Gendering Nationalism in the Catalan Independence Movement

Description

The gendered dimensions of nationalism are a topic that has received attention in political science not just in recent years, but at the very least since the 1980s. The observation that men and women hold different positions in nationalist projects has been researched in a variety of contexts, most famously by Yuval-Davis and Anthias (1989). A specific subset of nationalist movements are secessionist movements, seeking independence from an existing nation-state of which they do not feel a part. This dissertation seeks to examine the role of gender specifically in secessionist movements—its role for national identity, for activism in the independence movement, but also for the images that are used to justify secessionist claims and construct the nation. A special focus will rest on the memories of the nationalist movement, and the extent to which memory in itself and in its role in nationalist myth-making is a gendered concept. To this end, I choose Catalonia as a case study. Catalonia’s nationalist movement has been actively independence-seeking in recent years but has a history of national difference with Spain that stretches back centuries. Using a mixed-methods approach including a survey, guided interviews, and discourse analysis, I aim to answer the question: What is the interrelation between gender identity and national identity and how does gendered national identity impact on participation in the independence movement? The dissertation also speaks to the broader research question of the SCRIPTS Cluster of Excellence by examining the liberal border script. I examine the challenges to the territorial integrity of liberal nation-states that secessionist movements pose, but also problematize the use of border in a strictly territorial sense, by examining gender as an internal ‘border’ to both the independence movement and nation-states more generally.