Threatening Others: Nicaraguans and the Formation of National Identities in Costa Rica / Edition 1

by Carlos Sandoval-Garcia

Overview

During the last two decades, a decline in public investment has undermined some of the national values and institutions of Costa Rica. The resulting sense of dislocation and loss is usually projected onto Nicaraguan “immigrants.”

Threatening Others: Nicaraguans and the Formation of National Identities in Costa Rica explores the representation of the Nicaraguan “other” in the Costa Rican imagery. It also seeks to address more generally why the sense of national belonging constitutes a crucial identification in contemporary societies. Interdisciplinary and based on extensive fieldwork, it looks critically at the “exceptionalism” that Costa Ricans take for granted and view as a part of their national identity.

Carlos Sandoval-García argues that Nicaraguan immigrants, once perceived as a “communist threat,” are now victims of an invigorated, racialized politics in which the Nicaraguan nationality has become an offense in itself.

Threatening Others is a deeply searching book that will interest scholars and students in Latin American studies and politics, cultural studies, and ethnic studies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780896802353
Publisher:	Ohio University Press
Publication date:	05/28/2004
Series:	Ohio RIS Latin America Series , #42
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Carlos Sandoval-García is a professor of communication studies at the University of Costa Rica.

Table of Contents

	List of Tables	vii
	List of Abbreviations	ix
	Acknowledgments	xi
	Introduction	xiii
Chapter 1.	Making Sense of National Identities	1
Chapter 2.	Media Representations of Nicaraguans in Costa Rica	26
Chapter 3.	Costa Rican Exceptionalism and the Nicaraguan Other in Historical Perspective	62
Chapter 4.	Belonging and Racialization as Lived Experience	99
Chapter 5.	Material Decline, Dislocation, and Racialization	137
	Conclusion	172
Appendix 1.	Framing in News about Nicaraguans in Costa Rica, La Nacion and La Republica, 1995-96	187
Appendix 2.	Toward a Network of Crimes Committed by Former Contras, 1991-96	191
Appendix 3.	International News about Nicaragua, La Nacion, 1994-96	194
Appendix 4.	News Actors in Reports about Nicaraguan General Elections (1996)	195
Appendix 5.	Stories by Primary and Secondary Students about Costa Rica as a Nation	196
Appendix 6.	Portrayal of Nicaraguans in Costa Rica in Stories by Primary and Secondary Students	198
	Notes	201
	Bibliography	215
	Index	237