Short Abstract

This roundtable will focus on the anthropology of Catalan popular culture, identity constructions, and cultural heritage in light of recent political pro-independence transformations, inviting comparative reference to the Scottish independence movement and its politics of culture.

Long Abstract

This roundtable focuses on the anthropology of Catalan and Scottish identity, cultural heritage, and politics in light of recent political transformations that pursue statehood and independence. It will first briefly present two recent ethnographic works in the Catalan context, and will then feature two broader comparative assessments of the politics of popular culture and language in Catalonia and Scotland. The panelists' remarks will be followed by questions from and engagement with the audience. The volume Popular Culture, Identity, and Politics in Contemporary Catalonia (2023) edited by Alessandro Testa and Mariann Vaczi draws from various cultural manifestations including festivals, bull runs, and the politics of the Cathar past, discussing how civil mobilization, women's participation, gentrification and heritagization intertwined with national constructions, and the COVID-19 lockdowns. Mariann Vaczi’s ethnography Catalonia’s Human Towers: Castells, Cultural Politics, and the Struggle Toward the Heights (2023) reveals how this unique sport provides a social base, image, and vocabulary for the independence movement. The roundtable will reflect on the development of anthropological research into the politics of culture through Dorothy Noyes’s work, and her seminal Fire in the Plaça: Catalan Festival Politics After Franco (2003). Finally, Sharon Macdonald will discuss the politics of cultural and linguistic heritage in Scotland. This roundtable will problematize the politicization of culture, nation-building, inclusion-exclusion, authenticity, belonging, nationhood, and identity, among others, in the Catalan and Scottish cultural and political contexts.