Reframing Islandness: Thinking with the Archipelago

1. Reframing Islandness: thinking with the archipelagoAssociation of American Geographers MeetingNew York City, February 26, 2012 Looking for the Thyrenide : Corsica and Sardiania, two "islands-sisters". A socio-anthropologicalapproach of an archipelagic imaginary. Marina CASULA Associate Professor in Sociology Toulouse -1 Capitole University , France

2. Initial questioning : Corsica, identity and islandness • The object of this communication is to participate in the understanding of the relation island-island (Stratford and al, 2011). • The genesis of the reflections which I am going to expose here : • I discovered sociological questions linked to insularity during my ph. D, my doctorate in political science . I was working then on the so called “processus de Matignon”. • 1999-2002 : The " processus de Matignon " led to the modification of the institutional status of Corsica. • The deep motivation of the elected representatives who participated actively in this process was that the specificities of the island (not only cultural but also territorial) had to be taken into account.

3. My hypothesis : “archipelago” gives a sense to relations between Corsica and Sardinia • The place of Corsica in the Mediterranean area, and more particularly about the relations between Corsica and Sardinia • My hypothesis : The concept of archipelago gives a sense to the history and to the strong links which connect these two "islands-sisters", Corsica and Sardinia. • These two islands were part of a former continent, the Tyrrhenide, that disappeared two million years ago. • But they also feed an archipelagic imaginary which is at the same time based on the strength of their subjective links (sociocultural, due to common features) but also objectives (as the institutional cooperations). • This archipelagic relation can be seen as an element of the construction of a vaster strategy of the Corsican leaders to position their island as a central, major element within the Mediterranean area • My references are multidisciplinary. : sociology, geography and anthropology, history => qualitative methodology of investigation

4. How to describe islands: the point of view of the geographers • Thinking the island, "going round the island", (André-Louis Sanguin, 1997) supposes to have a different glance, to consider islands for themselves, without isolating them from their environment. • French geographers have built typologies of the island spaces to classify islands. • Joseph Martinetti (1989) has distinguished five groups, elaborated from essentially physical criteria as their surface but who also integrate some elements as population or economic weight. • André-Louis Sanguin, a typology built on relationships between a center and its periphery, and which seems to me more interesting than the previous one, because it emphasizes the island sociopolitical dynamics. • auto-centered islands/islands with regional sub-centers/polycephalic islands/islands with reduced center/isolated peripheries/islands with a political partition • This typology is particularly interesting to understand the relationship between Corsica and France, with an institutional point of view.

5. And Take into account also the living of the islanders: the point of view of the sociologists • However the question of the life experience is not approached as such in the typology imagined by Sanguin • The life experience of the populations must be taken into account when questioning insular situations. • Anne Meistersheim (Figures de l'île, 2001) three notions to understand questions related to islands: • Insularity to indicate " all which recovers from the geography and from the economy, all the data which we can approach from measures and from figures and for which we can build "indications". And we can speak about insularity in particular about economic development " • Insularism to understand " all the phenomena which recover from the political domain, as well as the political behavior of the islanders or about the geopolitical situation of islands, about their particular institutions, about interactions between central State and islands, about relations between islands in situation of archipelago " • “îléité” (Islandness) to approach " the life experience of the islanders, their culture, their imagination, all the behavior inferred by the particular nature of the island space, of time(weather), of the company(society), and which so crosses and underlies all the phenomena "

6. MEISTERSHEIM Anne, Figures de l’île, DCL, Ajaccio, 2001 • 9 figures • Ile microcosme = Island as a microcosm • Ile en archipel = Island in archipelago  • Ile solidaire = solidarity-based Island • Ile paradis = island as a paradise • Ile labyrinthe = Island as a labyrinth • Ile des masques = Island of masks • Ile conservatoire = Island as a conservation area • Ile laboratoire = Island as a laboratory • Ile système = Island as a system

7. Island in archipelago • "the archipelago emphasizes the marine character, the liquid element, the link between islands rather than islands themselves." [Meistersheim 2001 : 39] • Anne Meistersheim has developped Joël Bonnemaison's works, who considered that islands need to enter into an alliance with the outside, while remaining the center of their own world. He privileged a reticular approach of islands: " It results from this approach the assertion of a certain inadequacy of the political " center and peripheries " models, when we try to apply them in the island universes. Islands pertain to other models of organization of their space which can offer new keys of explanation of the world. This world can be indeed read just as much in term of spaces in network that in term of central spaces , he can be considered not as a single space but as an archipelago. It obeys then a logic of political relation rather that in a logic of economic concentration " • So thinking with the archipelago gives a sense to socio-anthropological approaches of the complexity of the relations between close islands, even if they are not belonging to the same national space. • this archipelagic dimension is relevant to understand the new relations between Corsica and Sardinia.

8. Corsica and Sardinia : so closely related one to each other

9. Two "islands-sisters" or two twin-islands?A look to Mercator map (1598)

10. But reality is more complex

11. A history which took them far one from each other • Until a very recent period, both islands lived side by side without really trying to recreate distended links. • kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica (under the Roman antiquity, then in 14th and 15th century), • They have both to suffer from their geostrategic position in the Mediterranean area as described by Fernand Braudel (1949) • Dominated by powers with opposite interests (the Spanish in Sardinia and the Genoese in Corsica), they did not have the opportunity to develop real exchanges (exception made by some bandits in exile) • Then from the end of the 18th century, Corsica had a common destiny with France and Sardinia with Italy.

12. But both have common cultural referents: towards an archipelagic imaginary • Corsica is culturally and historically close to the Tuscany but also and especially to Sardinia which is often presented as her sister or her cousin. Both have common referents • Jean-François Ferrandi (1999) evokes two great Sardinian and Corsican authorsto point " a common imaginary. We can quote the famous reflection of the Sardinian Antonio Gramsci, on the same theme, " the pessimism of the intelligence and the optimism of the will ", that of Janine Renucci on the “sense of identity of a ground (Corsica) which has never, either been able to, or known how to master its solitude " (…) "

13. A testa Maura : a common emblem on theirs flags

14. A linguistic continuity between Corsica and Sardinia: the corso-gallurese language Source : http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fichier:Dialetti_corsi.gif

15. Some cultural initiatives participate in the construction of this common imaginary • An exposition « Corsica-Sardegna » took place in the Museum of Corsica in Corte from june to december 2008 • Children were involved throught a game « l'enquête sarde » (the sardinian inquiry)

16. From an archipelagic imaginary to an institutionalized cooperation • Living on a territory produces at the same time sense but also inventiveness, imagination. • " in a way, any social territory is an immaterial and symbolic phenomenon (…). Any social territory is a product of the human imagination. " (Barel, 1986) • Sardinia is a part of the universe of the collective representations which feed the political actors in Corsica, in particular as for the future of Corsica in the European Union, • cf. José Rossi, former president of the Assembly of Corsica (from 1998 till 2004) " Sardinia is, naturally, the island sister of Corsica. (…) Beyond the rational operation of the European funds within the framework of the program Interreg, I think that it is completely convenient to go faster and farther to create of real emotional climate between the Sardinians and Corsica which everything moves closer. " (in BERNABEU-CASANOVA, LANZALAVI, 2003 : 91-92)

17. Islands in archipelago: the IMEDOC network • The IMEDOC program (Islands of the Western Mediterranean Sea) is an important illustration of this cooperation. • Created on May 9th, 1995, the IMEDOC network groups islands of the Mediterranean area (The Balearic Islands, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily since April 17th, 2000) . Its main objective was to create a "common front of the islands of the Mediterranean area" • Domains: transport and infrastructures of communication, Tourism, Environment, Fishing and fish farming, Development of companies, Culture and identity... • Their interest is not only to act together and to exchange know-how between island political and economic actors, but also to promote, in particular with the European authorities, the specificity of the islandness (cf. network as Eurisles). • This network is growing: a new agreement of island cooperation, " Eurimed-Iles of the Mediterranean Sea " was signed in October, 2004 between the Balearic Islands, Corsica, the Crete, Sardinia and Sicily. The next stage could be the one of the integration of Malta or still Cyprus.

18. The programs INTERREG: a networking of Corsica and Sardinia with the other territories of the Tyrrhenian Sea • The European programs as INTERREG III, Meda and the others concern as well the environmental protection and natural resources, that the economic development or cultural actions. The creation of scientific and university collaborations is also part of the priorities. These programs exist since 1986 • Program of cross-border cooperation Corse-Sardaigne-Toscane-Liguria for years 2007-2013 : The objective is to increase the potential of this zone of cooperation through key themes • One of the privileged domains of this cooperation is environment. Example : collaboration which aims at the creation of the International Marine Park of Corsica and Sardinia, to protect both the strait of Bonifacio, in south Corsica and the Archipelago di la Maddalena National Park in the North of Sardinia. • A « historical » meeting in Feb.2011: " to move closer to two islands which would never have to go away "; " together both islands can establish a solid base both in the Mediterranean area and towards the European Union. " Emmanuelle de Gentili, President of the Office of the hydraulic equipment of Corsica

19. In Conclusion • If the voluntarism of institutions and actors is the indispensable pillar of the implementation of an active and effective cooperation, it cannot be effective without a will to be together, and a feeling of membership in a common space. • The notion of archipelago allows to give meaning at the same time to the socio-anthropological contents but also to the political dimensions of the projects which we evoked. • If Tyrrhenide disapeared a long time now, it continues to feed a fertile imaginary for the action and cooperations of the islanders.

20. THANK YOU !