Analyzing the Relationship between National Identity and Ethnic Identity with emphasis on the role of Religiosity: the Case of High-School Students of Yasuj

Introduction Nowadays, with the development of mass media and the universalization of culture, the decreasing effect and the shivering position of governments as the most important players of the world after the Cold War, has become one of the most important concerns of politicians and statesmen National identity defines one of the chief and widest rings of our what-ness and who-ness in the modern era, and modifies both the universalistic and particularistic extremities like a communicative vessel. Effective factors on national identity can be analyzed along two intersecting axes of external (supra- national factors) /internal (sub- national factors) as well as centrifugal (sense of deprivation) and centripetal (common culture and religion) forces. In recent years, one of the most important foundational changes in history has been the alteration of the relationship between religion and collective identities. During the Enlightenment to the last decades of the 20th century, many scientists, under the radiance of secularization theories, believed that modernism and developments in literacy would lead to the limitation of religious influence on the realm of private life and the destruction of the collective correlation function of religion. Today, with the collapse of communism and the emergence of new countries out of it, whose national identities are often based on religion, as well as the noticeable inauguration of religious movements worldwide, the effect and importance of religion has steadily attracted attention in the manifestation of collective interactions and social unity or collapse.   Material & Methods We assumed that religion, as one of the chief factors in attaching the ethnic group of Lors to the bigger Iranian community, can prepare the background for their sense of belonging and unity with the bigger community to a great extent. In other words, according to the religious comm:union: between the Lors and the bigger Iranian community, religion was assumed as one of the chief centripetal forces among the Lors, which can prepare the background for the cultural unity of the Iranian community. The society under study was the high-school students of Yasuj in which over 90 percent of the population belong to Lor ethnicity. The method undertaken was quantitative and surveying, and the data was collected via the questionnaire. Independent and dependant variables of the study were ethnic identity and national identity, respectively. The religiosity variable (in the form of the four-dimensional belief, affection, rite, and consequence) was assumed to be the modifying variable in the relationship between these two collective identities.   Discussion of Results & Conclusions According to the results, of the dimensions of religiosity, only correlation between the consequential dimension and national identity was meaningful and positive. Also, correlation between all dimensions of religiosity and national identity was meaningful and positive. Besides, the amount of the correlation between dimensions of religiosity and national identity was more than that of the correlation between the consequential dimension and ethnic identity. In accordance with the results of the detailed correlation test, the correlation between the two variables of ethnic and national identities decreased, after controlling the effect of the dimensions of religiosity (0.02 percent which is not considerable). Based on the results from regression, it can be said that the two dimension of belief and consequence, respectively, as the most influential dimensions of religiosity variable, could determine 14 percent of the variance of the national identity. The results of the study indicate that religion, as one of the most important cultural capitals of Lor people, has had a great influence on attaching them to the bigger Iranian community. But according to the measure of the mutual correlation, the detailed correlation coefficient, and regression results, there should be no exaggeration about the influence and no neglect for other influential factors on the social and cultural unity of the Lor people with the bigger society. &nbsp