- Author
- Title
- Out of character: debating Dutchness, narrating citizenship
- Supervisors
- Award date
- 18 December 2014
- Number of pages
- 347
- Document type
- PhD thesis
- Faculty
- Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences (FMG)
- Institute
- Amsterdam Institute for Social Science Research (AISSR)
- Abstract
-
This is an inquiry into the public and political debates over Dutchness and citizenship in the Netherlands (1972-2008). It demonstrates how disagreements over nationhood and citizenship were deliberately transformed from disputes about character into debates about identity and its particular problems. As debates about Dutchness and belonging grew in intensity and political significance, national identity debates came to involve narratives and performative repertoires that were markedly different from previous modes of articulation. The study reconstructs the emergence of this discursive formation, while also showing its subsequent development into an exceptionalist imaginary of dialogical Dutchness. Across these debates, Dutchness is - again and again - performed to be liberal, expressive, plural and outspoken. Inclusion into this nation is imagined at once inevitable and liberating, while also demanding and unattainable. Along the way, citizenship politics devolves into a governmental project of retracing the public image of Dutchness with borderlines of protection. The deliberate move away from character's essentialism ends up being a potent conversation machine. However, it fails to produce struggles to win and instead revolves discussions around a native public to be defended.
- Note
- Research conducted at: Universiteit van Amsterdam
- Persistent Identifier
- https://hdl.handle.net/11245/1.434301
- Downloads
-
Thesis (complete)
Front matter
1: Introduction: where to begin?
2: Crafting an approach: composing nationalism and narrating of citizenship
3: The culturalisation of citizenship, or how to narrate 'burgerschap'
Introduction to section 1: Making Dutchness public
4: How Dutchness became a public problem: from national character to public question
5: Dialogical Dutchness: enacting Dutchness through debate
Introduction to section 2: Ascending to the native public
6: Reactive politics: moments and their men
7: Enculturation: testing malleability through cultural demands
8: The right to speak of us: history, expert engagement and the native public
9: Enacting the style of popularity
10: Out of character: the national inflections of citizenship politics
Bibliography
Nederlandse samenvatting
English summary
- Supplementary materials
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