The Space Between Us Negotiating Gender and National Identities in Conflict

by Cockburn, Cynthia

• ISBN13: 9781856496186
• ISBN10: 185649618X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-02-15
• Publisher: Zed Books

Summary

Even in places of deadly national enmity, some very ordinary people are routinely doing peace. In this highly original study, Cynthia Cockburn deepens our understanding of the processes sustaining conflict in Northern Ireland, Israel/Palestine and Bosnia/Hercegovina by means of a close involvement with three remarkable women's projects that have chosen co-operation. How, she asks, do they fill the dangerous space between them with words instead of bullets? How do they make democracy out of difference? The book brings fresh insight to theories of the self in relation to collective identities and of gender in nationalist thought and practice. Observing in words and photographs how these women's alliances create a safe space in which to work together, we learn more about the dangers of essentialism and the problematic relationship between identity and democracy.

Author Biography

Cynthia Cockburn is Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, City University, London.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	vii
Introduction	1	(11)
Women and Nationalism	12	(34)
Northern Ireland: Post-Colonial Limbo	16	(6)
Israel/Palestine: Wrong and Wrong Again	22	(5)
Bosnia-Hercegovina: Ethnicity As Destiny	27	(7)
People, Nation, Land	34	(6)
Women, Feminism and Nationalism	40	(6)
Northern Ireland: Women's activism in a divided city	46	(30)
Different Cultures, Different Classes	51	(2)
Shared Disadvantage	53	(6)
Grassroots Activism	59	(3)
The Women's Centres	62	(6)
Crossing Communal Boundaries	68	(5)
Changes in Women's Lives	73	(3)
Women's Support Network, Belfast	76	(23)
Differences and Commonalities	79	(2)
Handling Disagreement	81	(6)
Multiple Bridges	87	(6)
Maintaining an Alliance: A Democracy of Differences	93	(6)
Israel/Palestine: Across an abyss	99	(30)
Jewish Women of The Kibbutzim	99	(9)
The Unknown Neighbour: Palestinian Arab Women	108	(8)
Women's Disadvantage and The Rise of Feminisms	116	(5)
Women's Activism for Peace	121	(8)
Bat Shalom: A women's group for peace	129	(27)
Handling Identity Difference	132	(7)
Peace: Another Kind of War	139	(3)
Dimensions of Political Division	142	(9)
Maintaining Unity: Resources and Threats	151	(5)
Bosnia-Hercegovina: Women in a disintegrating Yugoslavia	156	(18)
Women in Tito's Yugoslavia	157	(3)
The Uses of Women in The National Projects	160	(3)
Women's Activism and War	163	(5)
Women in Anti-War Action	168	(6)
Medica Women's Therapy Centre	174	(37)
Responding to Trauma	175	(10)
The Meaning of Medica to The Team	185	(4)
Feminism and Democracy	189	(3)
Ethnicity in Medica	192	(4)
Holding Together	196	(7)
Ethnic and Gender Relations: Adaptive Renewal	203	(8)
Identity and Democracy	211	(20)
Identity Process and Democracy	212	(4)
National and Gender Identity and The Sense of Self: Rada's Story	216	(6)
Spaces of Violence and Democracy	222	(9)
Bibliography	231	(9)
Index	240