Stains on My Name, War in My Veins : Guyana and the Politics of Cultural Struggle

Burdened with a heritage of both Spanish and British colonization and imperialism, Guyana is today caught between its colonial past, its efforts to achieve the consciousness of nationhood, and the need of its diverse subgroups to maintain their own identity. Stains on My Name, War in My Veins chronicles the complex struggles of the citizens of Guyana to form a unified national culture against the pulls of ethnic, religious, and class identities. Drawing on oral histories and a close study of daily life in rural Guyana, Brackette E. Williams examines how and why individuals and groups in their quest for recognition as a “nation” reproduce ethnic chauvinism, racial stereotyping, and religious bigotry. By placing her ethnographic study in a broader historical context, the author develops a theoretical understanding of the relations among various dimensions of personal identity in the process of nation building. Country and Community: On the Politics of Cultural Struggle. Cockalorum: Spatial Boundaries, Economic Limits, and Cultural Constraints. Status Stratification and Status Signaling. The Art of Becoming "Somebody"--Ideology, Ethnicity, and Anglo-European Hegemony: Ideology and the Formation of Anglo-European Hegemony. Anglo-European Hegemony and the Culture of Domination. The JlEthnic Production" of Class Stratification -- Ethnicity, Class, and Cultural Production: Religion, Class, Culture, and the Ghost of Hegemony. "Bamboo" Weddings and the Ghost of Hegemonic Dominance. Locating and Exorcizing the Ghost