tartalo's Last.fm Journal

Frantzes akademiarena eta Hizkuntza Komunaren (sic) aldeko Manifiestoa

Fri, 4 Jul 2008 20:32:23 +0000

Frantzes akademiarena eta Hizkuntza Komunaren (sic) aldeko Manifiestoa zer diren argi azalduta apologista batek ahotik:

http://www.estrelladigital.es/diario/articulo.asp?sec=opi&fech=26/06/2008&name=contreras

Frenazo en Francia a las lenguas regionales

Lorenzo Contreras @ Estrella Digital

El Manifiesto por la Lengua Común, propulsado por dieciocho primeros firmantes, constituye la primera reacción organizada contra la marginación del castellano en determinadas comunidades con lengua propia.
(...)
La declaración de guerra al castellano o español ha producido la respuesta de “ilustrados” contenida en el Manifiesto. Lo que se dice una contraofensiva cultural y política cuya razonable y razonada pretensión es defender, dígase lo que se quiera, la esencia de España y, por supuesto, uno de los elementos básicos de su unidad.
(...)
La Constitución de 1978 ha empezado a ser flagrantemente violada. Una fiebre diferenciadora paralela ha sido combatida en Francia por la Academia que fundara en el siglo XVIII el cardenal Richelieu.
(...)
Los académicos franceses han considerado tal añadido [reconocimiento de lenguas "regionales"] como “atentado contra la identidad nacional”. Allí, por lo que se ve, no se andan con bromas. Los “inmortales” galos han dado el frenazo a la ocurrencia parlamentaria. Para ellos lo que impera es el artículo segundo de su Constitución, que preceptúa: “La lengua de la República es el francés”. Y se acabó.
(...)
Se ve que los franceses son institucionalmente más coherentes que nosotros y más amantes de su patria. Aquí, las lenguas catalana, vasca o gallega gozan de una equiparación al español que, como lengua común, va quedando en letra muerta. Papel crecientemente mojado. ¿Se está todavía a tiempo de frenar la avalancha disgregadora? Ojalá.

Ene bada!

Local language recognition angers French academy

Fri, 4 Jul 2008 18:57:49 +0000

The Guardian, Tuesday June 17, 2008
For years France's regional languages were seen by Paris as a taboo that threatened national unity and should be repressed - children were punished for speaking Breton in the playground, banned from speaking Occitan in southern schools or Alsatian dialect in the east. But now, just as the French parliament has taken a historic step to recognise minority languages in the constitution, a new war of words has broken out.

L'Académie française, the institution that defends the purity of French, issued a furious warning that recognising regional languages in the constitution would be "an attack on French national identity". In turn, local language militants criticised the academy as a ridiculous relic of outdated nationalism.

The row has highlighted how far France differs from other European countries in the defence of minority tongues. Unlike the UK, which has acted to protect languages such as Welsh and Scottish Gaelic, France is one of the few European states which refuses to ratify the European charter for minority languages and give legal status to its various language groups.

More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jun/17/france

http://www.lepoint.fr/actualites-societe/l-academie-francaise-contre-les-langues-regionales-dans-la/920/0/253644

http://www.elpais.com/articulo/cultura/lenguas/regionales/atentan/identidad/nacional/elpepucul/20080616elpepucul_10/Tes

Anari's new live EP for free at her web

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 02:09:34 +0000

Anari is a Basque singer songwriter. Her poems bleed sadness, pain and rage, that is felt (even if you don't speak Basque) in her very personal voice and desafinado way of singing.

The Curriculum Vitae of the musicians that complete the main band is guarantee of the best quality and innovative noisy yet very melodic description of those feelings.

Drums: Mikel Abrego
(Bands: Fermin Muguruza / -Gailu / Inoren ero ni / Bap!! / Negu Gorriak)
Bass: Drake
(Bands: -Gailu / Inoren ero ni / Anari ta Petti / Bap!!)
Guitar: Borja
(Bands: Inoren ero ni)
Keyboards and Trumpet: Jomes

Anari is offering her new live EP as free download at her official Myspace page, but MySpace sucks, so here you have it in a single zip.

Anari - 2007ko Martxoaren 31ean Bilboko Kafe Antzokian (2008)

Euskara etiketa erabiltzeko aholkuak

Wed, 20 Feb 2008 00:37:40 +0000

(klik)

Euskara etiketak sortutako irratiak euskara hutsean emitituko dezan, hau da euskara etiketa erabiltzeko modurik egokiena:

* Jarri etiketa artistari artista horren kanta guztiak Euskaraz edo instrumentalak badira. (Adibidez Ruper Ordorika)

Horrela ez bada (adibidez Kortatu):
* Jarri etiketa diskoari diskoko kanta guztiak euskaraz edo instrumentalak badira. (adibidez: Kolpez Kolpe)

* Diskoak hainbat hizkuntzatan dauden kantak baditu (adibidez Azken Guda Dantza), jarri etiketak euskaraz dauden kantei soilik.

Hona nireak:
http://www.last.fm/user/tartalo/tags/euskara

WELGR 18: Irish / Geasa

Sat, 9 Feb 2008 18:56:15 +0000

THE LANGUAGE: IRISH

Irish (Gaeilge) is a Goidelic language, originating in Ireland, and historically spoken by the Irish. It enjoys constitutional status as the national and first official language of the Republic of Ireland, and it is an official language of the European Union.

Although once spoken across the whole of the island, it is currently a minority vernacular in Ireland, spoken in specific communities and most particularly in officially-recognised Gaeltachtaí (sing. Gaeltacht), which exist around the Republic of Ireland. Irish is also an officially-recognised minority language in Northern Ireland.

Written Irish is first attested in Ogham inscriptions from the fourth century AD; this stage of the language is known as Primitive Irish. Old Irish, dating from the sixth century, used the Latin alphabet and is attested primarily in marginalia to Latin manuscripts. Middle Irish, dating from the tenth century, is the language of a large corpus of literature, including the famous Ulster Cycle. Early Modern Irish, dating from the thirteenth century, was the literary language of both Ireland and Gaelic-speaking Scotland, and is attested by such writers as Geoffrey Keating.

Bobby Sands

From the eighteenth century the language went into a decline, rapidly losing ground to English due in part to restrictions dictated by British occupation, and in the mid-nineteenth century it lost a large portion of its speakers to death and emigration resulting from poverty, particularly in the wake of the Great Irish Famine (1845-1849). At the end of the nineteenth century, members of the Gaelic Revival movement made efforts to encourage the learning and use of Irish in Ireland.

Bloody Sunday

Of the Republic of Ireland's 4,057,646 residents who are aged three and over, 1,656,790 people (40.9%) regard themselves as competent in Irish. The number of people in the Gaeltacht regions of Ireland is 91,862, as of the 2006 census. Of these, 70.8% aged three and over speak Irish and approximately 60% speak Irish on a daily basis. The number of people speaking Irish reflects the fact that, to a certain extent, Irish is a compulsory subject in Ireland. Outside the educational system, 1,203,583 (29.7% of the population aged three years and over) regard themselves as competent Irish speakers. Of these 85,076 (7.1%) speak Irish on a daily basis, 97,089 (8.1%) weekly, 581,574 (48.3%) less often, 412,846 (34.3%) never, and 26,998 (2.2%) didn't state how often. Today, complete monolingualism is restricted to the very elderly in Gaeltacht regions and to native speakers under school age.

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland

THE ARTIST: GEASA

One of the more permanent fixtures of the Irish scene, Geasa have been around in one form or another and currently share members with none other than Primordial and Abaddon Incarnate.

Together since '94, they released their demo tape "Starside" two years later winning them steady critical acclaim and much appreciation since, with its powerful and aggressive black metal.

France's Season of Mist records picked up the band in 1998, and they released their debut album "Angels Cry" - a progression from the straight black fury of the demo into a metal which could only be termed classically Irish. Poignant, mournful riffs reminiscent of Primordial characterised this release, though Season of Mist and the band parted ways a year or two later.

In their lengthy sojourn since "Angel's Cry", these stalwarts of the Irish scene have moved off Marseille's Season of Mist and relocated to the greener pastures of Co.Cork's Acheron label who have furnished them with an excellent package and reproduction.

Geasa continue the progression in a similar vein as was displayed there - the churning black metal of their beginnings has now morphed into a more coherent and song oriented melancholic Metal with many nods to their more extreme past...

Overall the nearest point of reference must surely be Primordial, whose fullsome integration of folk and metal has definitely informed Geasa's style. The opening of "Heavenfall", the most weighty track on here, could be more accurately likened to Morbid Angel, one can even detect a hint of those masters of the obscure, Bethlehem.

Overall though Geasa's propensity is toward the epic, and their decent ear for the song means they can largely pull this off. The nice dynamics of "Divine Reality" remind of the much underrated Blood Divine (coincidence?) and the folky "Eire" sees them tackle Cruachan's territory successfully with its melancholy lament.

Discography

* Starside (Demo, 1996)
* Angel's Cry (Full-length, 1999)
* Fate's Lost Son (Full-length, 2003)
* Murder (Single, 2004)
* Godslaughter (Full-length, 2005)

Sources:
http://metalireland.com/bands/geasa.html
http://metalireland.com/nrev/geasa.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geasa_(band)

WELGR 17: Garifuna / Andy Palacio

Fri, 25 Jan 2008 14:34:50 +0000

THE LANGUAGE: GARIFUNA

Garifuna is an Arawakan language spoken in Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Belize by the Garifuna people. It is spoken by a majority of Afro-Hondurans.

The Garifuna language has survived centuries of persecution and linguistic imperialism.

It is rich in tales (raga), which originally served as an activity during wakes or large gatherings. Nowadays, this story-telling art is being lost at the same time as the language is in retreat.

There is a very strong link between the Garifuna language and the songs and dances which are associated with it. The melodies bring together African and Amerindian elements and the texts are a veritable store of the history and traditional knowledge of the Garifuna, such as cassava-growing, fishing, canoe-building and the construction of baked mud houses.

The dances are generally accompanied by three types of drum and the onlookers mix with the dancers during the ceremonies. There is also a considerable amount of satire in these songs, which is particularly directed at certain forms of behaviour.

Economic migration, ethnic discrimination and the complete absence of the Garifuna language in the school system in Belize are endangering its survival.

The language is still widely spoken but it is now taught in only one village. Consequently, the young no longer have mastery of their language and are no longer aware of their history; this then makes them vulnerable to the influence of the dominant culture. The National Garifuna Council (NGC) has put together the Garifunda agenda and has signed a memorandum with the Government of Belize, which commits itself to according proper recognition to the Garifuna culture.

The Garífuna are ethnically descended from Amerindian and African people. The British colonial administration used the term Black Carib to refer to the Garífuna and distinguish them from Yellow Carib - the Amerindians who had not intermarried with Africans. In recent history, Garífuna have thrown off their British appellation and encourage others to refer to them as Garífuna. The Garífuna population is estimated to be around 400,000 - 500,000 both in their Central American homeland and in the United States, the latter due to heavy migration from Central America.

One of the earliest accounts of the ancestors of the Garífuna comes from the Frenchman Père Raymond Breton. Living on the island of St. Vincent in the 1630s, he recorded the Black Caribs' story of their migration from Brazil. According to legend, the Arawak speaking peoples of Northern Brazil came to St. Vincent long before the arrival of Europeans in the New World. They lived for a long time in peace and tranquility until one day the island was attacked by a group of Carib-speaking men from the mainland. The Carib men slaughtered all the Arawak men and took the women as their slaves and companions. At some point, escaped African slaves arrived on the island and were successfully integrated into the population, adding an African element to the culture. Another version of the origin of "Black Caribs" states that pre-Columbian African explorers intermingled with the indigenous population.

When the British took over Saint Vincent after the Treaty of Paris in 1763, they were opposed by French settlers and their Carib allies. After a series of Carib Wars which were encouraged and supported by the French and the death of their leader Satuye (Chatoyer), the Carib eventually surrendered to the British in 1796. The Black Caribs were considered enemies and were deported to Roatán, an island off the coast of Honduras. The British separated the more African-looking Caribs from the more Amerindian looking ones. They decided that the former were enemies who had to be deported, while the latter were merely "misled" and were allowed to remain. Five thousand Black Caribs were deported, but only about 2,000 of them survived the voyage to Roatán. Because the island was too small and infertile to support their population, the Garífuna petitioned the Spanish authorities to be allowed to settle on the mainland. The Spanish employed them as soldiers, and they spread along the Caribbean coast of Central America.

They are known for their dance, which is called Punta, and for its associated musical style, which has the dancers move their hips from right to left in a circular motion.

In 2001 UNESCO proclaimed the Garífuna's language, dance and music as a "Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity" in Nicaragua, Honduras, and Belize. In 2005 the First Garífuna Summit was held in Corn Island, Nicaragua with the participation of the government of other Central American countries.

SOURCES:
Wikipedia: Garifuna language
Wikipedia: Garifuna People
UNESCO: Garifuna Language

THE ARTIST: Andy Palacio

Andy Palacio was not only the most popular musician in Belize, he was also a serious music and cultural activist with a deep commitment to preserving his unique Garifuna cultureis work as a recording and performing artist thanks to the critical success of his early 2007 album Wåtina.

Andy Vivien Palacio was born in the small coastal village of Barranco, Belize on December 2, 1960. Palacio grew up listening to traditional Garifuna music as well as imported sounds coming over the radio.

It was while working with a literacy project on Nicaragua's Atlantic Coast in 1980 and discovering that the Garifuna language and culture was steadily dying in that country, that a strong cultural awareness took hold and his approach to music became more defined. “I saw what had happened to my people in Nicaragua. The cultural erosion I saw there deeply affected my outlook,” he said in late 2006, “and I definitely had to react to that reality.”

His reaction took the form of diving deeper into the language and rhythms of the Garifuna “It was a conscious strategy. I felt that music was an excellent medium to preserve the culture. I saw it as a way of maintaining cultural pride and self esteem, especially in young people.”

Palacio became a leading figure in a growing renaissance of young Garifuna intellectuals who were writing poetry and songs in their native language. He saw the emergence of an upbeat, popular dance form based on Garifuna rhythms that became known as punta rock and enthusiastically took part in developing the form.

He helped found Sunrise, an organization dedicated to preserving, documenting and distributing Belizean music.

Palacio also brought his passion for Garifuna culture into the public sector. In December 2004, Palacio was appointed Cultural Ambassador and Deputy Administrator of the National Institute of Culture and History of Belize.

About five years ago, Belizean producer Ivan Duran, Palacio’s longtime collaborator and founder of the local label Stonetree Records, convinced Palacio that he should focus on less commercial forms of Garifuna music and look more deeply into its soul and roots. Duran and Palacio set out to create an all-star, multi-generational ensemble of some of the best Garifuna musicians from Guatemala, Honduras and Belize.

Andy Palacio & The Garifuna Collective unites elder statesmen such as legendary Garifuna composer Paul Nabor, with up-and-coming voices of the new generation such as Aurelio Martinez from Honduras and Adrien martinez from Belize.

The Garifuna Collective rather then focusing solely on danceable styles like punta rock, the Collective explores the more soulful side of Garifuna music, such as the Latin-influenced paranda, and the sacred dügü, punta and gunjei rhythms.

Palacio and Duran embarked on the production of Wátina, an album that would come to redefine modern Garifuna music and become one of the most critically-acclaimed world music releases of 2007. The initial recording sessions for this exceptional album took place over a 4-month period in an improvised studio inside a thatch-roofed cabin by the sea in the small village of Hopkins, Belize.

It was an informal environment, where the musicians spent many hours playing together late into the night, honing the arrangements of the songs that would eventually end up on this album. While the traditions provided the inspiration, the musicians also added contemporary elements that helped give the songs relevance to their modern context. After the sessions, Ivan Duran worked tirelessly back at his studio to craft what is surely the pinnacle of Garifuna music production to date.

In November, 2007, Palacio became the first Caribbean and Central American artist to be designated awas named a UNESCO Artist for Peace. He received the prestigious WOMEX Award in October, 2007 which was co-awarded to Ivan Duran. In September, 2007 Palacio was conferred the Order of Meritorious Service by the Prime Minister of Belize. Wátina was also nominated for the influential BBC Radio 3 World Music Awards.

At home in Belize, the international success of Wátina has sparked a revival of Garifuna music, as young musicians have become inspired by Palacio’s example.

January 19, 2008 was declared dead at 9pm Belize time due to a massive and extensive stroke to the brain, a heart attack and respiratory failure due to the previous two conditions. He was 47.

SOURCE:
cumbanchamusic.blogspot.com

WELGR 16: Scottish Gaelic / Mill a h-Uile Rud

Fri, 11 Jan 2008 19:46:09 +0000

THE LANGUAGE: SCOTTISH GAELIC

Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig) is a member of the Goidelic branch of Celtic languages. This branch also includes the Irish and Manx languages. It is distinct from the Brythonic branch of the Celtic languages, which includes Welsh, Cornish, and Breton.

Gaelic, a descendant of the Goidelic branch of Celtic and closely related to Irish, is the traditional language of the Scotti or Gaels, and became the historical language of the majority of Scotland after it replaced Cumbric, Pictish and Norse.

Gaelic has a rich oral (beul-aithris) and written tradition, having been the language of the bardic culture of the Highland clans for several centuries. The language preserved knowledge of and adherence to pre-feudal laws and customs (as represented, for example, by the expressions tuatha and dùthchas).

The language suffered especially as Highlanders and their traditions were persecuted after the Battle of Culloden in 1746, and during the Highland Clearances.

The 2001 UK Census showed a total of 58,652 Gaelic speakers in Scotland (1.2% of population over three years old). Compared to the 1991 Census, there has been a diminution of approximately 7,300 people (an 11% of the total), meaning that Gaelic decline (language shift) in Scotland is continuing.

After centuries of persecution, prejudice and neglect, Gaelic has now achieved a degree of official recognition with the passage of the Gaelic Language (Scotland) Act 2005.

The Education (Scotland) Act 1872, which completely ignored Gaelic, and led to generations of Gaels being forbidden to speak their native language in the classroom, is now recognised as having dealt a major blow to the language. People still living can recall being beaten for speaking Gaelic in school.

The first modern solely Gaelic-medium secondary school, Sgoil Ghàidhlig Ghlaschu (‘Glasgow Gaelic School’), was opened at Woodside in Glasgow in 2006 (61 partially Gaelic-medium primary schools and approximately a dozen Gaelic-medium secondary schools also exist). A total of 2,092 primary pupils are enrolled in Gaelic-medium primary education in 2006-7

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Gaelic_language

THE ARTIST: Mill a h-Uile Rud
Mill a h-Uile Rud is a Seattle-based band who sing in Scots Gaelic. The name translates as 'Destroy Everything'

The band formed in 2003 and retain their original line-up of Tim Armstrong (vocals, guitar), Sgrios a h-Uile Rud (vocals, bass) and Sìne Nic Anndrais (drums).

Song topics frequently deal with sex which is unusual for contemporary Gaelic music. However the band and others contend that this is in keeping with Gaelic bardic tradition and traditional poets from past centuries such as Iain Lom and Alasdair MacMhaighstir Alasdair.

As a band, Mill a h-Uile Rud are highly critical of much Celtic Punk that, in their opinion, sells a cheesy, beer-soaked stereotype of Gaelic culture. They are also noted for their hard-core stance on Gaelic use in and around the band.

In a Gaelic music scene where the language is often exploited as a showcase without much actual practical use outside of the songs themselves, Mill a h-Uile Rud stand out for not only singing in Gaelic, but using it in packaging, on their websites, on the stage and with each other. Mill a h-Uile Rud have also never allowed any official translations of their songs.

In 2005, Tim moved to Scotland full-time to study sociolinguistics and language revival, and as such, the band is less active, although they still play from time to time when Tim is back in the Seattle. Tim is also involved in the Gaelic techno/hip-hop act, Nad Aislingean, and the Gaelic rock band, Là Luain.

Sgrios remains quite active in the Seattle folk-punk scene and is involved in a number of bands in the city.

Sìne now runs a goat cheese farm outside of Seattle and also regularly works as a Gaelic TV presenter on BBC2.

Only their roadie, Erin, still lives on the remote punk commune in the mountains outside Seattle where the band was formed.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mill_a_h-Uile_Rud

DOWNLOAD WITH ARTIST PERMISSION

MILL A H-UILE RUD - Ceàrr

WELGR 15: Sámi / Mari Boine, Amoc and Tiina Sanila

Sun, 18 Nov 2007 14:30:22 +0000

Authors: vuorbi and Zet_

THE LANGUAGES: SÁMI LANGUAGES

Geography and demographics

The Sámi languages are a group of languages in the Uralic family, specifically in the Finno-Ugric subgroup. Other languages in this group are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian and numerous others with numbers of speakers ranging from just a handful to tens of thousands.

There are currently nine Sámi languages remaining. They are spoken in a quite large area ranging from central Sweden and Norway all the way to the eastern end of the Kola Peninsula. The languages are further devided into two subgroups: western and eastern.

Western:
* Southern Sami
* Ume Sami
* Pite Sami
* Lule Sami
* Northern Sami

Eastern:
* Inari Sami
* Kemi Sami (extinct)
* Skolt Sami
* Akkala Sami (extinct)
* Kildin Sami
* Ter Sami

Despite this devide, there is a quite neat continuum of dialects ranging across the whole region, closely situated dialects being somewhat mutually intelligible. However, an average speaker of Southern Sámi would certainly not easily understand Skolt Sámi, for example.

Most of the Sámi people – some sources say as much as 90% – speak Northern Sámi. It has somewhere between 15,000 and 25,000 speakers in northern Norway, Sweden and Finland. Other languages have significantly fewer speakers and are seriously endangered. For example, the last known speaker of Akkala Sámi died in 2003.

Linguistic features

Sámi languages are agglutinative languages and they share many features with other Uralic languages. Perhaps the most notable peculiarities are consonant gradation (also present in Finnish and Estonian), the dual number and the negative verb.

Atleast in Northern Sámi, the dual number only exists for verbs (nouns only have singular and plural). It is only used when referring to humans.

Examples of the dual number in Northern Sámi dán nieiddat leaba mu 'these two daughters are mine', but dán beatnagat leat mu 'these dogs are mine'. There is not word "two" in either sentence, but in the first one the verb, leaba, is inflected in the dual third person, which indicates that there are precicely two daughters. Had the verb been in the plural third person, the number of daughters would be three or greater. In the latter example the verb leat is in the plural third person, but because it refers to non-humans (dogs), the number of dogs is two or greater.

The negative verb is typical of Uralic languages. In many European languages negation is expressed with small non-inflected particles (e.g. not, nicht, inte), while person, mood and tense are marked in the main verb. Sámi Languages, however, employ an auxiliary verb for negation which is inflected by person, mood and in Southern Sámi even tense, while the main verb remains uninflected.

Sámi Languages distinguish between different sound durations. Many distinguish between not just two but three different consonant lengths. This has to do with the consonant gradation. For example, in Northern Sámi, guolli [kuol:i] 'fish' (sg. nominative) : guoli [kuoli] 'fish' (sg. accusative/genitive). The "superlong" duration is not marked in standard Northern Sámi orthography but some dictionaries and textbooks mark it with an apostrophy; suolu 'island' : sul'los 'on (the) island'. Furthermore, unlike in Finnish and Estonian, gemination also applies to affricates: vázzit ['væd:tsiht] 'to walk', vázán ['vædtsæn] 'I walk'. In geminate affricates the initial stop part is longer than in short affricates.

Distinctive sound lengths are not limited to just consonant gemination in Northern Sámi. In addition, Inari Sámi distinguishes between short and long diphthongs as well as short, semi-long and long consonants. Long diphthongs and semi-long consonants are not marked in script, although long monophthongs and long consonants are marked as two letters: moonnađ 'to go'.

Most Sámi languages have a Subject-Verb-Object word order, but this is not a strict requirement, and different emphases and connotations can be conveyed with an altered word order. It is also notable that in Southern Sámi the default order is SOV.

The Sámi people

The Sámi people, sápmelaččat, are the only officially recognised
indigenous people within the EU, today spread across the northern parts of Norway, Sweden and Finland and the Kola peninsula in north-western Russia, an area called Sápmi in the North Sámi language.

The origins of the Sámi people are unknown, and their history has been until the 20th Century mostly written by Western explorers, tax collectors and priests that had started to settle among the Sámi from the 16th century on and convert them to Christianity. Because there was not much interaction between people in different parts of the Sápmi and no big concentrations of population to speak of, it took relatively long for the Sámi to recognise their common ground.

The Sámi culture is diverse and adapted to life in the Arctic, and it had thrived for centuries and gained trading contacts. Europe was always hungry for fish and game, and fur was in high demand among the wealthy. The Sámi were variably taxed by the emerging states of Norway, Sweden (of which Finland was part of until 1809) and Russia, in the case of the Inari Sami sometimes by all three simultaneously owing to border disputes in the North. When the national states began to form in the 18th and 91th centuries and borders were closed, those Sámi who had previously moved between states were forced to settle down. The pressure to assimilate to their dominant cultures increased in the beginning of the 20th century being the most destructive time for the traditional Sámi life, which continued until the WWII, which was one of the turning points in Sámi history of the 20th century.

In Norway, Finland and Sweden, the outward pressure was lifted
slightly after the WWII, but assimilation continued on a different route. Since the racial theories that had originated during the Nazi regime were no longer in favour, the Sámi were no longer considered an inferior race (at least not in so many words), but they now had to attend Finnish schools and deal with authorities that only spoke Finnish or Swedish, and straight on from comprehensive school the official policy was that the Sámi culture was not suited for modern life and was going to be extinct anyway, so assimilation was in the long run a much better choice for the Sámi than holding on to their "outdated" customs. The development that had started with the first Christian priests culminated in school dormitories where Sámi children lived for months without seeing their families, were beaten if they spoke their own language and bullied as a matter of course. In Finland this was not mended until the 1990s, when it became possible to study North Sámi in comprehensive school.

In the 1970s the Norwegian government planned to dam the river Alta to create an artificial lake and a hydroelectric power plant. The planned artificial lake would have drowned a Sámi village and a cemetery and been destructive to reindeer herding and wild salmon fishing that had been the traditional livelihoods of the local Sámi, and the Sámi of Norway formed a resistance that first appealed to the government and the royal family, organised demonstrations, and in late 1979 when the construction was about to start a number of them blocked the machines' way to work, and some went on a hunger strike. The government responded with force, at one point with as much as one tenth of the Norwegian police force being stationed around Alta. Finally the plan was carried out in a much lesser scale, and the controversy served as a point of recognition of mutual interests and problems of the different Sámi groups, and a new level was established in the cross-border co-operation between the Sámi in the three Nordic states.

The Sámi of Russia were left behind of this development for many years to come because of the political tension between the West and East blocks.

Today there are Sámi Parliaments in Norway, Finland and Sweden, and the Saami Council working as an international cultural and political co-operation organization, some Sámi languages are established teaching languages in comprehensive schools and a cultural revival of sorts is taking place, but the question of much of the modern world can you assimilate before it assimilates you remains contemporary among the Sámi, the youth especially. Only a minority of the Sámi live off their traditional livelihoods and a notable part of the population
has moved outside Sápmi to find work. The Sámi have always lived on the edge, and maintaining balance is ever important for a small a non-homogeneous people to not fall off of that edge.

Sámi music

Traditionally Sámi music has consisted mostly of yoik, sometimes accompanied by drums, performed both solo and in groups. According to Ulla Pirttijärvi, a prominent North Sámi yoiker and musician, there are four main types of yoik: the Southern vuelie, North Sámi luohti, Skolt leu'dd and the now extinct Inari Sámi lidvi. These four differ in their use of rhythm and melody, but the technique is basically the same.

Yoik has always been more than just music as we know it today: it was used for ceremonial events, shamanistis sessions, telling stories, reminiscing of people and places and even to scare away the wolves by the reindeer herders. A yoik has traditionally been very personal and specific about its subject, either a person, a place or an event, and the subjects were always named. When a yoik was made, it was not altered in any way, and it was important to get the yoik exactly right. A yoik of a person could be inherited by one of the previous subject's descendants, especially if they possessed some of the same qualities, and in this case new words would be made, but the tune would stay the same.

Yoik was deemed by the Christian priests as devilish moaning and wailing, and yoiking was discouraged and it became a susceptible activity. The tradition did not vanish but it went underground, and from that time comes the stereotype of yoiking being the pastime of drunkards, beggars and madmen.

The radicals of the seventies gave yoik back to general public, but also brough general perspective to the tradition with respect to contemporary political and ethnic awakening: where there had been small groups of Sámi people with their differences, there was now one people of great variety, and when in the old days you would have yoiked about e.g. the hill or the lake beside your home, in the seventies they started to yoik about hills and lakes in general. Today both approaches, the specific and the general, are in active use, the latter especially in "modern" yoik.

THE ARTISTS: THREE SPOTLIGHTS

Mari Boine

Mari Boine, born 1956 in Finnmark, Norway, is perhaps the most widely known Sámi musician and a very influential figure in contemporary Sámi music. Her music is a combination of pop, rock, jazz and traditional Sámi music, and most of her lyrics are in North Sámi. While the young radicals of the 1970s explored the almost suffocated yoik tradition and brought it back as an acceptable form of tradition, Mari Boine took it further and made it a part of the repertoire of modern Sámi music. In addition to her own texts, she has sung the poetry of Nils-Aslak Valkeapää, for example. Her voice is both confident and emotional, and she has said in an interview with Kaltio magazine that when she performed, her old schoolmates could barely recognise the meek little Mari they had come to know. Anger was her way out of shyness and learned inferiority, but it has given way to much more reflective ways of expression.

Mari Boine grew up in a strict religious home. Her parents were devout Laestadians, and dancing, singing and playing music other than hymns was forbidden. She grew up to think that the Sámi were inferior people, and girls even more so. Even as she studied to become a teacher she had wanted to be Norwegian rather than Sámi, but after several years of work she quit on the grounds that could not continue the norwegialisation of other Sámi. In 1985 she became a full-time musician. The Sámi tradition and language as well as social and political consciousness has remained one of the leading themes of her
artistic work; when she was asked to perform at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, she refused because she felt it was about bringing a minority on stage for mere curiosity.

She released her debut album, Gula Gula, in 1989, and signed to Real World after Peter Gabriel had heard the album. Since then she has released seven full-length studio albums, one live and a remix album and collaborated with innumerable internationally acclaimed musicians and artist. In 2005 Mari Boine was nominated for the Norwegian of the Century, along with two kings, three prime ministers and a few explorers.

Mari Boine at Last.fm
http://www.myspace.com/boine Mari Boine at MySpace

Amoc

amoc, or Mikkal-Antti Morottaja (born 1984), is a young Inari Sami rapper and a member of the rap collective Guerra Norte. There are only a few hundred native speakers of Inari Sami, and Amoc is one of the few of the Inari Sami of his generation that have learned Inari Sámi as their first language. His success has inspired youth to use their language and be proud of their roots.

Amoc first gained fame through his hit song Kolle ákšu (The Golden Axe) a few years ago, and his song Val moonam taan čoođa (I'll Go Through This) was the first Inari Sámi rap song ever made. He released his first full-length studio album Amok-kaččâm on the Sámi National Day,

6th of February 2007, and has appeared on the Lappi itsenäiseksi
mixtape vol 1 along with the rest of Guerra Norte and other North Finnish rap groups. He has collaborated with Hannibal & Soppa, Ezkimo and Edorf, and is often seen performing live in Northern Finland both solo and with Ružže, another Inari Sámi rapper.

http://www.amoc.fi/ Amoc official site (in Finnish)

Tiina Sanila

Tiina Sanila is a young Skolt Sámi rock musician and leu'dder. She lives in her home village, Sevettijärvi, northeast from Inari, and tends to her reindeer herd and family farm when she is not off playing gigs with her band. A Skolt Sámi performer of the older generation, Jaakko Gauriloff, once said of Tiina Sanila that finally after twenty years there is a new generation of Skolt popular music. Most of the other Skolt Sámi musicians are traditional leu'dders.

Tiina Sanila Band record for the same record company, Tuupa Records (run by her lead guitarist Jussi Isokoski), as amoc. They have released two studio albums, Sää´mjânnam rocks! (2005) and Kå´llkue´ll še måttmešt tålkk (2007), and one single, Uuh (2006).

http://www.tiinasanila.com/ Official site

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sami_people
http://www.galdu.org/web/index.php?sladja=25&vuolitsladja=11&giella1=eng

Yoik:
Lecture by Ulla Pirttijärvi on the music tradition of the Sámi in 2005

Mari Boine:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mari_Boine
Turun Sanomat
http://www.turunsanomat.fi/kulttuuri/?ts=1,3:1005:0:0,4:5:0:1:2005-12-04,104:5:344168,1:0:0:0:0:0:
Kaltio Magazine http://www.kaltio.fi/index.php?139

Tiina Sanila:
the official site and her own words
http://www.tuuparecords.fi/

Amoc:
official site, his own words
http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amoc

WELGR 14: Welsh / Tystion

Sun, 11 Nov 2007 15:48:09 +0000

THE LANGUAGE: WELSH

Welsh (Cymraeg or y Gymraeg), is a member of the Brythonic branch of Celtic spoken natively in Wales (Cymru).

It competes with Breton (a close relative spoken in France) as the most-spoken Celtic language. 62% of the 611,000 Welsh speakers in Wales claim to use Welsh daily, and 88% of the ones fluent in the language use it daily.

The earliest extant sources of a language identifiable as Welsh go back to about the 6th century, and the language of this period is known as Early Welsh. Very little of this language remains.

The next main period, somewhat better attested, is Old Welsh (Hen Gymraeg, 9th to 11th centuries); poetry from both Wales and Scotland has been preserved in this form of the language. As Germanic and Gaelic colonisation of Great Britain proceeded, the Brythonic speakers in Wales were split off from those in northern England, speaking Cumbrian, and those in the south-west, speaking what would become Cornish, and so the languages diverged. Both Canu Aneirin and Canu Taliesin were in this era.

The influx of English workers during the Industrial Revolution in Wales from about 1800 led to a substantial dilution of the Welsh-speaking population of Wales. English migrants seldom learnt Welsh An important exception, however, was in the non-conformist churches, which were strongly associated with the Welsh language.

By the twentieth century, the numbers of Welsh speakers were shrinking at a rate which suggested that it would be extinct within a few generations. The 10-yearly census first started to ask language questions in 1891, by which time 54% of the population still spoke Welsh.

Support for the language grew during the second half of the 20th century, along with the rise of organisations such as the nationalist political party Plaid Cymru and the Welsh Language Society, Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg.

The language has greatly increased its prominence since the creation of the television channel S4C in November 1982, which broadcasts exclusively in Welsh during peak viewing hours. The main evening television news provided by the BBC in Welsh is available for download. There is also a Welsh language radio station, BBC Radio Cymru, which was launched in 1977.

Perhaps most important of all, at the end of the twentieth century it became compulsory for all school children to learn Welsh up to age 16, and this both reinforced the language in Welsh-speaking areas and reintroduced at least an elementary knowledge of it in areas which had become more or less wholly Anglophone.

There is, however, currently no daily newspaper in Welsh, the only national newspaper Y Cymro, being published once a week, although a daily newspaper called Y Byd ("The World") is scheduled to be launched on 3 March 2008.

The 2001 census shows that about 25% of Welsh residents were born outside Wales. Since December 2001 the British Government has planned to ensure that all immigrants know English. It remains to be seen if Welsh will be considered a separate case. At present, a knowledge of either Welsh, English or Scottish Gaelic is sufficient for naturalisation purposes and it is believed that this policy will be continued in any proposed changes to the law.

The 2004 Welsh Language Use Survey shows 21.7% of the population of Wales are Welsh speakers. This is an increase from 20.5% in the 2001 census, and from 18.5% in 1991. The highest proportion of Welsh speakers was among young people, which bodes well for the future of Welsh.

TRIVIA

The traditional counting system used by the Welsh language is vigesimal, The vigesimal or base-20 numeral system is based on twenty (in the same way in which the decimal numeral system is based on ten) ; numbers from 21–39 are "1–19 on twenty", 40 is "two twenties", 60 is "three twenties", etc.

According to German linguist Theo Vennemann, the vigesimal system in Europe is of Basque origin and spread from the so-called Vasconic languages to other European tongues, such as many Celtic languages, French and Danish.

In East Asia, the Ainu language also uses a counting system that is based around the number 20. In America twenty was a base in the Maya and Aztec number systems too.

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigesimal

THE ARTIST: TYSTION

Fierce campaigners for the promotion of the Welsh language, rappers Tystion fused bilingual rhymes with a revolutionary ideology.

"People in Wales sit in pubs all day, saying 'Let's go off and have a revolution'. Tystion is about actually getting up and doing something"

Tystion began in 1991, in a bedroom in Carmarthen, when Steffan Cravos (Ex Gorky's Zygotic Mynci ) - a 15-year old schoolboy fired by the sound of Public Enemy and the Dead Kennedys - connected up two tape decks and a mixer that he'd bought from a high street electronics shop.

Attending an Eisteddfod in the early 1990s, Cravos met one Gruff Meredith - a fellow DIY musician with a penchant for kazoos and harmonicas, and a skill for truly surreal wordplay. Meredith chose to join Cravos on the mic, moving down to Cardiff to expand Tystion into a duo.

An early demo tape garnered only blank looks from record companies, so Cravos chose to circumnavigate the music industry altogether, founding his own label, Fitamin Un. The first two releases - 1995's Dyma'r Dystiolaeth and 1996's Tystion vs Allfa Un - were scrappy, lo-fidelity cassette-only releases that did little more than reinforce Tystion's radical anti-mainstream ethos.

But 1997 saw a debut album proper, Rhaid I Rhywbeth Ddigwydd (Something's Got To Happen), recorded with future Murry The Hump member Curig Huws. It took a spraycan to the grey slate drudgery of small-town Welsh life, Cravos and Meredith rapping about pulling handbrakes in Tesco car-park and smoking themselves senseless in a hedge - and its anarchic spirit caught the attention of Ankstmusik, who offered to give a handful of tracks off the record a national release. The Brewer Spinks EP came out in 1998, shifting several thousand copies, and scoring the plaudit of Single Of The Week in Melody Maker.

“We knew we wouldn’t get away with lyrics like ‘I fucked that Michelle in the kitchen, man that bitch was twitching’.”
Instead they aimed to “Prove that Wales wasn’t all about choirs, chapels and mountains; and to move Rap away from the mysoginy and cliché that prevails all too often.”
“If ever there was a call to arms for the Welsh underclass, this was it.”

Many lyrics are forward-looking and speak of a regrouping of Wales, ostensibly Y Fro Gymraeg and a Welsh-speaking Wales. “ “Stepping forward, not looking back. … C’mon, it’s time to be decisive. … Too many voices, no one’s innovating. We have to be strong, will that day come? … I can’t relax, I’m being strangled. We need our own rules. We can’t be treated like a machine. Break free, and start teaching self-confidence. If we are to leave the gutter, get up, NOW!>” This is a similar call to the one Saunders Lewis gave when he proclaimed that the Welsh language could be saved and that people had to be willing to pay fines and face prison sentences for their beliefs.

“you’ll never get any solace smoking a joint, what’s the point, you sit in front of the tele, you sit still, that’s when the enemy comes in for the kill.” “We ain’t justifying aggression. We don’t have to justify anything. hip hop poetry in motion. Streets are in commotion. Our mother tongue was stolen. The lies of lay men. They tried to crush the nation. Henry VIII destroyed our religion, burnt our books, stole our faith. Our history is a set of lies agreed upon, but some has another notion and over the years planned revolution. Shrug off the complex.”

1999's Shrug Off Ya Complex was an ambitious and jumbled affair, boasting a revolving line-up of twenty musicians - among them, Gwion Ap Sion (later of Murry the Hump), the Erban Poets, and a proper backing band that included DJ Jaffa, drummer John Griffiths, guitarist Nick Fenwick, and bassist Kevs Ford.

It was most notable for the juxtaposition of Cravos' and Meredith's rapidly diverging rapping styles, however. As Cravos' purist rhymes took on a politically-charged dimension, inspired by an interest in Welsh independence and his past in Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg, Meredith continued to indulge his whimsical, drug-fried muse. But after one more release, the Toys EP - a ramshackle affair featuring Frank Naughton of Rocketgoldstar on guitar - Meredith left the band. He would later sign to Ankstmusik as Mc Mabon.

With Cravos at the reigns, 2000's Hen Gelwydd Prydain Newydd was the defining Tystion statement to date. A powerful, politicised collection, it ranted against the Labour government's New Deal policy, draconian anti-terrorism legislation, the bad attitude of corporate giants like AOL, and the patronising cliches that defined Welsh popular culture.

New to the band were Gareth Williams (aka MC Chef) and on bass and keyboards, Clancy Pegg - formerly part of an early incarnation of Catatonia.

By 2001, Tystion had severed ties with Ansktmusik, and Y Meistri - a taster for their forthcoming fourth album surfaced on their blossoming Fitamin Un imprint. Playlisted by Chuck D's Bring The Noise internet radio station and a number of underground European radio stations, it proved a defining moment in Tystion's mission to bring the Welsh language to the international stage.

Sadly, however, Tystion announced their split in August 2002, shortly before the release of their final single MOMYFG. The announcement was made by Steffan Cravos from the stage of Maes B, at what was to be their last gig.

Sources:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/music/sites/tystion/pages/biography.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tystion

WELGR 13: Corsican / I Muvrini

Sun, 4 Nov 2007 18:36:21 +0000

THE LANGUAGE: CORSICAN

Corsican (Corsu or Lingua Corsa) is a Romance language spoken on the island of Corsica, alongside French, which is the official language. A similar language to Corsican is also spoken to some extent in Sassari and in the Gallura area of Sardinia. It has strong similarities to Italian and in particular the dialects of Italian from Tuscany.

The language has several dialects including Northern Corsican, spoken in the Bastia and Corte area, and Southern Corsican, spoken around Sartene and Porto-Vecchio. The dialect of Ajaccio has been described as in transition. The dialects spoken at Calvi and Bonifacio are closer to the Genoa dialect, also known as Ligurian.

The Corsican language is a key vehicle for Corsican culture, which is notably rich in proverbs. Corsica also has a tradition of polyphonic singing that dates back to the 16th century.

According to its UNESCO classification, the Corsican language is currently in danger of becoming extinct. In recent years, greater protection for the language has been discussed as part of proposals for the increased autonomy of the region of Corsica from France.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corsican_language

THE ARTIST: I MUVRINI

I Muvrini was formed in the early 1980s by the brothers Jean-François Bernardini and Alain Bernardini who were born in the village of Tagliu-Isulacciu in the north of Corsica. They are named after a type of wild sheep which live in the mountains of Corsica.

The Bernardini brothers were introduced to traditional Corsican music at an early age by their father, Ghjuliu, who was a well known poet and singer. They recorded their first single with their father in collaboration with the group Canta U Populu Corsu. Ghjuliu Bernardini died in December 1977 and I Muvrini's first album, I Muvrini ... ti ringrazianu, which was released in 1979, was dedicated to their father's memory.

In 2000, I Muvrini joined up with Sting to record the their most famous song, "Terre d'Oru" (English: Fields of Gold).

Throughout their career they have promoted the Corsican language and culture.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Muvrini

CORSICA

Corsica is the fourth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea (after Sicily, Sardinia, and Cyprus). It is located south-west of Italy, south-east of France, and north of the island of Sardinia.

Corsica is usually considered one of the 26 regions of France, although strictly speaking Corsica is a "territorial collectivity" (collectivité territoriale) by law.

The first known settlers on Corsica were Greeks from Phocaea on the coast of Asia Minor. In 565 B.C. they founded the colony of Alalia (now Aléria)

Soon after the beginning of the first Punic War (264-241 B.C.), the Romans took Alalia (259 B.C.) and began their conquest of Corsica. But the interior was not pacified till 162 B.C. In 420 Aléria was set on fire, totally destroyed by the Vandals in 456.

In 552 Corsica became an Eastern Roman province when it was taken over by the Emperor Justinian in his bid to rebuild the Roman Empire.

In 568 the Lombards began to invade Italy from the north. They advanced southwards, and in 725 they took over Corsica, however, their desire to unite Italy did not meet with the approval of the Papacy, and in 754 the Pope turned to France for assistance.

Pippin the Short of France engaged in a successful campaign against the Lombards, and in 756 handed over some of the territory he had gained to the Pope. Known as Pippin's Gift, it later formed the basis for the the development of the Papal States. Corsica was part of this gift, but was one of the territories whose administration the Pope left to others. So the Corsicans were at the mercy of whatever governor happened to be in charge.

The following 200 years Corsica was repeatedly invaded by the Saracens. With the retreat of the Saracens a unified government was apparently established in the 10th century under a Count of Corsica, but collapsed in the 11th century, when power fell into the hands of local nobles. Some communities had elected chieftains, who often succeeded in making their authority hereditary. They took over Bonifacio in 1187 and Calvi in 1268. In the meantime Sinucello della Rocca, profiting by the discord between the rival republics made himself Master of Corsica, promulgated a primitive constitution at a national assembly at Mariana in 1264. He was captured by the Genoese after the defeat of Pisa and died in prison in 1306.

Genoa and Aragon

As soon as the Pisans had withdrawn, another rival power appeared. For in 1297 the Pope had handed over Corsica and Sardinia to the kingdom of Aragon. In the struggle for supremacy, the Corsican nobility supported Aragon, while the people now supported Genoa. In 1420 King Alfonso staged a military invasion, and after Bonifacio was besieged for 5 months, he left Corsica. Bastia was founded by the Genoese in 1380.

In 1453 the bank of Saint George took over the administration of Corsica.They showed no mercy in putting down local rebellions. The existing town of Ajaccio was founded in 1492.

Sampiero Corso (1498-1567)

This Corsican hero was born in 1498 in Bastelica; He was an officer in the French army, attempted to improve the lot of his homeland by bringing it under French sovereignty. The result was 3 years of war, followed by 3 years of French rule, 5 years of Genoese rule and a further 3 years of war. At the end of this the Genoese remained the sole rulers. Many Corsicans left the island; some of them went to Rome to serve the Pope, where they became the famous Corsican Guard.

The struggle for independence

The war began in 1729, when the Corsicans rebelled against the oppressive rule of the Genoese, whose power was now waning. In 1735 a constitution was drawn up and declared themselves independent under the leadership of Andrea Ceccaldi, Luigi Giafferi and Ghjacinto Paoli.

On 12 march 1736 a ship under the English flag arrived in Aléria. They carried canons, munition, rifles and grain. With it a German adventurer called Baron Theodor von Neuhoff came ashore and promised to rescue them from Genoese tyranny. They made him king for a few months, but soon came to realise that what he had promised was no more than bluff.

Since 1745 the Corsicans had a new leader: Gianpietro Gaffori from Corte. His storming of the citadel in Corte has become a legend. In his distress, the military Genoese commander had Gaffori's young son kidnapped and held him over the fortress wall in order to stop the Corsican attack.

Gaffori's wife begged her husband to continue the siege regardless. Gaffori then went on to take the citadel. In 1746 the Assembly proclaimed Corsica's independence once more. Gaffori was elected the sole leader of the country. He succeeded in winning back almost the entire island; the Genoese Governor finally had to instigate a conspiracy to get rid of him; Gaffori was murdered in 1753.

Corsica independent (1755-1769)

In 1755 Pasquale Paoli (son of Ghjacintu) was proclaimed General of the Corsican Nation. He made Corte his capital and declared this newly independent state a constitutional democracy.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, on whose theories the constitution was based, offered his support.
Paoli built a new port at Ile Rousse because Calvi and Bastia were still under Genoese domination.

The blow came in 1768, when the news came that Genoa had effectively sold Corsica to the French. Pasquale Paoli pursued all possible diplomatic channels in his efforts to retain Corsica's hard-won independence, but to no avail. The French brought in their troops,who defeated Paoli's army at Ponte Nuovo on the 9th of May 1769.

About twenty years later Pasquale Paoli was pardoned by Louis XVI, and returned to his native island. In 1790 he was made governor of Corsica, but soon came into conflict with the French revolutionary authorities. He immediately convened his old Corsican parliament, which declared the island independent for a second time, requesting the British to provide military support. Admiral Hood came along and took both Calvi and Bastia.

Corsica spent a period of two years under the rule of a British viceroy. One might have expected this to be Paoli, but King George II decided to send sir Gilbert Elliot. The king requested Pasquale Paoli to return to England, which he did for the last time in October 1795. He died in London at the age of 82 in 1807.

Under pressure both from the Corsicans and from the French army in Italy, Britain renounced its claim to the island. Ironically, the French army was under the command of a Corsican general called Napoleon Bonaparte, who in 1793 had held on to Bonifacio for France.

The recent years

The late fifties saw an alarming increase in the number of people leaving the island. Corsica experienced a real "diaspora". This mass exodus has meant that worker shortages have added to the economical problems of Corsica.

On the island there was a wave of protest against the proposed construction of an underground atomic testing station and at the plan to sink atomic waste in the see between the French mainland and Corsica. Further adding to the tension was the stationing of French Foreign Legionnaires; these troops were viewed as an army of occupation.

Bombs against speculators

Moreover, there was growing resistance to the sale of the Corsican coast to financial consortia from the French mainland, which went on to line their pockets with the vast proportion of the islands' income from tourism. As far as the new holiday villages were concerned, virtually everything was imported from the mainland, from the building materials to the food supplies: even the staff was almost exclusively non-Corsican. And thus Edmond Simeoni was speaking for many when he said: "The loveliest areas of Corsica were handed over to the real estate speculators and industrial tourist agents, who now destroy the local hotel business, commandeer the beaches and mutilate the countryside without producing any real profit for the inhabitants."

Autonomy

August 1975, Aléria: the occupation of a wine-vault ends in bloodshed. Paris sends in heavily armed forces and looses two policemen in a shooting. Dr. Edmond Simeoni, leader of the ARC (Action Régionaliste Corse), surrenders to the police.

In 1976 the FLNC (Front de Libération Nationale de la Corse) is launched.

Corsica gets to know the meaning of the "blue nights":
111 attacks in 1978, 463 in 1983 and thousands were to follow. On the other hand, the nationalistic movement gets the University of Corte reopend in 1981.

1998: Murder of the prefect Claude Erignac.
1999: Affaire of the 'paillotte'. Start of the process of Matignon on Corsica.
2000: The assembly of Corsica approves, by 44 voices(votes) on 51, the devolve in Corsica of a 'supervised' legislative power.
2002: Resumption of the discussions by the government Raffarin.
2003: Creation of Fronte per a lingua Corsa on 2003
Process against the presumed murderers of prefect Erignac (June 2003)
Arrest of Yvan Colonna (July 2003)
Referendum to create one region with a measure of autonomy (July 6th, 2003; Corsica voted no)

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corsica
http://www.terracorsa.info/