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Delaney Vaughn

IAS Capstone

Nationalism Essay

March 10, 2017

Nationalism-The Evolutionary Tale: An Account of Five Different Theories

Afshin Marashi once said, Simple arguments are probably too simple. Good arguments

include complexity. This quote applies diligently to the case of nationalism, specifically when

one tries to pinpoint exactly what nationalism is, what it does and how it originated. When

discussing theories based on nationalism, it is important to take as many arguments into

consideration as one can. The definition of nationalism, according to one person, could far vary

from that of another. In this essay, I will compare and contrast the works of five scholars, all of

whom have defined and placed the importance of nationalisms origins throughout different

phases of history. However, I would argue that not one single statement is more correct or

incorrect than the other, but rather, that each pinpoints a time, place, event, or shared mentality

when nationalism experienced an important change and, therefore, fell victim to the same

evolutionary system applied in multiple other facets of academic study today.

Consider first, the work of Anthony Smith, author of National Identity. Smiths

nationalism argument emphasizes ones self and ones own beliefs, cultural ties and sense of

identity to be paramount to the formation and foundation of nationalism. Smith notes these

foundations to be what he constitutes as ethnic ties and identities that have commonly formed

their cultural basis and that...have played an important part in the formation of the first
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subsequent nations.1 Smith uses examples of ancient history2-qualifying him to be one of if not

the sole quasi-primordialist in this group of five scholars-to draw on his idea that the world,

before nations, first experienced a term he coined as the ethnie,which he explains to be a

symbolic attachment to ones history and the myths that make that up.3 Only after the formation

of the ethnie did the roots of imperialism begin to take shape in the world, eventually resulting

in the recognition of intellectuals, spread of a common language4 and, therefore, evolution into

the first concept of nationalism. One of Smiths final points allows for the understanding that this

concept of the origins of nationalism is not possible without an overall sense of emotional

aptitude in the study: What are the underlying sentiments and aspirations that nationalist

ideology and national language and symbols evoke?...territory, history, and community.5

Next, perhaps one of the most popular works centered around the idea of nationalism is

the newest edition of Benedict Andersons Imagined Communities. To sum-up Andersons

229 page theory, the origins of nationalism stands on the idea that one is conscious of the people

in his or her community, regardless of never having actually met them, but still assume that ones

group is comprised of all of these certain type of people, though the majority of whom are never

1
Anthony D. Smith, National Identity (New York: Penguin Books, 1991), 52.
Smith discusses two different types of ethnies or ethnic communities in this chapter. The first, a lateral
ethnie, in which he uses the Norman community of Normandy circa. 913-1204 as an example stating that
it is usually composed of aristocrats and higher clergy The second, a vertical ethnie which he
contributes to the diffusion of other social strata and classes.
2
Smith, National Identity, 42.
Smith defines nationalism As a named human population sharing an historic territory, common myths
and historical memories, a mass, public culture, a common economy, and common legal rights and duties
for all members.
3
Smith, National Identity, 53.
4
Smith, National Identity, 64.
Smith describes two different facets of revolution towards nationalism in which there is a cultural
resistance to the empirical and the colonial systems where the secular intelligentsia turns against the
older guardians of tradition as well as some aspects of vernacular mobilization.
5
Smith, National Identity, 78.
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actually seen.6 Think of this as the beginnings of local nationalism or local consciousness

most commonly experienced in todays modern version of small town or home town pride.

However, and this next point is the glue that holds Andersons theory together, vernacularization,

a term seemingly interchangeable with mechanism and technology in this work, improves upon

local consciousness and, with the invention of the printing press, produces national

consciousness, which then produces an idea of global consciousness.7 Anderson even further

narrows down the importance of the printing press by noting that newspapers and novels were

the two great outcomes of the invention.8 Like Smith, this is an idea which emphasizes the

adaptation of a common language, though it does neglect the sentiment and emotion that Smith

values so heavily.

To be thorough, examine the theories of Ernest Gellner, author of Nations and

Nationalism and E.J. Hobsbawm, who wrote Nations and Nationalism since 1780. Both help

to point out particular instances in history where nationalism takes on its largest evolutionary

rebirth since the notation of cultural ties in Anthony Smiths ethnies. Gellners argument

centers around two important emergences in the timeline of nations and nationalism: literacy and

a specialized clerical class.9 Each of these established roots in nations, specifically European

6
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (New York: Verso, 2006), 6.
In fact, all communities larger than primordial villages of face-to-face contact are imagined.
Communities are to be distinguished, not by their falsity/genuineness, but by the style in which they are
imagined.
7
Anderson, Imagined Communities, 25.
8
Anderson, Imagined Communities, 44-45.
Andersons notion of print-capitalism with the invention of the of the printing is what he believes to be
the origin of true nationalism. It remains only to emphasize that in their origins, the fixing of
print-languages and the differentiation of status between them were largely unselfconscious processes
resulting from the explosive interaction between capitalism, technology, and human linguistic diversity.
9
Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (New York: Cornell Paperbacks, 1983), 8.
Much of Gellners argument is based on the idea of the agrarian society. Think trickle-up economics. In
chapter 2 of his book, he talks about why the emergence of literacy and the clerical class are so important
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according to Gellner, which would shape into what the world knows today as the

industrialization.10 Mankind is irreversibly committed to an industrial society, and therefore to a

society whose productive system is based on cumulative science and technology.11 For a better

understanding of how this fits on the nationalism timeline, imagine throwing a pebble into a

pond, the ripples created by this represent the evolution of nationalism. In the eyes of Gellner,

industrialization is the process by which urban society was created and therefore, was the

metaphorical nationalist shot heard round the world.12

Hobsbawm, on the other hand, uses the idea of nation as progress13 to assert his idea

that nationalism is rooted in innovation and modernity in a nation, which he defines as the

collectivity of persons who have the same ethnic origin and generally speak the same language.
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As a matter of fact, Hobsbawm uses his innovation argument to create his own timeline in

to the agrarian society and the formation of a nation with an emphasis on the importance of the written
word. Again, an argument in favor of language; The written word seems to enter history with the
accountant and the tax collector...once developed, however, the written word acquires other uses, legal,
contractual, administrative.
10
Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, 19.
11
Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, 39.
12
Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, 58.
Gellner gives yet another account to the verification of nationalism as an evolutionary case in chapter 5
of his book when he talks about a characteristic scenario of the evolution of nationalism. He goes on to
note that the Ruritatrians peasants in the Empire of Megalomania all shared common language and
shared the religion. As megalomania industrializes, Ruritania does not, rather than the fight the battle of
assimilation, the Ruritanians decide to create their own nation in which to industrialize. Thus, creating the
spread of nationalism via industrialism.
13
E.J. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780 (United Kingdom: University Press, Cambridge,
1992), 39.
Hobsbawm states that in order for small communities to transform into larger ones that there first has to
be a perspective of liberal ideology. This goes back to Anthony Smiths idea of the intelligentsia
movement. In fact, Hobsbawm notes the liberal ideologies as a stage of evolution in the mid-nineteenth
century where smaller communities had opportunity to assimilate into larger ones, usually abandoning
loyalties and sentiments-contrary to Smith, and that The geographically and socially mobile, who had
nothing desirable to look back upon in their past, might be quite ready to do so.
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Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, 15.
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which he infers how the formation of a nation and its nationalism can evolve over time; consider

first, the family. The family then becomes a tribe, the notion of tribe spreads throughout a

certain region, the region then becomes a nation and, finally, the nation evolves into what

Hobsbawm calls the unified world of the future.15

Finally, an analysis of the work of Rogers Brubaker, author of the 1998 article Myths

and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism, is pertinent. In this article, Brubaker examines

six different observances in the study of nationalism that he deems to be commonly

misconceptualized. For example, the first myth is what he notes as the architectonic illusion,

meaning that nationalist conflicts can be solved by establishing the proper territorial and

institutional framework.16 This, Brubaker argues, is misguided due simply to the fact that

national conflicts cannot be solved by drawing proper borders.17 This is the theme in the vast

majority of Brubakers paper in which he negates theories about nationalism that he feels either

do not apply to the case or simply cannot be fact when other circumstances in any particular

nations instance are considered, be it theoretical or empirical.

Theoretical conclusions and empirical cases each play a role in all of the statements put

forth by Smith, Anderson, Gellner, Hobsbawm, and Brubaker, though it may seem redundant to

suggest at this point that, when studying nationalism, it is difficult to have one without the other.

Hobsbawm derives his definition from the Dictionary of the Spanish Academy, which he notes does not
finalize its version of the definition until 1925. An aspect that could potentially be added to the
Evolutionary Timeline of Nationalism.
15
Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism, 38.
Hobsbawm states that in this future that the world would be unified even linguistically. This ties into
the establishment of a common language, again, that Smith spoke about in his book.
16
Rogers Brubaker, Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism, University of California
(1998): 274. Brubaker notes that though there many different way that this architectonic illusion can
take shape, each is generally based on the principle of national self-determination that he defines as
something which assigns moral agency and political authority to nations.
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Brubaker, Myths and Misconceptions, 275.
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Each of the five men help to inspire the idea that nationalism is evolutionary in their own way

while at the same time paying tribute to multiple areas of study. For example, each argument

ecompasses some instance of a common or standardized language, this is useful in the field of

sociology when discussing functionalism, or the way in which analyzing a society can help to

figure out how a society systematically functions.18 Each argument also, without a doubt, is

centered around people, whether it be their minds, behavior, or social class. Because people are

so important to the study of nationalism, so too are the principals of anthropology, which can be

defined, simply, as the ...study of what makes us human.19 Therefore, studying the origins or

evolution of nations and nationalism helps to enhance the study of what each critically entails,

various social sciences.

As a unit, the five theorists were all able to present their arguments in clear and concise

manors, though it should be mentioned that some of Ernest Gellners points accompany a hint of

abstraction. All in all, however, it is safe to say that each scholars ideals about what nationalism

actually is, how nationalism originated or how nationalism has been misconceptualized over the

years are all easily digestible and make for important topics of thought and conversation. With

that being noted, the idea that one is no more correct or incorrect than the other comes back into

play. Rather, consider a theory that for the purpose of this essay will be called the Evolutionary

Case of Nationalism. This is one that encompasses the principal argument of all five of the

nationalist theories above and, instead of pinning one against another, puts each on the same

18
Functionalism, Last Modified July 3, 2013. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/functionalism/
Functionalism in the philosophy of mind is the doctrine that what makes something a mental state of a
particular type does not depend on its internal constitution, but rather on the way it functions, or the role it
plays, in the system of which it is a part.
19
What is Anthropology, Last Modified 2016.
http://www.americananthro.org/AdvanceYourCareer/Content.aspx?ItemNumber=2150
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timeline-beginning with the quasi-primordialist notions of Anthony Smith, followed by the

industrialized nationalism roots proposed by Gellner, the innovative ideals of E.J. Hobsbawm,

the imagined concept of one's community according to Benedict Anderson, ending with the

nationalist misconceptions of Rogers Brubaker seen overtime- and argues each theory is correct

when correlated with its period or overall concept of history. This creates a more unified theory

of nationalism than any relationship in the readings was able to achieve. Brubaker even uses his

own concept of nationalist conflicts changing overtime that help to reflect this point when he

states, Today, of course, this argument is less likely to be as advanced than it was a few years

earlier.20 Therefore, the Evolutionary Case of Nationalism stands firm; if nationalism origin,

misconception, conflict and argument can evolutionize, nationalism in and of itself can

evolutionize.

All of theses concepts, specifically by way of thinking about each one inhabiting different

points of the same timeline, will be very useful when it comes to pinpointing the nationalist

ideology and the role that women played during the Irish revolution against the United Kingdom

in the early 1920s. It is my intention to draw parallels with each of the last five theories and be

able to use them, by way of evolution, to not only explain the nationalist build-up in the years

before the Irish partition, but also be able to find in the history of Irish freedom the points in

which women began experiencing their own form of evolution that encouraged involvement.

Whether it be by way of simple sentiment to rally women to the cause, industrialization and

innovation opening up more opportunities for that to happen or the idea that Irish women by way

20
Brubaker, Myths and Misconceptions, 275.
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of print capitalism were more consciously aware of their communities, each should play a role

in my next paper, 1920s Irish Nationalism and the Role that Suffrage Played.

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