The Language of Ethnicity

Abstract

The 1988 constitution has led to the introduction of ethno-legal categories grounded on the dual premises of exceptionality and territorial administration. This article offers an explanation of why mobilizations based on ethnicity have not petered out despite the evident disengagement of the state, suggesting that it is important to distinguish between two ways of envisioning the articulation of singularity with territory: while the state considers that differences between populations pre-exist prior to territorial delimitation, local populations are convinced that the intention to proceed with demarcation suffices in itself to demonstrate their specificity. Moreover, from their perspective, a territorial claim is important as a way of accessing other rights that they consider equally essential. Our second section examines not only recent declarations of identity but also the observed switching between ethno-legal categories, building on a comparison with religious conversion as a meandering, complex, sometimes paradoxical process. Ethnicity, like religious affiliation, can thus be seen as a language developed at the national level but reappropriated by various populations in the service of local issues and usages. A final section examines particularism, whether quilombola, traditional or Indian, as the currently dominant norm and form of expression for social protest, while reflecting on the role of outside actors as “institutional hosts” [Houtzager 2004]. It should be noted, moreover, that such standardization of the forms of political involvement no more precludes the replication of the social hierarchies between outsiders and natives, than it prevents social protest from being co-opted by the authorities.