نشریه مطالعات ملی
سال هشتم شماره 2 (پیاپی 30، تابستان 1386)

The present article is a brief report of the results of a broader research on language planning and national awareness in Iran. The hypothesis of the research is that "identity" is a complex phenomenon, consisting of several interrelated components. One of the main components of Iranian national identity is Persian Language. The main questions of this article are the followings: What are the components of Iranian national identity regarding the attitudes of Iranians? Among these components, what status does Persian Language have? How does the speakers' age and occupational status affect their attitudes towards Persian's status as a symbol of national identity? The speakers' attitudes have been assessed by distributing questionnaires among 826 Iranians residing in Tehran. The collected data have been analyzed using different statistic methods. The results of the research demonstrates that Iranians consider the following items as components of their national identity: culture (customs, clothing, food, beliefs ...), behavioral habits (both good and bad ones), Iranian certificate, ancient monuments, Iranian myths, ancient and contemporary athletics, religion, ethnicity, national anthem, geography and locations, economy, arts, Persian Language, literature, science and industry, history and civilization, Iranian famous figures, politics and flag. It seems that Persian Language is among the most important components of Iranian national identity for its speakers. The two variables "age" and "occupational status" seems to affect people's attitudes towards Persian's Language status among other Iranian national identity components. Therefore, it can be concluded that identity is a dynamic phenomenon which partially depends on age and occupational status of the speakers.

Proverbs are the subcategory of the people’s culture and the people’s culture is one of the important elements that form identity. Becuase of the role importance of proverbs in forming identity and reflecting the people’s culture in making the personal and social identity, they are an important topic in studies concerning national identity. This research wants to show what is the role of proverbs in reflecting and supporting the national identity? To answer this question among different components of identity, we chose two components to analyze proverbs on the basis of these two categories: 1- National components include: country, language, fable, traditions and nations 2- Religious componets include: signs&traditions, terms, concepts, ceremonies & deeds, religious names and places and concepts. After theoretical introduction of the discussion, we chose twelve proofs of national and religious identity among one hundred thousand Persian proverbs that are being published to classify and categorize them and to show their reflections in the proverbs. These studies show in the area of national components 1538 proverbs and religius components 6800 proverbs, there are 8338 proverbs in all that allude to the national and religious subject directly. These numbers insist on this important point that proverbs are the mirror of culture and people’s thoughts and include their experimental wisdom that derive from two important religious and national resources.These two from 8.5% of total number of Persian proverbs and this bulk is the sign of people’s attention to their national and religious identity.

Mirth (Cheerfulness) in the sense of dependency on one’s self and others and a movement toward one’s cheerful end and a kind of adjustment of the life flow to human needs is considered as a God’s gift and one of the principles of Iranian identity. Therefore, to analyze and describe it in different periods of Iranian culture and literature, one is supposed to study and consider the socio-political condition, lifestyle and the command rituals and tradition (customs) of each specific period. The primary concern of the present article is to study and elaborate on the afformentioned points, the quality and the kind of mirth and cheerfulness from pre-Islamic period. (before the outbreak of Islam) to the era of Hāfez. As a result, three types of mirth and cheerfulness such as worldly, internal (self-related) and worldly-internal are at centre of discussions, of different periods. Emphasizing on the contemporary socio-political conditions, rituals, customs and traditions, the impact of these three kinds of mirth and cheerfulness on the prominent post of each period was analyzed and delineated.

Iranians have had deep relations with different people of the world since long time ago. Due to this aspect and in order to promote the ancient culture and civilization of Iran they started to travel to dangerous areas in the then known world. These immigrations which we have faced during the history of Iran oftenly have had very successful results. Therefor since then there are traces of culture and cvilization of Iran in different parts of the world. Historical migration of some Shirazids to the coasts and islands of East Africa (around one thousand year ago) under the surveillence of one Iranian prince is one of the best travels for this purpose. These migrators who settled permanently in a vast area in some part of east and southern East Africa gradually established friendly relations with indigenous peoples and after sometimes publicized culture and civilization of Iran to some parts of then Tanzania, Kenya and Comore. In this article some components of Iranian civilization such as celebration of Nowruz, penetration of Persian words to Kiswahili Language, the prevalence of solar clendar, Iranian architecture style and ... which has been penetrated to the culture of East Africa permanently would be reviewed.

This article examines the relation between football and national identity. After a definition of identity and its aspects, there is a discussion about football’s effect on national belongings in Iran and other countries. These effects could be seen in local identities, too. Interaction between football and political system, conflicts between national and global identities in football players also typology of this matter have been discussed in this article.

The purpose of the present article is to analyze the collective and individual religious behaviour of students. This study used the survey research method and way of sampling in multy-steps sample. The statistical population have been 1145 students. The results show that, fasting, shiring, participation in Moharam ritual paid little attention and religious behaviors such as prayer, reading Quran, participation in collective prayer have a good situation moreover, th strict study states other foundings in term of individual family and educational features.

The purpose of this research is to study the "identity crisis" among high school students in Lar and the factors affecting on it in 1384-85. The identity crisis talks about a kind of instability and ambiguity on the basis of definition of the individual concerning how recognizes himself and his being and due to that, he is not able to answer such question as "who am I?" and ''what do I want?" In this research, the theories derived from gestalt psychological school, development psychological school, symbolic interaction school and also Erikson's and Stryker's theories have been analyzed, then on the basis of them all, the model of this research presented. The answer to the basic question of "who am I?" represents the cognition aspect of forming identity process and the respond to the "what do I want?" is to be the value aspect of such a process. The data are collected by survey and by use of interviews and questionnaire technique. The population contains the high school students in Lar. Calculation size of sample is 260. All variables included in regression equation analysis, could explain 0.4 variance of cognition aspect and 0.5 variance of value aspect of identity crisis.