Roza Meuleman

To whom do national days matter? A comparison of national belonging across generations and ethnic groups in the Netherlands

This paper studies to what extent participating in days for national commemoration and celebration is associated with feelings of national belonging, and to what extent this is comparable across generations and ethnic groups. Utilizing data from a national survey (N = 4,505), three major national days in the Netherlands are examined. We find that whereas participation in Queens Day is associated with national belonging for all generations, for Remembrance Day this holds only for the generation born between 1945 and 1955, and for Liberation Day for the generations born after 1955. Moreover, for citizens with a non-Western origin, participating in national days is associated with national belonging more strongly than for citizens with a native Dutch or other Western background. These findings highlight the importance of paying attention to potential group differences in the association between participation in national days and feelings of national belonging.

Parental socialization and the consumption of domestic films, books and music

By innovatively combining insights from research on cultural consumption, socialization and nationalism, this study is one of the first empirical studies to shed more light on role of parental socialization in domestic and foreign cultural consumption of films, books and music. Similar to previous studies on parental socialization of highbrow and lowbrow cultural consumption, parents’ cultural socialization when respondents were in their formative years (i.e. parental domestic cultural consumption) is relevant for respondents’ domestic and foreign cultural consumption later in life. Parents’ national behaviour during their children’s formative years is related to the respondents’ positive nationalist attitudes, which, in turn, is associated with respondents’ domestic film and music consumption. Parental socialization plays a less important role in domestic book consumption, indicating that in less diverse cultural markets, other socialization influences (such as school) might be playing a role as well. Adding to the debate on the influence of parental socialization over the life course, we found indications that the effects of parental socialization on domestic consumption were weaker for older compared to younger people. This suggests the importance of parental socialization and the varying ways in which it is associated with domestic cultural consumption.

'Oranje Boven': Vieren en herdenken in vrijheid

By ways of national celebrations and commemorations national cohesion is believed to be enlarged. It is unknown however who participates in these activities. In this contribution we address the question to what extent socialization by the parents and schools, and integration into religious organizations affect participation in national celebrations and commemorations. We also hypothesize that this form of national participation is affected by one’s nationalistic attitudes. Our findings show that these forms of participation are affected by patriotic attitudes, and not by chauvinistic attitudes. Moreover, parental examples are crucial for participation in the national celebrations and commemorations. Schooling and religiosity only affect specific forms of national celebrations and commemorations. Patriotic attitudes do not provide an interpretation for the effects from parents, schools and churches. The strong effect of parental transmission is neither moderated by the socializing role of the school, nor by integration into religious organizations