ABSTRACT
Corsica became part of France in 1768 (ceded by Genoa). Situated some 200 km south-east of the mainland, the Mediterranean island has a distinctive and unique identity in French culture. Representations of Corsica are contrasting. Known as ‘the Island of Beauty’, it is renowned for its picturesque scenery and tourist attractions but the underdevelopment of its economy and the persistence of social problems also serve to fuel feelings of isolation from mainland France. Indeed, Corsican difference is a given. Half of the population speak the Corsican language (in addition to French) while a significant percentage of the island’s 260,000 inhabitants retains separatist ambitions and, in the second half of the twentieth century, these were even expressed in terrorist campaigns, both on the island itself and on the mainland, led primarily by the Fronte di Liberazione Naziunale di a Corsica (FLNC), which has allegedly been responsible for thousands of attacks since its creation in 1976 including the assassination in 1998 of Claude Erignac, the Prefect of Corsica (the most senior representative of the French government on the island). Demands for independence or, at least, a form of autonomy punctuated the late twentieth century and kept ‘the Corsican question’ (Crettiez 1999) on the agenda of a country constantly searching for the best way to balance its political status as a unitary (and, until recently, highly centralized) state with its socio-cultural nature marked by the considerable regional diversity that is a legacy of its lengthy history.
