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- Title
The Search for French Identity in the Regions: National Versus Local Visions of France in the 1930s.
- Authors
MOENTMANN, ELISE MARIE
- Abstract
Organizers of the Regional Centre at the International Exposition held in Paris in 1937 attempted to present a unified France through an idealized French identity. They defined France economically through manual production, culturally with the artisan as an ideal French worker, and aesthetically via the combination of tradition and aesthetic development. In the end, they advanced a limited definition of an essential France, aspects of which the Vichy regime would perpetuate. In examining regional responses to this vision, I argue that local leaders offered a more realistic, diverse and dynamic view of France, informed by the current situation of each region, as well by as their own ideas of both regional and national identity in the 1930s. Rather than an all-encompassing idea, they suggested that the very diversity of the regions characterized the essence of France, an evolving synthesis of traditional and modern industries, as well as the cultural traditions that would continue to define the country in the post-war period.
- Subjects
FRANCE; FRENCH national character; CULTURE; CULTURAL pluralism; SOCIAL conditions in France; 20TH century French history; TWENTIETH century; MANNERS &; customs
- Publication
French History, 2003, Vol 17, Issue 3, p307
- ISSN
0269-1191
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1093/fh/17.3.307