Divided Europeans: Understanding Ethnicities in Conflict

Book excerpt: This book critiques the concepts of cultural functionalism and biologised ethnicity. The chapters examine ethnicities in conflict across Europe, and have been selected on the grounds that they not only provide a rich ethnographic account of overt ethnic conflict or racial violence, but also relate these local situations to wider processes. The contributors do not put forward a single homogeneous point of view, but they all assume perspectives that are opposed to the prevalent simplistic primordialism of most media coverage and political analysis. Most of the contributors are anthropologists and have presented drafts of their chapters at a series of meetings organised by a network called the Forum Against Violence. Many of the articles have appeared previously in the International Journal on Minority and Group Rights (Volume 4). This book should be of interest to academics and practitioners in the fields of human rights, anthropology and related topics.