxy
- 10. Locating and Exorcizing the Ghost
- Traditionalism, the Ghost of Hegemonic Dominance, and the Order of Nations
- Cultural Innovation, Homogenization, and Hegemonic Dominance
- Anthropology, Identity Formation, and the Politics of Cultural Struggle
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
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