demagogic_schizoid
29 Mar 2007, 11:52 PM
Essay I wrote. Brendan might especially find it interesting as anthropology is similair to sociology - but better ;) it's about identity as a social construct, all that etc.
According to anthropologists, ?nations? are social constructions, (just like race, gender and other identities). Using the following case-studies, explore the relationship between the construction of national identities and racial and ethnic identities in Latin America.
Latin America was created by the Spanish, Portuguese and French conquests beginning with the arrival of Columbus at the end of the 15th century. This brought into contact two worlds ? the indigenous and the European . Since then, various parts of the region have experienced influxes of European immigration and transportation of black slaves , as well as immigration from other parts of the world such as the Middle East. The way these different cultures have interacted has helped shape the culture of the region as a whole. Furthermore, Latin America is divided into various nation-states. The way that different races and cultures in each state have interacted, as well the way each state has interacted with the different cultures within it and with other states, has all helped shape the culture (or cultures) of each state, and that of the region as a whole. However, it is too simplistic to see the region as just a product of interaction and intermixing between different races and cultures. If nations and races are social constructs, then identity is just something different people use for different purposes at different times, and it is continually being redefined. This essay will seek to explore some examples of this. Specifically, what I am interested in is the way that national or racial identity has been used simultaneously to include and exclude people, how it {can both undermine and empower} (Karam, 2004, p339), as this is a theme which runs through all of the readings mentioned.
Normally, one would assume that in any society, the ?hegemonic? identity would be the national identity, and that other identities would be defined in relation to this. Therefore, it would be impossible to answer this question without first giving an overview of the idea of the role of national identity in Latin America. De la Cadena (2001, p258) describes Latin American nationalism as a {quasi-oxymoronic venture}. This is a reference to the Eurocentric attitudes of the dominant ?white? elites (an identity which will be reviewed later in this essay) at the time of independence from Spain, and the way that nationalism in Latin American states was {produced in dialogue with (and adjusted to) an international colonial capitalist order}. Therefore, the creation of Latin American national identity can be viewed as an attempt to introduce European values of {secularization, rationality and scientific progress} to continent largely populated by people, such as Indians and blacks, to whom such values were foreign, and which the elites regarded with {trepidation} (de la Cadena, 2001, p58). De la Cadena is therefore correct, as this attempt to associate nationalism with the implementation of an outward-orientated development model within a system which {organized profoundly hierarchical relations between Europe and the rest of the world} ? i.e. which designated Latin America as ?backwards? and needing to emulate models which had been successfully implemented elsewhere ? and which most people within the nation did not relate to, was in many ways paradoxical. Furthermore, there was the problem of how to create a national identity in a multi-cultural society. This has often been attempted by emphasizing the identity of the mestizo - a person of mixed of Spanish and Indian descent and therefore a bridge between these two identities which could unite them into one national one? or by redefining terms such as ?Indian? and ?white?.
One interesting relationship is that between the mestizo and the Indian. Mallon (1996, p172) describes how the perception of the mestizo could range from the {most abhorred and illegitimate representative of oppression, to the most promising and virile symbol of the ?new nation?}. While it may be true that throughout history and especially in the era of the Spanish Empire, amongst the white elites there was prejudice against people of mixed Indian and Spanish heritage, this essay will generally assess mestizaje as being something glorified and encouraged by the state in order to promote national unity, as this is the positions that comes across most clearly in all the readings used. This was in many ways an inclusive strategy, as it sought to integrate a larger bulk of the population into the political and economic life of the state. However, it can also be seen as a somewhat dishonest attempt to {(deny) colonial forms of racial/ethnic hierarchy and oppression by creating an intermediate subject and interpolating him/her as the citizen} (Mallon, 1996, p171). In this way, perceived differences between working class mestizo?s and the ?white? elite would be minimised, and the blame for the failures of the nation would be shifted onto the Indians, who would typically be viewed as backward, and actively choosing a life of Indian-ness as opposed to the respectable mestizaje they could achieve if they changed their behaviour to conform with the demands of the elite. In the context of Ecuador specifically, this signified a shift in the dominant national identity. It was a move away from the conservative construction of {a relatively unified national self? in opposition to an inferior indigenous other} (Crain, 1990, p46) which viewed society as rigidly stratified and aimed to keep different ?races? separate; a view which had much in common with the Spanish strategy during the early years of the Conquest, of granting Indians semi-autonomy via the establishment of , albeit under conditions which emphasised their position as {an inferior native labouring population} (Crain, 1990, p44). The change in direction signalled a new national identity which viewed {indigenous peasants as national subjects} and sought the {capitalist transformation of the countryside} (Crain, 1990, p48) via the creation of a {class of small-holding peasants} (Crain, 1990, p47). However, this new national identity, though potentially more inclusive, also had the potential to be more overtly exclusive, as, unlike the old system of stratification, it demanded that the Indians change, and would more specifically blame them for their own Indian-ness and for holding back the development of the nation if they didn?t. Stutzman relates an article where a General of the Ecuadorian army declared that anybody could be ?white? if they wanted; the condition being that they ?whiten? their behaviour. In this way, the mestizo is used as an ideal for the Indian to strive to (and a justification for the elites own claim to rule the country, as they too can claim to be mestizo and therefore no less indigenous than the Indians). In the words of Stutzman (1981, p83); {From the perspective of the mestizo nation, there is something seriously wrong with those who fail to assent to the goals and values of national culture?the logic of national culture would suggest, they must be sick}.
Crain (1990, p44) refers to the {imaginary Indian} which the political class in Latin America (in this case, Ecuador) sought to project in order to integrate the Indians more into Ecuadorian society and court their support. For example, the state established a National Institute of Cultural Patrimony which viewed Ecuador?s Indian population as part of the nation?s heritage. Such {public representations of the past} were an attempt to integrate Indians and make them feel valued as Ecuadorian?s. However, because they tried to reconcile Indian identity with a national project and encourage harmony between different groups, Crain criticises them as {(privileging) existing property arrangements that keep what they regard as ?their territory? in the hands of either the landed elite or the state}. Furthermore, this official view of the Indian in many ways seeks to idealise them and associate them with the past rather than the modern world; however, Indians would be unlikely to see themselves this way, or even as ?Indians?. For example, Crain (1990, p50) compares two separate cultural events; one is the national celebration of Indian music, while another is the performance of song and dance in an Indian village. She claims that {state-sponsored ?cultural productions are often devoid of any localized sense of identity} and are based on {representative sampling of groups of Indian musicians drawn from all over the country}. In contrast, {local performances of dance and song are rooted in specific communal traditions and embody a particular sense of place, thereby serving to re-enforce identities of community and kin}. Therefore, the state?s representation of and discourse with ?the Indian? is often seen as unauthentic, and it seeks to include the Indians by proclaiming them as part of the national heritage, yet it also simultaneously excludes them from modernity by representing them as such.
A similar problem faces anyone who seeks to unite an Indian nation. If all nations are social constructs which must be created through an arduous process, it will therefore be especially difficult to unite a ?nation? which is divided by borders and language as well as being interspersed, ruled over by, having mutually beneficial arrangements with, and in many cases related to, people who the nationalist seeks to define as separate to that nation. One group which tried this was the indigenistas; a group which Mallon (1996) views in the context of 1920?s Ecuador. These were left-wing intellectuals who claimed to fight for the political and economic rights of ?the Indian?, by viewing them as victims of capitalism and imperialism. The indigenistas {saw Indians and the self-defined ?gente decente? (white intellectuals) as the only proper ethnic/moral groups. Everyone else was potentially illegitimate, sexually suspect, and definitely mongrel: in short, ?mestizo?}(Mallon, 1996, p176). Therefore, again, we can see how identity was used to exclude as well as include. This indigenistas sought to give a voice to people who were usually ignored and discriminated against. However, they did this by pitting them against other groups who were also, in reality, discriminated against, such as the mestizo. The implications of this were not just worrying for mestizos, but also for Indians themselves, as {?indigenistas? implied that only the original and pure Inca tradition was ?really? Indian; contemporary Indians were in fact degenerated hybrids and needed to be redeemed. In their own claim to power and control as a regional elite, the ?indigenistas? thus suggested that only they, as gentlemen, could preserve and revindicate the original purity and dignity of Inca history and language, and only they could redeem the present day Indian}(Mallon, 1996, p176). Therefore, again, the identity being proposed was not the one of any Indian in Ecuador at the time, but rather, once more, of an ?imaginary Indian?. Again, therefore, any Indian who did not conform to this ideological project would be viewed as being insufficiently Indian, just as at other times they could be accused of being insufficiently Ecuadorian. However, the exclusion implicit in this Indian nationalism went further than that. It also sought to impose hierarchy against ?weak? or treacherous male Indians and was therefore very limiting towards the freedom of action of any particular Indian, in particular women, as I will now seek to demonstrate. For example, Mallon (1996, p176) tells how the indigenistas {glorified} Cori Ocllo, a young Indian woman at the time of the Spanish conquest who refused the advances of Spanish males. At the same time, they vilified Chimpu Ocllo, an Indian woman who had sexual relations with Spanish men. Mallon views this as a parallel with the view of Malinche, an Aztec woman who bore the child of Hernan Cortes, as ?La Chingada?; ?the one who got screwed?. The sexual overtones of the ?conquest? then are quite clear, and can be reproduced into the modern world as viewing any Indian (or, probably more realistically, and Indian woman) who chooses a ?white? man over an Indian, or any Indian who does any kind of political or business deal with a ?white?. Mallon elaborates on how a common insult used for such Indians is ?chocon?, i.e. a passive homosexual, and they are seen as being whores, like Chimpu Oclla, who are allowing not only themselves to be ?screwed?, but he whole Indian nation. Therefore this indigenista ideology bound Indians to their nationality and made assumptions about them, which could not be separated from negative assumptions about them as a defeated nation (even if the difference was that the mainstream view was that they should remain defeated, whilst this one proposed some kind of ?liberation). Also, the hatred of the mestizo betrays a hatred of the mixed society itself within which the Indians existed, and shows how, just as the Ecuadorian nationalists looked to idealised Europe and a sacred ?nation state? which they much create in their own land, the indigenistas had the same approach, but with the emphasis on an idealised Inca past and recreating the nation along those lines.
One last example of racial identity which should not be overlooked is the ?white? identity. De la Cadena (2001, p261) describes how her brown skin {?denies? and ?does not deny? (her) whiteness}; a reference to the fact that it shows she is not ?white? and therefore not a foreigner, but still potentially a ?Peruvian white? by having {elite education and ?proper birth?}. In this way, she describes the {notion of whiteness that was more than skin-deep, and therefore ?color??was the result of status, rather than its precondition} (De la Cadena, 2001, p260).Therefore Peruvian elites are described as {silencing whiteness} (De la Cadena, 2001, p261) as a biological feature, because it makes whites appear to be European, and therefore illegitimate Latin Americans. In this way, Latin American whites can claim to have earned their status and to have a truly ?national? identity, whilst at the same time using racial language to reinforce their perceived superiority over the non-whites. By associating the elites with the non-white population, this strategy seeks to legitimise their high status in relation to them.
In conclusion, this essay has sought to show how national, racial and ethnic identity in Latin America is a construct which has been used to unify certain people and guide them in a certain direction, while at the same time, implicitly or explicitly, excluding other people from this. This can be done by excluding them from the nation on the basis of their behaviour, or their social status, or simply their physical characteristics; but it is interesting the extent to which the first two are frequently linked in people?s minds and language to race itself. In this way, the interests of one ?nation? have continually been seen as contrasting with the interests of another, which either oppresses them from above or impedes their development from below. Furthermore, there is always the subtext that one who does not comply with the national project is an ?enemy within?. In this way, nationalism, race and ethnicity in Latin America have been used to unite large numbers of people whilst excluding others, and race itself has been used to give credence to nationalism in a region which perceives itself as being multi-cultural and multi-racial. Therefore, attempts to idealise either whiteness, or Indian-ness, or mestizaje have been commonplace, in order to lend a sense that the nation is bound by a common history and that its people have a common ancestry. Furthermore, by defining themselves in relation to a social group, a person can easily place themselves within a society. For example the Indian can claim to have a role as part of the nation?s heritage, the white as a ruler, the mestizo as the blend which represents the nation. However, that person can also suffer from identifying themselves in this was; for example the Indian can be seen as rooted in the past, the white as being a foreigner, and the mestizo as being a ?mongrel?, neither successful enough to be a white, nor as having the claim to being the authentic heir to the land which the Indian has.
Edit - having read that, I've realised I saved it in different places, and this is actually a slightly inferior version to the end essay. but the point is still basically the same. when I get onto the library computer I'll post the ammended conclusion though, which I think phrases things better.
According to anthropologists, ?nations? are social constructions, (just like race, gender and other identities). Using the following case-studies, explore the relationship between the construction of national identities and racial and ethnic identities in Latin America.
Latin America was created by the Spanish, Portuguese and French conquests beginning with the arrival of Columbus at the end of the 15th century. This brought into contact two worlds ? the indigenous and the European . Since then, various parts of the region have experienced influxes of European immigration and transportation of black slaves , as well as immigration from other parts of the world such as the Middle East. The way these different cultures have interacted has helped shape the culture of the region as a whole. Furthermore, Latin America is divided into various nation-states. The way that different races and cultures in each state have interacted, as well the way each state has interacted with the different cultures within it and with other states, has all helped shape the culture (or cultures) of each state, and that of the region as a whole. However, it is too simplistic to see the region as just a product of interaction and intermixing between different races and cultures. If nations and races are social constructs, then identity is just something different people use for different purposes at different times, and it is continually being redefined. This essay will seek to explore some examples of this. Specifically, what I am interested in is the way that national or racial identity has been used simultaneously to include and exclude people, how it {can both undermine and empower} (Karam, 2004, p339), as this is a theme which runs through all of the readings mentioned.
Normally, one would assume that in any society, the ?hegemonic? identity would be the national identity, and that other identities would be defined in relation to this. Therefore, it would be impossible to answer this question without first giving an overview of the idea of the role of national identity in Latin America. De la Cadena (2001, p258) describes Latin American nationalism as a {quasi-oxymoronic venture}. This is a reference to the Eurocentric attitudes of the dominant ?white? elites (an identity which will be reviewed later in this essay) at the time of independence from Spain, and the way that nationalism in Latin American states was {produced in dialogue with (and adjusted to) an international colonial capitalist order}. Therefore, the creation of Latin American national identity can be viewed as an attempt to introduce European values of {secularization, rationality and scientific progress} to continent largely populated by people, such as Indians and blacks, to whom such values were foreign, and which the elites regarded with {trepidation} (de la Cadena, 2001, p58). De la Cadena is therefore correct, as this attempt to associate nationalism with the implementation of an outward-orientated development model within a system which {organized profoundly hierarchical relations between Europe and the rest of the world} ? i.e. which designated Latin America as ?backwards? and needing to emulate models which had been successfully implemented elsewhere ? and which most people within the nation did not relate to, was in many ways paradoxical. Furthermore, there was the problem of how to create a national identity in a multi-cultural society. This has often been attempted by emphasizing the identity of the mestizo - a person of mixed of Spanish and Indian descent and therefore a bridge between these two identities which could unite them into one national one? or by redefining terms such as ?Indian? and ?white?.
One interesting relationship is that between the mestizo and the Indian. Mallon (1996, p172) describes how the perception of the mestizo could range from the {most abhorred and illegitimate representative of oppression, to the most promising and virile symbol of the ?new nation?}. While it may be true that throughout history and especially in the era of the Spanish Empire, amongst the white elites there was prejudice against people of mixed Indian and Spanish heritage, this essay will generally assess mestizaje as being something glorified and encouraged by the state in order to promote national unity, as this is the positions that comes across most clearly in all the readings used. This was in many ways an inclusive strategy, as it sought to integrate a larger bulk of the population into the political and economic life of the state. However, it can also be seen as a somewhat dishonest attempt to {(deny) colonial forms of racial/ethnic hierarchy and oppression by creating an intermediate subject and interpolating him/her as the citizen} (Mallon, 1996, p171). In this way, perceived differences between working class mestizo?s and the ?white? elite would be minimised, and the blame for the failures of the nation would be shifted onto the Indians, who would typically be viewed as backward, and actively choosing a life of Indian-ness as opposed to the respectable mestizaje they could achieve if they changed their behaviour to conform with the demands of the elite. In the context of Ecuador specifically, this signified a shift in the dominant national identity. It was a move away from the conservative construction of {a relatively unified national self? in opposition to an inferior indigenous other} (Crain, 1990, p46) which viewed society as rigidly stratified and aimed to keep different ?races? separate; a view which had much in common with the Spanish strategy during the early years of the Conquest, of granting Indians semi-autonomy via the establishment of , albeit under conditions which emphasised their position as {an inferior native labouring population} (Crain, 1990, p44). The change in direction signalled a new national identity which viewed {indigenous peasants as national subjects} and sought the {capitalist transformation of the countryside} (Crain, 1990, p48) via the creation of a {class of small-holding peasants} (Crain, 1990, p47). However, this new national identity, though potentially more inclusive, also had the potential to be more overtly exclusive, as, unlike the old system of stratification, it demanded that the Indians change, and would more specifically blame them for their own Indian-ness and for holding back the development of the nation if they didn?t. Stutzman relates an article where a General of the Ecuadorian army declared that anybody could be ?white? if they wanted; the condition being that they ?whiten? their behaviour. In this way, the mestizo is used as an ideal for the Indian to strive to (and a justification for the elites own claim to rule the country, as they too can claim to be mestizo and therefore no less indigenous than the Indians). In the words of Stutzman (1981, p83); {From the perspective of the mestizo nation, there is something seriously wrong with those who fail to assent to the goals and values of national culture?the logic of national culture would suggest, they must be sick}.
Crain (1990, p44) refers to the {imaginary Indian} which the political class in Latin America (in this case, Ecuador) sought to project in order to integrate the Indians more into Ecuadorian society and court their support. For example, the state established a National Institute of Cultural Patrimony which viewed Ecuador?s Indian population as part of the nation?s heritage. Such {public representations of the past} were an attempt to integrate Indians and make them feel valued as Ecuadorian?s. However, because they tried to reconcile Indian identity with a national project and encourage harmony between different groups, Crain criticises them as {(privileging) existing property arrangements that keep what they regard as ?their territory? in the hands of either the landed elite or the state}. Furthermore, this official view of the Indian in many ways seeks to idealise them and associate them with the past rather than the modern world; however, Indians would be unlikely to see themselves this way, or even as ?Indians?. For example, Crain (1990, p50) compares two separate cultural events; one is the national celebration of Indian music, while another is the performance of song and dance in an Indian village. She claims that {state-sponsored ?cultural productions are often devoid of any localized sense of identity} and are based on {representative sampling of groups of Indian musicians drawn from all over the country}. In contrast, {local performances of dance and song are rooted in specific communal traditions and embody a particular sense of place, thereby serving to re-enforce identities of community and kin}. Therefore, the state?s representation of and discourse with ?the Indian? is often seen as unauthentic, and it seeks to include the Indians by proclaiming them as part of the national heritage, yet it also simultaneously excludes them from modernity by representing them as such.
A similar problem faces anyone who seeks to unite an Indian nation. If all nations are social constructs which must be created through an arduous process, it will therefore be especially difficult to unite a ?nation? which is divided by borders and language as well as being interspersed, ruled over by, having mutually beneficial arrangements with, and in many cases related to, people who the nationalist seeks to define as separate to that nation. One group which tried this was the indigenistas; a group which Mallon (1996) views in the context of 1920?s Ecuador. These were left-wing intellectuals who claimed to fight for the political and economic rights of ?the Indian?, by viewing them as victims of capitalism and imperialism. The indigenistas {saw Indians and the self-defined ?gente decente? (white intellectuals) as the only proper ethnic/moral groups. Everyone else was potentially illegitimate, sexually suspect, and definitely mongrel: in short, ?mestizo?}(Mallon, 1996, p176). Therefore, again, we can see how identity was used to exclude as well as include. This indigenistas sought to give a voice to people who were usually ignored and discriminated against. However, they did this by pitting them against other groups who were also, in reality, discriminated against, such as the mestizo. The implications of this were not just worrying for mestizos, but also for Indians themselves, as {?indigenistas? implied that only the original and pure Inca tradition was ?really? Indian; contemporary Indians were in fact degenerated hybrids and needed to be redeemed. In their own claim to power and control as a regional elite, the ?indigenistas? thus suggested that only they, as gentlemen, could preserve and revindicate the original purity and dignity of Inca history and language, and only they could redeem the present day Indian}(Mallon, 1996, p176). Therefore, again, the identity being proposed was not the one of any Indian in Ecuador at the time, but rather, once more, of an ?imaginary Indian?. Again, therefore, any Indian who did not conform to this ideological project would be viewed as being insufficiently Indian, just as at other times they could be accused of being insufficiently Ecuadorian. However, the exclusion implicit in this Indian nationalism went further than that. It also sought to impose hierarchy against ?weak? or treacherous male Indians and was therefore very limiting towards the freedom of action of any particular Indian, in particular women, as I will now seek to demonstrate. For example, Mallon (1996, p176) tells how the indigenistas {glorified} Cori Ocllo, a young Indian woman at the time of the Spanish conquest who refused the advances of Spanish males. At the same time, they vilified Chimpu Ocllo, an Indian woman who had sexual relations with Spanish men. Mallon views this as a parallel with the view of Malinche, an Aztec woman who bore the child of Hernan Cortes, as ?La Chingada?; ?the one who got screwed?. The sexual overtones of the ?conquest? then are quite clear, and can be reproduced into the modern world as viewing any Indian (or, probably more realistically, and Indian woman) who chooses a ?white? man over an Indian, or any Indian who does any kind of political or business deal with a ?white?. Mallon elaborates on how a common insult used for such Indians is ?chocon?, i.e. a passive homosexual, and they are seen as being whores, like Chimpu Oclla, who are allowing not only themselves to be ?screwed?, but he whole Indian nation. Therefore this indigenista ideology bound Indians to their nationality and made assumptions about them, which could not be separated from negative assumptions about them as a defeated nation (even if the difference was that the mainstream view was that they should remain defeated, whilst this one proposed some kind of ?liberation). Also, the hatred of the mestizo betrays a hatred of the mixed society itself within which the Indians existed, and shows how, just as the Ecuadorian nationalists looked to idealised Europe and a sacred ?nation state? which they much create in their own land, the indigenistas had the same approach, but with the emphasis on an idealised Inca past and recreating the nation along those lines.
One last example of racial identity which should not be overlooked is the ?white? identity. De la Cadena (2001, p261) describes how her brown skin {?denies? and ?does not deny? (her) whiteness}; a reference to the fact that it shows she is not ?white? and therefore not a foreigner, but still potentially a ?Peruvian white? by having {elite education and ?proper birth?}. In this way, she describes the {notion of whiteness that was more than skin-deep, and therefore ?color??was the result of status, rather than its precondition} (De la Cadena, 2001, p260).Therefore Peruvian elites are described as {silencing whiteness} (De la Cadena, 2001, p261) as a biological feature, because it makes whites appear to be European, and therefore illegitimate Latin Americans. In this way, Latin American whites can claim to have earned their status and to have a truly ?national? identity, whilst at the same time using racial language to reinforce their perceived superiority over the non-whites. By associating the elites with the non-white population, this strategy seeks to legitimise their high status in relation to them.
In conclusion, this essay has sought to show how national, racial and ethnic identity in Latin America is a construct which has been used to unify certain people and guide them in a certain direction, while at the same time, implicitly or explicitly, excluding other people from this. This can be done by excluding them from the nation on the basis of their behaviour, or their social status, or simply their physical characteristics; but it is interesting the extent to which the first two are frequently linked in people?s minds and language to race itself. In this way, the interests of one ?nation? have continually been seen as contrasting with the interests of another, which either oppresses them from above or impedes their development from below. Furthermore, there is always the subtext that one who does not comply with the national project is an ?enemy within?. In this way, nationalism, race and ethnicity in Latin America have been used to unite large numbers of people whilst excluding others, and race itself has been used to give credence to nationalism in a region which perceives itself as being multi-cultural and multi-racial. Therefore, attempts to idealise either whiteness, or Indian-ness, or mestizaje have been commonplace, in order to lend a sense that the nation is bound by a common history and that its people have a common ancestry. Furthermore, by defining themselves in relation to a social group, a person can easily place themselves within a society. For example the Indian can claim to have a role as part of the nation?s heritage, the white as a ruler, the mestizo as the blend which represents the nation. However, that person can also suffer from identifying themselves in this was; for example the Indian can be seen as rooted in the past, the white as being a foreigner, and the mestizo as being a ?mongrel?, neither successful enough to be a white, nor as having the claim to being the authentic heir to the land which the Indian has.
Edit - having read that, I've realised I saved it in different places, and this is actually a slightly inferior version to the end essay. but the point is still basically the same. when I get onto the library computer I'll post the ammended conclusion though, which I think phrases things better.