scispace - formally typeset
Search or ask a question
Book

Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism

TL;DR: In this paper, Anderson examines the creation and global spread of the 'imagined communities' of nationality and explores the processes that created these communities: the territorialisation of religious faiths, the decline of antique kingship, the interaction between capitalism and print, the development of vernacular languages-of-state, and changing conceptions of time.
Abstract: What makes people love and die for nations, as well as hate and kill in their name? While many studies have been written on nationalist political movements, the sense of nationality - the personal and cultural feeling of belonging to the nation - has not received proportionate attention. In this widely acclaimed work, Benedict Anderson examines the creation and global spread of the 'imagined communities' of nationality. Anderson explores the processes that created these communities: the territorialisation of religious faiths, the decline of antique kingship, the interaction between capitalism and print, the development of vernacular languages-of-state, and changing conceptions of time. He shows how an originary nationalism born in the Americas was modularly adopted by popular movements in Europe, by the imperialist powers, and by the anti-imperialist resistances in Asia and Africa. This revised edition includes two new chapters, one of which discusses the complex role of the colonialist state's mindset in the development of Third World nationalism, while the other analyses the processes by which all over the world, nations came to imagine themselves as old.
Citations
More filters
Proceedings Article
20 May 2012
TL;DR: For example, this article found that, much like individuals in real-life communities, social brokers are opinion leaders who tweet about diverse topics, have geographically wide networks, and express not only positive but also negative emotions.
Abstract: Debate is open as to whether social media communities resemble real-life communities, and to what extent. We contribute to this discussion by testing whether established sociological theories of real-life networks hold in Twitter. In particular, for 228,359 Twitter profiles, we compute network metrics (e.g., reciprocity, structural holes, simmelian ties) that the sociological literature has found to be related to parts of one's social world (i.e., to topics, geography and emotions), and test whether these real-life associations still hold in Twitter. We find that, much like individuals in real-life communities, social brokers (those who span structural holes) are opinion leaders who tweet about diverse topics, have geographically wide networks, and express not only positive but also negative emotions. Furthermore, Twitter users who express positive (negative) emotions cluster together, to the extent of having a correlation coefficient between one's emotions and those of friends as high as 0.45. Understanding Twitter's social dynamics does not only have theoretical implications for studies of social networks but also has practical implications, including the design of self-reflecting user interfaces that make people aware of their emotions, spam detection tools, and effective marketing campaigns.

121 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
24 Apr 2009-Compare
TL;DR: This article explored the paradoxical role of and demand for English as a tool of decolonization for multilingual populations seeking equitable access to a globalizing economy, and depicted tensions between multilingualism and English across three national cases, at both policy and classroom level.
Abstract: This paper explores tensions in translating multilingual language policy to classroom linguistic practice, and especially the paradoxical role of and demand for English as a tool of decolonization for multilingual populations seeking equitable access to a globalizing economy. We take an ecological and sociolinguistic approach, depicting tensions between multilingualism and English across three national cases, at both policy and classroom level. Despite India's egalitarian Three Language Formula (TLF) of 1968, many Indian children are being educated in a language which is not their mother tongue. Singapore's bilingual education policy with English medium of instruction and mother tongues taught as second languages nevertheless leaves the linguistic capital of multilingual children who speak a pidginized variety of English called ‘Singlish’ out of the equation, since the school medium is standard English. South Africa's Constitution of 1993 embraces multilingualism as a national resource, raising nine major...

121 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the major aspects of the SpanisheMoroccan rebordering since Spain joined the European Union in 1986 are analyzed, focusing on the geopolitical, functional, and symbolic aspects.

121 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Westphalian system of sovereign nation-states is being challenged as national administrations lose their ''gate-keeper-role'' between domestic and international politics as mentioned in this paper. But what kind of politic...
Abstract: The Westphalian system of sovereign nation-states is being challenged as national administrations lose their `gate-keeper-role' between domestic and international politics. But what kind of politic...

121 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors argue that the main lines of division in explanations of nationalism reflect the differential privileging of one view of the significance of territory, and one practice of territoriality over the other, and that neither nationalist ideology nor practice can be understood without reference to the spatial powers which it mobilises and creates.
Abstract: This article is a response to growing recognition that the role of territory has been neglected in recent explorations of nationalism. To improve understanding of how and why territory has been significant to the development of nationalist thought, this article advances two closely related arguments. The first is that the ideology of nationalism is, itself, a product of attempts to merge two very different views about the value of territory and, consequently, two different practices of territoriality. Secondly, I argue that the main lines of division in explanations of nationalism reflect the differential privileging of one view of the significance of territory, and one practice of territoriality, over the other. To substantiate these assertions, the article begins by identifying the latent powers of space and outlining the process of territoriality that allows human beings to harness these powers. This is followed by a discussion of how nationalism – as part of the shift to modernity – contributed to a major transformation in the general significance of territory and territoriality. Drawing on both pre–modern and modern views, the article demonstrates how different understandings of the significance of territory and territoriality help to define the spectrum of nationalist thought that has emerged from the eighteenth–century work of Herder and Rousseau. Through this geographical lens, the article as a whole reveals the profoundly territorial quality of nationalism and thus confirms the view that neither nationalist ideology nor practice can be understood without reference to the spatial powers which it mobilises and creates.

121 citations