Villages on Stage examines the contribution of folklore and ethnography to the construction of national identity in post-Soviet Moldova through the development of a new genre of folkloric performance. By highlighting the contribution of villages to the creation of national culture and identity, the standards of authenticity for amateur folkloric ensembles generate an alternative discourse to the State's official, but contentious, promotion of multiethnic policies. At once inclusive and exclusive of the country's multiple ethnic groups, the goals, practices, and ideologies embodied in folkloric performance portray both the local dilemmas of post-socialist nation-building and the shared challenge for folklore and ethnography to participate in public debates about cultural diversity. (Series: Halle Studies in the Anthropology of Eurasia - Vol. 26)

Annotation Explores Berber cultural identity and performance in Algeria, France, and on the world music scene.

This book revisits South Indian Christian communities that were studied in 1959 and written about in Village Christians and Hindu Culture (1968). In 1959 the future of these village congregations was uncertain. Would they grow through conversions or slowly dissolve into the larger Hindu society around them? John Carman and Chilkuri Vasantha Rao s carefully gathered research fifty years later reveals both the decline of many older congregations and the surprising emergence of new Pentecostal and Baptist churches that emphasize the healing power of Christ. Significantly, the new congregations largely cut across caste lines, including both high castes and outcastes (Dalits). Carman and Vasantha Rao pay particular attention to the social, political, and religious environment of these Indian village Christians, including their adaptation of indigenous Hindu practices into their Christian faith and observances.

A history of our time.