Oriol Pi-Sunyer

Acculturation as an Explanatory Concept in Spanish History

This essay can best be considered an anthropological venture in the field of recent and contemporary Spanish historiography. Our aim is twofold: an understanding of the nature of Spanish historical interpretation as it is elaborated by national historians; the examination of certain phases of intercultural contact critical in the formation of a distinct Spanish cultural form.

Elites and Noncorporate Groups in the European Mediterranean: a Reconsideration of the Catalan Case

In a recent article in this journal, Peter Schneider, Jane Schneider and Edward Hansen (1972) examine the role of regional elites and noncorporate groups in the European Mediterranean and proceed to elaborate a model that should allow us to understand more clearly the dynamics of social and economic change in underdeveloped peripheral regions. The two areas which they have selected for detailed consideration, and which consequently form the empirical basis for a model of broader applicability, are Western Sicily and Catalonia. Sicily I know only from the literature, but my impression is that it can more realistically be regarded as an underdeveloped peripheral region with the structural attributes described and analyzed by the authors. Catalonia, though, is a different matter, and it is to the Catalan case that I will be addressing myself.

The Academy as Marketplace

As the university becomes tied to the world of work, the professor - at least in the natural and some of the social sciences - takes on the characteristics of an entrepreneur. (Clark Kerr, quoted in Harrington 1969: 142)