The Influence of Cultural Competence on the Interpretations of Territorial Identities in European Capitals of Culture

Lähdesmäki, Tuuli

doi:10.2478/bjes-2014-0005

Abstract

The EU’s cultural initiative ‘the European Capital of Culture’ (ECOC) includes high identity political aims. It requires the designated cities to introduce and foster local, regional, and European cultural identities. In addition, the cities have used the designation as an opportunity to promote national cultural identity. Audiences of the ECOC events recognize and interpret different kinds of representations of territorial cultural identities from what the cities have to offer in culture. However, the contents of these interpretations vary drastically in the ECOCs. The article discusses whether the competence of interpreting the representations of territorial cultural identities is related to some social determinants of the audiences. Based on a questionnaire study conducted in recent ECOCs-Pécs (Hungary), Tallinn (Estonia), and Turku (Finland)-the study indicates that, for example, education, source of livelihood, and active cultural participation impact the interpretations of the representations of territorial cultural identities.

References

Antonsich, M. & Holland, E. (2012), ‘Territorial attachment in the age of globalization: The case of Western Europe,’ European Urban and Regional Studies. Published online before print July 2012. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/096977641244583010.1177/0969776412445830
Axford, B. (2006), “The dialectic of borders and networks in Europe: reviewing ‘topological presuppositions’,” Comparative European Politics, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 160–182.10.1057/palgrave.cep.6110079
Bauman, Z. (1992), Intimations of Postmodernity, Abingdon: Routledge.
Beck, U. (1992), Risk Society. Towards a New Modernity, London: Sage.
Bennett, T.; Emmison, M. & Frow, J. (1999), Accounting for Tastes: Australian Everyday Cultures, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bennett, T.; Savage, M.; Bortolaia Silva, E.; Warde, A.; Gayo-Cal, M. & Wright, D. (2008), Culture, Class, Distinction, London: Routledge.10.4324/9780203930571
Bhabba, H. (1994), The Location of Culture, London: Routledge.
Bohlman, P. (2009), Music, Nationalism, and the Making of a New Europe, London: Routledge.10.4324/9780203844496
Bottero, W. (2010), “Intersubjectivity and Bourdieusian Approaches to ‘Identity’,” Cultural Sociology, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 3–22.10.1177/1749975509356750
Bourdieu, P. (1974), ‘The school as a conservative force: scholastic achievement and cultural inequalities,’ in J. Eggleston (ed.) Contemporary Research in the Sociology of Education, London: Methuen, pp. 32–46.
Bourdieu, P. (1984), Distinction. A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, London: Routledge.
—— (1987), ‘The forms of capital,’ in J. G. Richardson (ed.) Handbook of Theory and Research of the Sociology of Education, New York: Greenwood Press, pp. 241–258.
—— (1991), Language and Symbolic Power, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
—— (1993), Sociology in Question, London: Sage.
—— (1998), Practical Reason, Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Bourdieu, P. & Darbel, A. (1991), The Love of Art: European Art Museums and Their Public, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Boyatzis, R. (1998), Transforming Qualitative Information: Thematic Analysis and Code Development, Thousand Oaks: Sage.
Bradford, V. (2003), ‘Spiritual capital: Theorizing religion with Bourdieu against Bourdieu,’ Sociological Theory, vol. 21, no. 2, pp. 150–174.10.1111/1467-9558.00182
Cookson, P. & Persell, C. (1985), Preparing for Power: America’s Elite Boarding Schools, New York: Basic.
Davey, G. (2009), “Using Bourdieu’s concept of habitus to explore narratives of transition,” European Educational Research Journal, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 276–284.10.2304/eerj.2009.8.2.276
Davidson, A. C. (2008), “Through thick and thin: ‘European identification’ for a justified and legitimate European Union,” Journal of Contemporary European Research, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 32–47.10.30950/jcer.v4i1.58
Delanty, G. (2003), ‘Is There a European Identity?’ Global Dialogue, vol. 5, no. 3–4. Retrieved from http://www.worlddialogue.org/content.php?id=269 [accessed 14 Mar 2014]
DiMaggio, P. (1987), ‘Cultural capital and school success: The impact of status culture participation on grades of U.S. high school students,’ American Sociological Review, vol. 47, no. 2, pp. 189–201.10.2307/2094962
—— (1996), ‘Are art-museum visitors different from other people? The relationship between attendance and social and political attitudes in the United States,’ Poetics, vol. 24, nos. 2–4, pp. 161–180.
DiMaggio, P. & Mohr, J. (1985), ‘Cultural capital, educational attainment, and marital election,’ American Journal of Sociology, vol. 90, no. 6, pp. 1231–1261.10.1086/228209
Dumais, S. (2002), ‘Cultural capital, gender, and school success: The role of habitus,’ Sociology of Education, vol. 75, no. 1, pp. 44–68.10.2307/3090253
Farrell, L. (2010), ‘Pierre Bourdieu on European identity: Theories of habitus & cultural capital,’ Social and Political Review, vol. 20, pp. 107–115.
Fornäs, J. (1995), Cultural Theory & Late Modernity, London: Sage.
de Graaf, P. (1986), ‘The impact of financial and cultural resources on educational attainment in the Netherlands,’ Sociology of Education, vol. 59, no. 4, pp. 237–246.10.2307/2112350
Giesen, B. (1991), Nationale Und Kulturelle Identitat: Studien Zur Entwicklung Des Kollektiven Bewusstseins in Der Neuzeit, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.
Hall, J. (1992), ‘The Capital(s) of culture: A nonholistic approach to status situations, class, gender, and ethnicity,’ in M. Lamont & M. Fournier (eds.) Cultivating Differences: Symbolic Boundaries and the Making of Inequality, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 257–285.
Hall, S. (1990), ‘Cultural identity and diaspora,’ in J. Rutherford (ed.) Identity, Community, Culture, Difference, London: Lawrence & Wishart, pp. 222–237.
—— (1992), ‘The question of cultural identity,’ in S. Hall, D. Held & T. McGrew (eds.) Modernity and Its Futures, Cambridge: Polity Press, pp. 273–325.
Kaiser, R. & Nikiforova, E. (2008), ‘The performativity of scale: the social construction of scale effects in Narva, Estonia,’ Environment and Planning D: Society & Space, vol. 26, pp. 537–562.10.1068/d3307
Kalmijn, M. & Kraaykamp, G. (1996), ‘Race, cultural capital, and schooling: An analysis of trends in the United States,’ Sociology of Education, vol. 69, no. 1, pp. 22–34.10.2307/2112721
Kuus, M. (2007), ‘Ubiquitous identities and elusive subjects: puzzles from Central Europe,’ Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, vol. 32, no. 1, pp. 90–101.10.1111/j.1475-5661.2007.00244.x
Lähdesmäki, T. (2011), ‘Contested identity politics: Analysis of the EU policy objectives and the local reception of the European Capital of Culture program,’ Baltic Journal of European Studies, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 134–166.
—— (2012), ‘Rhetoric of unity and cultural diversity in the making of European cultural identity,’ International Journal of Cultural Policy, vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 59–75.10.1080/10286632.2011.561335
—— (2013a), ‘Interpretations of cultural identities in the European Capital of Culture events in Turku,’ Ethnologia Fennica, vol. 40, pp. 66–88.
—— (2013b), ‘Identity politics of the European Capital of Culture initiative and the audience reception of cultural events compared,’ The Nordic Journal of Cultural Policy, vol. 16, no. 2, pp. 340–365.10.18261/ISSN2000-8325-2013-02-09
Lamont, M. (1987), ‘Cultural capital and the political behavior of professionals and managers: a comment on Brint,’ American Journal of Sociology, vol. 96, pp. 1501–1505.10.1086/228673
Lamont, M. & Lareau, A. (1988), ‘Cultural capital: Allusions, gaps and glissandos in recent theoretical developments,’ Sociological Theory, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 153–168.10.2307/202113
Lareau, A. (1987), Home Advantages: Social Class and Parental Interventions in Elementary Education, London: Falmer Press.
Lewicka, M. (2005), ‘Ways to make people active: The role of place attachment, cultural capital, and neighborhood ties,’ Journal of Environmental Psychology, vol. 25, no. 4, pp. 381–395.10.1016/j.jenvp.2005.10.004
Lizardo, O. (2010), ‘Pierre Bourdieu as a post-cultural theorist,’ Cultural Sociology, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 1–22.
Maffesoli, M. (1996), The Contemplation of the World: Figures of Community Style, Minnesota: Minnesota University Press.
Marks, G. (1999), ‘Territorial identities in the European Union,’ in J. J. Anderson (ed.) Regional Integration and Democracy. Expanding on the European Experience, Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, pp. 69–91.
Massey, D. (1995), ‘The conceptualization of place,’ in D. Massey & J. Pat (eds.) Place in the World, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 45–86.
Paasi, A. (1996a), Territories, Boundaries and Consciousness. The Changing Geographies of the Finnish-Russian Border, Chichester: John Wiley and Sons.
—— (1996b), ‘Inclusion, exclusion and the construction of territorial identities: Boundaries in the globalizing geopolitical landscape,’ Nordisk Samhällsgeografisk Tidskrift, vol. 23, pp. 6–23.
—— (2000), ‘Territorial identities as social constructions,’ Hagar – International Social Science Review, vol. 1, no. 2, pp. 91–113.
—— (2003), ‘Region and place: Regional identity in question,’ Progress in Human Geography, vol. 27, pp. 475–485.
—— (2009a), ‘Regions and regional dynamics,’ in C. Rumford (ed.) The Sage Handbook of European Studies, London: Sage, pp. 464–484.
—— (2009b), “The resurgence of the ‘region’ and ‘regional identity’,” Review of International Studies, vol. 35, pp. 121–146.
Prieur, A.; Rosenlund, L. & Skjott-Larsen, J. (2008), ‘Cultural capital today: A case study from Denmark’, Poetics, vol. 36, no. 1, pp. 45–71.10.1016/j.poetic.2008.02.008
Pöllmann, A. (2009), ‘Formal education and intercultural capital: towards attachment beyond narrow ethno-national boundaries?’ Educational Studies, vol. 35, no. 5, pp. 537–545.10.1080/03055690902880240
Prokkola, E-K.; Zimmerbauer, K. & Jakola, F. (2012), ‘Performance of regional identity in the implementation of European cross-border initiatives,’ European Urban and Regional Studies. Published online before print. http://dx.doi. org/0.1177/0969776412465629
Purhonen, S.; Gronow, J. & Rahkonen, K. (2011), ‘Highbrow culture in Finland: Knowledge, taste and participation,’ Acta Sociologia, vol. 54, no. 4, pp. 385–02.10.1177/0001699311422092
Purhonen, S. & Wright D. (2013), ‘Methodological issues in national-comparative research on cultural tastes: The case of cultural capital in the UK and Finland,’ Cultural Sociology, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 257–273.10.1177/1749975512473462
Reay, D. (2004), “It’s all becoming a habitus: beyond the habitual use of habitus in educational research,” British Journal of Sociology of Education, vol. 25, no. 4, pp. 431–444.10.1080/0142569042000236934
Relph, E. (1976), Place and Placelessness, London: Pion.
Richards, G. & Rotariu, I. (2010), ‘2007 European Cultural Capital in Sibiu – Preliminary findings concerning the impact on major stakeholders,’ Studies in Business and Economics, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 146–155.
Robertson, D.; Smyth, J. & McIntosh, I. (2008), Neighbourhood Identity. People, Time and Place, Layerthorpe: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
Rosenlund, L. (2009), Exploring the City with Bourdieu: Applying Pierre Bourdieu’s Theories and Methods to Study the Community, Saarbrücken: VDM.
Sack, D. (1997), Homo Geographicus, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
Said, E. W. (1985), Orientalism, London: Penguin Books.
Shore, C. (2000), Building Europe: The Cultural Politics of European Integration, London: Routledge.
—— (2004), ‘Whither European citizenship? Eros and civilization revisited,’ European Journal of Social Theory, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 27–44.10.1177/1368431004040018
Stråth, B. (2002), ‘A European Identity: To the historical limits of a concept,’ European Journal of Social Theory, vol. 5, no. 4, pp. 387–401.10.1177/136843102760513965
Sulkunen, P. (1982), ‘On the cultural sociology of Pierre Bourdieu,’ Acta Sociologica, vol. 25, no. 2, pp. 103–115.10.1177/000169938202500201
Taylor, S. J. & Bogdan, R. (1984), Introduction to Qualitative Research Methods: The Search for Meanings, New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Terlouw, K. (2012), ‘From thick to thin regional identities?’ GeoJournal, vol. 77, no. 5, pp. 707–721.10.1007/s10708-011-9422-x
Trueba, H. (2009), ‘Multiple ethnic, racial, and cultural identities in action: From marginality to a new cultural capital in modern society,’ Journal of Latinos and Education, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 7–28.10.1207/S1532771XJLE0101_2
de Vaus, D. (2004), Surveys in Social Research, London: Routledge.
Zhang, Y. & Wildemuth, B. M. (2009), ‘Qualitative analysis of content,’ in B. M. Wildemuth (ed.) Applications of Social Research Methods to Questions in Information and Library Science, Westport: Libraries Unlimited, pp. 308–319.

The Influence of Cultural Competence on the Interpretations of Territorial Identities in European Capitals of Culture

Abstract

Paradigm

My account