Research on Humanities and Social Sciences www.iiste.org ISSN (Paper)2224-5766 ISSN (Online)2225-0484 (Online) Vol.6, No.2, 2016 145 Ethnicity, Ethnic Minority and Self-Determination: An Examination of Conceptual Linkage Mohammad Agus Yusoff 1* & Athambawa Sarjoon 1 & 2 1 School of History, Politics and Strategic Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia,43600 UKM Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia 2 Department of Political Science, University of Peradeniya, Peradeniya-20400, Sri Lanka Abstract The concepts of ethnicity, ethnic minority and self-determination have gained such a vital importance as an integral part of ethnic and minority politics of the contemporary world. The major objective of this paper is to identify the conceptual linkage and relations between “ethnicity”, “ethnic minority” and the minorities’ claims for “self-determination” through an extensive analysis of the existing definitions, interpretations and criticisms to the above concepts. The analysis of these concepts reveals that the concept of ethnicity, ethnic minority and self- determination are interconnected each other and have gained prime importance in the politics of minority groups for ethnic identity construction, self-determination claims and ethno-nationalist discourses. Key Words: Ethnicity, ethnic minority, ethnic group, self-determination, conceptualization 1. Introduction The concepts of ethnicity, minority, and self-determination have an interconnected relationship and play vital roles in the contemporary discourses of ethnic conflict and ethnic politics. They are controversial and often understood differently by different parties in different contexts. They evoke different responses too. The main focus of this paper is to conceptualize the above concepts with the existing definitions, theoretical arguments and criticisms. For this, an extensive analysis of the relationships between the concepts “ethnicity”, “ethnic minority”, “majority-minority (or state-minority) relations”, and minority’s claims for “self-determination” is made to understand the interconnected linkages. Further, a specific focus has been given to the historical context of the claims for self-determination by the minorities. The nature of analysis of these concepts is descriptive and interpretive. Also, this paper has adopted only the secondary dada for its analysis. 2. Concept of Ethnicity Ethnicity is a pivotal and broader concept covering variety of factors such as race, language, color and culture in social and political theories revealing practically pertinent in the post-colonial era. These markers of social distinctions have become the basis of ethnic group’s identity and play specific roles in their political process. The ethnicity is constructed on one or more of the primordial features such as religion, language, race, or caste. In many plural societies, these features were used as the inherent unifying element of ethnic groups. Ethnicity is a term that has been used increasingly since the 1960s to account for human variation in terms of culture, tradition, language, social patterns, and ancestry. It refers to the fusion of many traits that belong to the nature of any ethnic group: shared values, beliefs, norms, tastes, behaviors, experiences, and consciousness of group, memories and loyalties. Therefore, a person’s ethnic group is such a powerful identifier because it cannot be denied, rejected or taken away by others (Ashcroft et.al, 2000). Ethnicity is defined as thought and action stemming from identification with a community of putatively shared ancestry that exceeds the scale of face-to-face community (gemeinschaft in German). Cultural markers like language, religion, customs and phenotype (or “race”) are used by ethnies to demarcate their boundaries, so ethnic groups need to possess at least one diacritical marker (Note 1). However, the changing nature of the criteria poses difficulties in defining “ethnicity.” Indeed, there is still not a working definition to “ethnicity” and the concept has been used in variety of ways depending upon the various purposes for which the group has been identified. Therefore, not every ethnic group will possess all the possible traits, but all will display various combinations of them to varying degrees. Kellas (1998:6) defines ethnicity as “state of being ethnic or belonging to an ethnic group.” Hutchinson & Smith (1996:8) treat ethnicity as “a social and cultural resource for different interests and status groups.” Eriksen (2002:12) finds ethnicity as an aspect of social relationship between agents who consider themselves as culturally distinctive from members of other groups with they have a minimum of regular interaction. Therefore, ethnicity to come about, the group must have a minimum contact with each other, and they must entertain ideas