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xi Preface In the corner of the western Pyrenees known as the Basque Country, people have disagreed about many things. They have disagreed about the kind of society they want to build, its proper name, its geographic boundaries, about whether it should be socialist or capitalist, whether they want to have independence and what that might mean. They have argued bitterly over the legitimacy of political violence and have also suffered deeply its consequences. But one issue about which there has been a remarkably strong degree of consensus over the years is that the Basque language, Euskara, is a valuable heritage that should be protected and reclaimed. This book explores the pursuit of that conviction, examining some of the changing methods, modes of representation, and discourse of the Basque ­ language revitalization movement as it was first expressed at the end of the nineteenth century and again when it reemerged as a social movement in the waning years of the Franco regime. Drawing on the analysis of historical documents, political treatises, and my own direct observations and interviews conducted through ethnographic fieldwork over the course of more than twenty years, I explore the reasons why people have thought it important to save Basque and how they have gone about it. These efforts at language revival have been unfolding alongside and sometimes at the very center stage of the simultaneous Basque nationalist struggle for autonomy . For some language advocates, the two struggles are inseparable. For others, they are issues that should be kept clearly distinct. We will look at these and many other debates that language advocates have about what affects the social life of Basque and what it means to speak a modern language. The principal protagonists behind these actions call themselves euskaltzaleak, Basque-language advocates. Though many are of Basque ethnic heritage, others are not. And while many language advocates speak Basque natively, some learned Basque as a second language, and yet others may not know Basque well at all. Euskaltzaleak are best thought of not as an ethnic group or a linguistic community in the usual sense of the term, but as a political-affinity group. Coming from various class and social locations, intellectuals, artists, musicians, linguists, educators , parents, and young people of varying walks of life, euskalzaleak make up a xii  Preface polymorphous social movement. Some of them have gone on to become part of official language-planning efforts working in town halls and provincial or regional governments, while others work in a wide array of civic organizations that are collectively referred to as euskalgintza. A compound work composed of the root euskal (Basque) and the suffix gintza (production, construction), the term euskalgintza conveys an understanding of language revival as an active and ongoing process of collective making and remaking Basque. Euskalgintza is the main focus of this book, and by all accounts, the results of this movement have been nothing short of impressive. The ethnographer enters the lives of others and, if they are willing, stays for a long time to inhabit their world and experience it with them. The research on which this book draws comes from many such extended stays in the Basque Country, during which time I have received many kinds of support, advice, introductions , and extraordinary help, for which I am very grateful. I want to thank the dozens of people over the years at schools, radio stations, language-planning offices, town halls, research institutes, community associations, and newspapers in the Basque Country who allowed me to consult their archives, observe their events, and interview them. I learned much from these interviews and have tried as best I can to represent their viewpoints faithfully. To protect the anonymity of my interviewees, in most cases I do not give their real names. For most of my research, I have lived in the town of Usurbil (Gipuzkoa) and have benefited enormously from the help of its town hall and residents. There are more people who helped me there and elsewhere than I can list, but I would like to signal in particular the invaluable help and encouragement I have received from Olatz Altuna, Esther Barrutia, Olatz Osa, Lurdes Zubeldia, Jaime Otamendi, Alan King, Xabier Falcón, Arantxa Enetarriaga, Itziar Illaramendi, Joselu Aranburu, Feliz Aizpurua, Maialen Lujanbio, and Joxean Artze. I also want to thank the Patri Jatetxea and its extended family, the entire Zabalea household, Xabier Garagorri, Pedro SanCristobal , and students and colleagues in the anthropology department at the Basque University in Donostia who have...

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