Birds as political and ethnic symbols

Butter — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 16:12:57 +0000

You know what I like? Flags. They’re just symbols, of course, and like frackin’ crackers, they aren’t particularly special by themselves, and their maltreatment can breach dams of pent-up emotions and irrationality and make life unpleasant for all involved. But I still like the craft involved in encapsulating a bit of the culture or history of a group of people, or the geography or general look and ambience of a place, and making it look sober, compelling, even awe-inspiring—or at least not completely superfluous and trite.

It’s interesting that in the pursuit of these goals, it’s common to use images of birds. So as a bit of geopolitical education, and just for fun, here are some of my favorite bird-bearing flags of the world. Note the absence of any of the upright, stylized heraldic eagles with straggly feathers; see the flags of Germany (specifically, the state flag), Albania, Montenegro, Poland, and Austria for examples. They’re quite dignified and possessed of storied histories, no doubt (the two-headed ones in Eastern Europe come from the Holy Roman Empire, for example), and they’re quite impressive, but they’re everywhere, and really, after several hundred years they’re getting a tad stale. The Avian class has more emblematical potential than that:

National Flags

*Dominica*. Badge displays the endemic endangered Sisserou Parrot. An IUCN estimate has 150 individuals left alive.

*Kazakhstan*. Charged with a Golden Eagle, a traditional symbol of Kazakh tribes.

*Uganda*. Charged with the Grey Crowned Crane, the badge under British rule. The bird is native to sub-Saharan Africa.

*Papua New Guinea*. Charged with a Raggiana Bird of Paradise in the fly. The bird is common on New Guinea.

*Kiribati.* Charged with a Great Frigatebird above the waves. The bird is common in the tropical areas of the Pacific and Atlantic.

*Guatemala.* Coat of arms includes a Resplendent Quetzal perching on a bayoneted rifle. The bird is found only in Central America and is listed by the IUCN as Near Threatened, mainly because of deforestation.

Many more examples can be found if we examine subnational units, such as states, provinces, and municipalities; these will follow in a later post.

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Image credits: All flag images retrieved from Wikipedia. Sisserou Parrot: Retrieved from http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/tt/11e/ Golden Eagle: Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:GoldenEagle2.jpg Grey Crowned Crane: Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Grey_Crowned_Crane_7.jpg Licence: GNU v. 1.2. Raggiana Bird of Paradise: Retrieved from http://calphotos.berkeley.edu © 2007 John White. Great Frigatebird: Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Male_great_frigatebird.JPG License: Public domain. Resplendent Quetzal: Retrieved from http://www.sigmatecc.com.mx/063054/Contenido/TablaPlantillaAve.html

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Birds as political and ethnic symbols