Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism by Benedict Anderson

Oct 21, 2010 Kelly rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history, owned, identity-crisis, 20th-century-postwar-to-late, imperialism

UPDATED: Amazing how reading this for a different class brought out a totally different discussion. The last class I read this for was called "Uses of History in International Affairs," and we spent the majority of our time talking about history as an act- history as narrative, history as an agenda, what someone might use these statements for. We were essentially diplomats in discussion, preparing our strategy of attack against the other side's claims. I don't think we discussed the validity of...more UPDATED: Amazing how reading this for a different class brought out a totally different discussion. The last class I read this for was called "Uses of History in International Affairs," and we spent the majority of our time talking about history as an act- history as narrative, history as an agenda, what someone might use these statements for. We were essentially diplomats in discussion, preparing our strategy of attack against the other side's claims. I don't think we discussed the validity of his claims at all, but rather focused on place they had in world events and history and how these ideas could affect our daily lives.

This time, I'm in an international history program, filled with historians. This time we bypassed that discussion entirely, taking it for granted as established and agreed on, and concentrated on dissecting the arguments presented on their structure and substance, in a close analytical read that sought to draw on our knowledge of history to poke holes in his argument. This time, we are being trained to think of ourselves as peers, whose job it is to show the main behind the curtain well... mostly because he's there, to borrow a phrase. It was a trip back to the basics to remind us what these arguments are really about in the end, while also forcing us to question not to accept.

Fascinating experience of the lines drawn between various disciplines and their goals- how the idea that "that's someone else's job" has very real effects in the formation of ideas.

ORIGINAL:Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities may be over twenty five years old now, but that doesn't make it any less relevant, even had he not added on the chapters (as interesting as they were) that he adjusted himself with later on, after the fall of the USSR and later with his new ideas on the topic. (Though I love that he did that- it shows someone who is not content to rest on his laurels and whose ideas about the world were not set by the best-selling status of one book he wrote, and that he refuses to be tied to it. I like watching geniuses continue to change and develop.)

In any case! It is quite relevant- especially since 9/11, as we see that the impact of nationalism hasn't declined in the least, and the attachment that people feel for it is very real and has very real consequences on people's lives. Anderson's basic thesis is that nations are "imagined communities," created in the New World by the creole bourgeoisie of the British and Spanish colonies by the conjunction of print journalism (which allowed groups of people to imagine themselves as a community, through providing the links that bound regions together), language, cultural imprints (such as "sacred script" cultures) and the forces of capitalism. He is writing this book to be useful to Marxist theorists, in order to fill what he feels is the gap in the Marxist analysis of nationalism. But it is by no means only useful to the Marxist or even liberal theorist. The reminder that nationalism is a new phenomenon, and that any pretentious to antiquity by any nation is absolutely ridiculous, and even the whole concept of a nation worth dying for is invented, not something that, as the Abbe Sieyes wrote in the French Revolution (perhaps understandably, he was trying to turn the nation of peasants into Frenchmen) "exists in the state of nature."

Anderson says that nations have three conditions: that they are sovereign, limited, and a community. He talks about how these resulted from the specific time and place that the whole concept was invented, but also how they have been adapted and used throughout the world. One of the major strengths of his book (surely influenced by the period of criticism he was writing in) is its major focus on areas of the world outside of Europe (though many of those areas- as most of the world was- were European colonies): Southeast Asia, Latin America, China, Japan. It is fascinating to watch first the process by which he believes nationalism is formed and then nationalism's journey across time and space to crop up in its many different incarnations as various groups constantly find different uses for it.

This is a book to be read and re-read constantly to remind oneself about questioning some very basic assumptions that a lot of people take for granted, and then questioning why those assumptions exist in the first place. I think this book constantly challenges you to look inward and to figure out what matters to you, how it got to matter to you so much, and how you may or may not have been steered that way by a government, leaders, education, or some other outside force that has nothing to do with "natural" feelings.

I've always had a hugely negative, shuddering reaction to two things: religious fundamentalism and overbearing nationalism. This book helped give me the language (as Anderson would say himself) to better explain why.(less)

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Apr 26, 2007 Dan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Lovers of history and theory

Shelves: critical, philosophy

Argues clearly and poetically that identities are constructed through shared media. Examines how newspapers and other media create a shared identity with people never met.

Pros: Excellent writing, clear argument, and historical evidence (almost exclusively) from the Spanish-speaking world.

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Mar 02, 2008 Chayuth rated it 5 of 5 stars

An indispensable canonical book for student of nationalism.

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Nov 14, 2011 Patrick McCoy rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

I first heard about Benedict Anderson's seminal study of nationalism, Imagined Communities, from a newspaper article in The Bangkok Post while on vacation in Thailand a few years back. It's not such an unlikely place to hear about Anderson since it turns out that he is somewhat of an expert on SE Asian countries. It seems that he has made his name studying Indonesia, but he has also published widely on Thailand and the Philippines including the intriguing title, In the Mirror: Literature and Pol...more

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Jul 13, 2008 Lauren rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: theory, history, exams-read

Asserted as a Marxist text, Anderson attempts to revise readings of the development of nationalism in attempt to sort out the possibilities its offers for a Marxist agenda. Most importantly, Anderson defines the nation as 1) sovereign, 2) limited, and 3) fraternal. He sees the nation as a structural form of collective imagination that works to cohere through the rise of print capitalism (specifically mass-marketed news media and novels, but one could easily add photography to this list) and the...more

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Jul 09, 2007 Hamad rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Thinkers and Leftists

This is a very important, but difficult read. Even though the author mentions that he did not want to introduce any academic lingo, it is still difficult to comprehend at times, and the academic structure is obvious.

It will truly make you think about history in a novel way once you do understand what is being described. However, the chapter on the Map, Census and Museum was the hardest to comprehend. Of course, the fact that so many themes in the book were hard to understand only goes to show h...more

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Oct 03, 2007 Gina rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: those into theories of nationalism

Shelves: dissndat

My friend saw this book on my desk and said, "Oh! that is such OLD news!" ehem...
Ben Anderson's book has influenced an entire generation of critics of nations and nationalisms. The book reads well (I enjoy the obvious pleasure with which he writes) and is still fresh to new readers like me. I enjoy his ability to position his work in friendly opposition to other scholars of nationalism

My favorite notion is by far that of "bourgeois aristocracy" in the colonies.

It's easy to navigate the book to f...more

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Feb 28, 2013 William Thompson rated it 4 of 5 stars

For those who remember my orientation in postmodern studies, you could predict my fascination for this book. Postmodernism, you will recall, is a rejection of the linear evidence for a particular proposition in favor of explanations of "truth" that societies enforce through power structures. Thus, Christianity has no inherent believability to it. After all, in our age, why would we believe a guy 2000 years ago died, woke up, wandered around for a few days, then claimed if we believed that story...more For those who remember my orientation in postmodern studies, you could predict my fascination for this book. Postmodernism, you will recall, is a rejection of the linear evidence for a particular proposition in favor of explanations of "truth" that societies enforce through power structures. Thus, Christianity has no inherent believability to it. After all, in our age, why would we believe a guy 2000 years ago died, woke up, wandered around for a few days, then claimed if we believed that story we would follow his glorious path. Believing you shouldn’t eat beef because your dead mother is roaming a cattle lot in Oklahoma is just as logical. Each could be true, just as you have to assume a particular intellectual starting point to believe there are billions of planets that you can’t see or that atoms exist that you can’t see. But in every case, a society suggests with moral, coercive or institutional force that we will be better off if we believe this, or at least respect it as a majority belief that must be taken as logical, if we want to get ahead in the world in which we belong.
In this book, Anderson applies that analysis of power to define how nations came to be and how they have finally replaced empires, kingdoms and even political belief systems as the fulcrum around which we define states.
Anderson defies the accepted tendency to believe that empires like the Spanish, which united Spain and Portugal, the Holy Roman Empire of Italian and German speakers, the German, French and Walloon speakers of Belgium and the Spanish Netherlands, along with the indigenous people of the Americas, were broken apart by the deep fissures of groups that could never be melted into a single nation. To most historians, nationalism is perceived as an invention of Western Europe, particularly centered in the French revolution. Only much, much later was it kidnapped in diluted versions to serve anti-colonial causes in Africa and Asia.
But revolutionary France, which has always been a darling of Marxist thinkers who viewed it as a direct precursor to the Marxist revolutions in Russia, Asia and southeastern Europe, is a horrible example of the creation of a state. After the fall of Louis XVI, for the next 80 years France progressively was a totalitarian state, a dictatorship, an empire, before becoming a monarchy again and again an empire.
Instead of an outgrowth of European political thought, Anderson counters with the argument that nationalism is what he calls a “cajun” invention of disgruntled colonials who knew they could never rise to the highest status in the metropole, or even within their own colony. This was not necessarily because of their racial status, but merely because they had been born outside the governing country, and all those slots of power, even in the colonial area, were to be filled by the elites of the mother country. The colonial elite, eager to gain and then perpetuate a governing status, commandeered an often-crudely drawn weaving of history, language and geography to create an “imagined” community.
This imagined community of a nation comprising disparate people, calling themselves Peruvians, Algerian or Australians who really had nothing in common other than this label, united them for the purposes of relaying power to their new masters. Thus, nationalism did not yield shared power, according to Anderson, only substituted a home-grown governing elite for the previous one.
Yet these often tiny national groups brought down once-large, polyglot monarchies that had somehow combined many language groups spread half-way round the world. With the rise of nationalisms, a multi-continental empire, which previously could be held together with a few mercenaries, was suddenly threatened by ideologically driven people willing to sacrifice their very lives for the sake of the abstract ideas of a nation, or an idea. The first of these was the United States.
Anderson uses as his final test case the invasion of Vietnam by Pol Pot’s Cambodians and then China’s subsequent invasion of Vietnam to throw out their fellow Communists. With this, Anderson concludes that what the 20th century saw as the world-unifying force of Communism or the United Nations had run its course. Now, each nation defines its diplomatic goals not in terms of an ideological standard, but in terms of its own nationalistic imperatives. Anderson did not address the subject of the European Community, but I would be interested in knowing how its starts and stops might have challenged his theories
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Nov 28, 2012 Mark Nassutti rated it 5 of 5 stars

A nation is a collection of people living in an area bounded by a border than can only be seen in a vastly scaled-down two-dimensional representation. These people can’t possibly know each other personally, but they believe fervently in each others’ existence and allegiance to a core set of values and beliefs, and would willingly give their lives to defend each other from any attack coming from outside their border. This is my interpretation of what Anderson means by “imagined communities.”

Ander...more A nation is a collection of people living in an area bounded by a border than can only be seen in a vastly scaled-down two-dimensional representation. These people can’t possibly know each other personally, but they believe fervently in each others’ existence and allegiance to a core set of values and beliefs, and would willingly give their lives to defend each other from any attack coming from outside their border. This is my interpretation of what Anderson means by “imagined communities.”

Anderson argues that there was no single force more powerful in forming these imagined communities than the printing industry. He points to the decline of three key conceptions of human culture that created the environment that the publishers of books, newspapers and pamphlets exploited: First, the notion that a given written language was holy. Second, a societal model built around strong centers, like royal families. Third, an understanding of time as static, history and the present being indistinguishable.

To make money, printers had to move beyond a tiny core of readers of Latin into vernaculars. To reduce their costs, printers had to group readers into as few language groups as possible, guiding regional dialects into national languages. The speed of book reproduction and distribution allowed new ideas to be disseminated very rapidly. In the context of nations, the need to capture complex and chaotic changes such as the French Revolution – really an era, not an event -- into a book that could be easily and quickly read and discussed forced condensation, simplification and the evolution of national myth.

Anderson provides a fresh and highly readable explanation of the nuances and variations across time and place of this evolution. It is only due to an effort to provide an overview in 300 words or less that I summarize the outcome as follows: Bond-driven humanity, unhooked by the decline of religious and royal cultural systems, latched onto national myths to provide a sense of belonging, a way to make sense of existential mysteries, and to simplify world and national history into an understandable timeline. Most of us know the terrible consequences.
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Oct 23, 2012 Elfriede Crage rated it 5 of 5 stars

A bit scholarly and heavily footnoted, but not very lengthy and a compelling read which I highly recommend to anyone who would like to form an opinion about "current affairs." The main conclusion I took from this book is the realization that my concept of what nations are and how people identify their nationality and loyalty to a nation is a very recent development and even in Europe only about one or two generations old. Likewise soldiering for a patriotic cause is an invention of the 20th cent...more

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Nov 08, 2011 John rated it 5 of 5 stars

I loved this book, I wish I hadn't gotten it from the library. I need to find a copy in a used bookstore. I did not think I would like it this much, in fact, I started to read it last year and couldn't get through the first chapter. Turns out, that was more about needing to get though the introduction and into the real meat of the book. Anderson has all kinds of great case studies and analysis here, and he really gives the book a world wide scope. His style is nice too, he's got a little humor m...more

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Jul 05, 2011 Chelsea Szendi rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: history-beyond-japan

It's sad when once-provocative texts become enshrined: they die a little for it. B. Anderson's "Imagined Communities" gets kicked about so much in seminars and discussions it's almost redundant to read the text itself. Which is a shame, since the prose itself is spry and lively, and the arguments are ambitious, yet simply stated. Some would argue too ambitious, too simple. Which is probably true, but what a pleasurable read! And it's enlightening to watch him weave analytic categories that can t...more

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Jun 27, 2011 Franditya rated it 3 of 5 stars

Benedict Anderson dalam “Imagined Communities” atau “Komunitas-Komunitas Terbayang”, mencoba menelusuri asal-usul bangsa dalam narasi sejarah peradaban Eropa mulai abad ke-15. Menurutnya, kebangkitan kapitalisme cetak yang dipicu oleh gerakan reformasi gereja, telah menumbuhkan sebuah komunitas masyarakat Eropa baru. Jika sebelumnya bahasa Latin nyaris memonopoli pengetahuan dan peradaban, setelah kitab suci berhasil diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Jerman, maka semakin teranglah jalan pencarian id...more

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Oct 31, 2010 Mazidah Mohamad rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: academic-books

Mike told me I dont have to read a book from its front to back, I just have to read those chapters I find interesting and relevant to my research/interests. The rest of the chapters might not be relevant to the reader altogether. I did just that. Ive only read Introduction, Cultural Roots and the Origin of Nation Consciousness. These 3 chapters are enough for me to get the gist of Anderson's Imagined Communities. All communities are imagined. He conceptualised this based on the knowledge that we...more

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Mar 10, 2010 Dan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2010

this is a great, readable-but-dense look at the idea of the nation, and how it came to organize the vast majority of political action in the 20th (and i guess now the 21st) century. anderson's book makes a nice companion to edward said's orientalism in terms of scope and outlook - only with more of a focus on traditional history than literature. some of the content was a bit above my pay grade (my knowledge of world history pretty much falls apart prior to about 1860), but anderson writes with a...more

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Apr 13, 2009 Michael rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Students of politics, history, economics

Recommended to Michael by: Professor David Johnson

Shelves: academic-history, politics

This book puts forth a simple thesis: that nations exist only in the minds of those who comprise them. It suggests that certain developments of modern culture (such as printed news, censuses, and colonialism) led to an awakening of "national consciousness" in the population, beyond merely the ruling class who traditionally had a stake in patriotic identity, and thus helped to consolidate the power of the State. Breaking from previous accounts, he sees nationalism as first developing among "creol...more

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Mar 12, 2013 Ralowe Ampu rated it 3 of 5 stars

this text is confusing. the point seems to be that the nation is merely a social ordering technology that is fun to dismiss, yet the writer frequently refers to nationalities as knowable entities, presumably to make the writing accessible, yet i noticed no caveat for this. i might have missed it, but he carries on so. would such a contradiction deserve better treatment than a footnote? i wished that he would just simply state what his unseemly predispositions were rather than insinuating through...more this text is confusing. the point seems to be that the nation is merely a social ordering technology that is fun to dismiss, yet the writer frequently refers to nationalities as knowable entities, presumably to make the writing accessible, yet i noticed no caveat for this. i might have missed it, but he carries on so. would such a contradiction deserve better treatment than a footnote? i wished that he would just simply state what his unseemly predispositions were rather than insinuating through sociology. what winds up happening is the feeling that the only basis for a theory of the life of nationality outside of social construction is bias. there's material to source here for a both/and thesis of race despite the perils of anderson's voice. the usage of race as a coherent and solid entity, i.e. as 'black' is made to cohere for the consideration of 'the black question,' reminded me of marxists, so i decided anderson is a marxist. i don't know if he's really a marxist, but he does talk about benjamin twice at meaningful moments near the beginning and near the end of the text, presumably for emphasis. not that i mind marxists, until they start talking about race like that. and talking about race in a lot of different contexts with an ease that makes me kinda suspicious, in a way where i just have to wind up taking your word for it. he talks about a lot of different parts of the world in a way that kind of made me uncomfortable. like they were all supposed to make sense under one unifying concept (capitalism? class?) that never materially effects each place differently. even calling attention to that makes me sound like a globalization denialist. i'm not a globalization denialist. it's just that talking about too many different places as if they're all the same in some ways seems to just further globalization. but if you come into this being aware of the contingency/hegemony problem, you should be okay. i do feel that, assuming he is indeed a marxist, he shouldn't be making you do that extra work. who does that? someone who for this edition needs to add a lengthy ramble on the anecdotes surrounding the translation and publication history of the boo you've just read. i tried to figure out how i could care but i gave up.(less)

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Feb 20, 2013 Kyle rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I have been walking around this past week, reading this book with everyone who sees me reading it telling me how much they enjoyed it. And I look at them perplexed. Telling them how tedious his examples are and how he rambles on about nothing insofar as he doesn't quite explain to you why you should care about the examples he is elaborating on. At which point, the person informs me that they were only two or three of the chapters out of the entire book for some class. I hope this is the reason w...more I have been walking around this past week, reading this book with everyone who sees me reading it telling me how much they enjoyed it. And I look at them perplexed. Telling them how tedious his examples are and how he rambles on about nothing insofar as he doesn't quite explain to you why you should care about the examples he is elaborating on. At which point, the person informs me that they were only two or three of the chapters out of the entire book for some class. I hope this is the reason why folks dig this book so much. On paper, I'll concede, this basic idea of imagined communities sounds fine and by all means, I think it should be one we keep albeit not in this form as Anderson has explained it.

I don't do literature, but I like how he reads literature, that the act of reading within print-capitalism lends itself towards imagining what is happening off the page and that others are reading alongside you.

Now is particular argument about how nationalism is not an ideology, but is instead something like kinship, as something that is coincidental is bollocks. First, his account of nationalism is basically that nationalism is how you have revolutions with no proletariat. Maybe that's convincing, but the ultimate result is that class analysis disappears in his account. Nationalism becomes how the bourgeoisie revolt and honestly I am not convinced that every form of nationalism is bourgeoisie-driven, for example, in Vietnam or other non-Soviet communist states that underwent revolution. I'm not saying it's wrong, but I need evidence not simply non-argumentative narratives as he produces throughout this book. And here is where my big issue arises: how do you disentangle Nazi racism from Nazi nationalism? Anderson's response is that due to the spread of national socialism in Germany being due to propaganda and not print-capitalism that we are somehow dealing with an official nationalism, that is, a nationalism constructed as an ideology "emanating from the state and serving the interests of the state" (159). Essentially, all the Germans who were swept up into Nazism, ignorant of the holocaust, were not actually participating in nationalism, but were being duped by an inauthentic nationalism. Nationalism, the establishment of an imagined community, does not in anyway require creating an Other. There is an affect created through the ties of nationalism, which Anderson never accounts for, only ever alluding to vague notions of death throughout the book. Rather than coming to terms with how ideology operates both horizontally and vertically, that nationalism can become ideologically mystifying without being disseminated by the state and that groups of people can be swept up into nationalism is beyond his account.

From his account, what he points towards, with how he discusses the bourgeoisie as becoming a class via the imagining of other bourgeoisie, is the possibility for solidarity through imagination. (less)

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Jun 14, 2012 Karen rated it 3 of 5 stars

I am giving this book three stars only because it is a seminal work in the field of historical studies and because it did encapsulate some great basic ideas. However, I found myself completely bogged down by the writing style. To me, the majority of the book felt very jumbled and confused. I could almost feel him sitting behind me going, "Oooh, and let's not forget about this. . .oh oh, don't forget this!" The examples felt very disjoined and almost as if he was including them for the mere purpo...more I am giving this book three stars only because it is a seminal work in the field of historical studies and because it did encapsulate some great basic ideas. However, I found myself completely bogged down by the writing style. To me, the majority of the book felt very jumbled and confused. I could almost feel him sitting behind me going, "Oooh, and let's not forget about this. . .oh oh, don't forget this!" The examples felt very disjoined and almost as if he was including them for the mere purpose of including them. Like, let's see how many different nations we can talk about in the span of fifty pages. Answer -- too many. Additionally, within his example, he jumped around quite a bit and assumed a lot of his audience. It was like he felt his audience should already have a basic understanding of the histories of countries such as Indonesia and Burma. I do not, and so those examples were mostly wasted on me since I did not have the beginning knowledge to more fully appreciate it. The examples he did give from my particular area of expertise were shallow at best even though they would have wonderfully illustrated most of the concepts he was discussing. One of my other big problems was that I felt that sometimes he had too much of a Valley Girl style (e.g. "But I have been informed by scholars of Japan that recent excavations of the earliest royal tombs suggest strongly that the family may originally have been -- horrors! - Korean"). Horrors? With an exclamation point? Are you even kidding me? This is not a blog posting, this is not a travel article for a newspaper, this is a scholarly treatise.

Despite all of that, the ideas here are interesting. Anderson makes many solid points about the connection between the formation of imagined communities and print-capitalism, language and the downfall of dynastic monarchies, among other things. As a text which informed a variety of historical studies and later works, it is a significant work. Maybe I would have liked it if I had read it for a class or in pieces (cutting out some of the seemingly extraneous examples), but since I read it all in two days and for an independent study, I am not too enamored. Better luck next time.(less)

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Feb 02, 2012 Dusty rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: graduate-school, read-in-2012

Like Foucault, or Bourdieu, or Butler, Benedict Anderson is an obligatory stop along the graduate literature student's journey toward the dissertation and graduation. The question of nationalism -- or, more specifically, the question of why one's allegiance to the "nation," in quotes here because it's a social construct, leads one to voluntarily lay down his/her life in order to defend it -- takes center stage in Imagined Communities, and while it could be argued that Anderson's expertise in Ind...more

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Jul 09, 2009 Susannah added it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I think I was in a different frame of mind when I bought this book; I am certain that when I decided this instructor's recommendation of a book must be on my shelves, I did not then see reasons behind activities of groups - officially and unofficially recognized as leaders of a given nation - as always arising from mundane needs and purposes, which is the way I see them now.
Having skimmed my way to page 7, I consider this book read. The author clearly feels that overwhelmingly immense study of...more I think I was in a different frame of mind when I bought this book; I am certain that when I decided this instructor's recommendation of a book must be on my shelves, I did not then see reasons behind activities of groups - officially and unofficially recognized as leaders of a given nation - as always arising from mundane needs and purposes, which is the way I see them now.
Having skimmed my way to page 7, I consider this book read. The author clearly feels that overwhelmingly immense study of how the people of nation act on and understand their "nationalism" is useful in understanding, eventually, the actions of groups behaving for stated political purposes. I do not agree with this author, then, on the justification for writing this book. And I think the how and why of 'nationalism' boils down to two points of interest: 1) what meaning "nationalism" has (for a given people, and for each person in a group), and
2) how the idea of "nationalism"draws strength, how it can be enough that people will happily die for it etc.
My answer is that
1) people are social creatures and must live in a community of sorts, and nationalism is simply the latest evolution in the line of types of communities that people live in together, so that they can depend on each other, and have their lives made easier by breaking the work up between them. "Nations" are in and "empires" are out; before then clans, villages, kingdoms, etc, all held the top spot as most popular mass social grouping at some point. "Why the passion of nationalism" is a bit late of a question; how about "why the grouping called nations"? What social grouping is popular - depends on food production rates and consequent population rates, also on technology - how fast/far can people travel and from that - how fast by what techniques are people defending themselves? So why nations, or whatever other size of bordered grouping being looked at, can never be a big mystery: grouping size depends on how many people can be supported by a given area, which depends on geographic fertility & food technology. Grouping boundaries depends on existing neighbor population challenges and on travel/defense technology. Nations are "in" because of the rate of food production, the deadliness of defense technology; more technology makes smaller groupings obsolete and bigger groupings, like empires, impossible; nowadays the amount of people living in the same area is far higher than in the days of empires; an empire is not plausible to manage.
2) "Nationalism" isn't a strong idea that people will die for....people ultimately die for their social grouping, not for an idea. There are always social groupings of some size, there are always fights for more stuff by the more determined leader, thus there will always be passion of some sort to stand behind the social grouping, of whatever size, that keeps you alive.
Quiz: What was the political feeling coined for enthusiasm for one's empire? Was a similar term never coined for clans or villages or kingdoms because soft sciences didn't exist then? As it is impossible for one to truly understand what it FELT LIKE, what passion there was behind 1) being a flower child, 2)being a member of the Medicis in Shakespeare's day or a desert clan member now or a knight or lady of a court - how can we know that passionate support as strong as patriotism is now, didn't exist in those various times to tie people to their various groups? What is now passion of patriotism was then passion for some other grouping; there is no mystery to why the attachment to one's group exists. How about a better question: Why do some people in a nation tie their most intense passion to their "families/gangs/ethnic groups/scholarly identity/socioeconomic class", and others to their "nation"?
And who cares anyway? Because whatever political reason people give for what they do is perhaps better categorized "the study of charm" or "the study of lies". It is a simple fact that should not be shocking that people ultimately cannot act for vague ideals; whatever democratic, Marxist, or Socialist theory they give for what they do or propose, there are sound, rational, logical reasons of finance and preservation that truly drive their actions. Annex some land not to "free the people" but because there are excellent natural resources that someone wants; promote "Communism" and "down with Capitalism it is evil" because you are a group of guys who want to retain and consolidate power and you better have a reason for people to put up with all the shit from your secret police that is worse than the torture and death they threaten.

In short, citizens will have some passionate emotion for their family/clan/village/nation that an anthropologist can coin some term for, but what it's named matters not; the feeling is verbalized because it exists to rationalize their ties to a group they cannot live without, serves to make them feel better about putting aside their own interests for those of the group. The loyalty, whatever its name, allows one to turn from the ugly reality of sticking with a group for reasons of raw survival, allows us to rationalize putting others interest before our own. If I want to know why a group in a country, or from a country's government did something, I can read the financial news, and compare what that group has to gain/lose regarding it's own survival and comfort. The spouted political reasons the group feels will be best bought by others for their actions - are amusing, but not an answer. For this reason, neither is the study of "nationalism." (less)

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Jul 16, 2012 Reed rated it 3 of 5 stars

Benedict Anderson's "Imagined Communities" is a very solid constructivist account on the origin, dissemination, and persistence of nationalism, and a strong reminder of the force that nationalism has had and will continue to exert on the modern world. The historical, geographic, and thematic scope of this book makes it relevant for a wide audience, and his engaging, almost conversational tone, which to my eyes is reminiscent of the best examples of Continental Philosophy, adds to the accessibili...more

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Mar 17, 2013 Eid marked it as to-read · review of another edition

"ﺍﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﻤﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ ﺗﺄﻣﻼ‌ﺕ ﻓﻲ ﺃﺻﻞ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻭﺍﻧﺘﺸﺎﺭﻫﺎ
ﺑﻨﺪﻛﺖ ﺃﻧﺪﺭﺳﻦ
ﺗﻘﺪﻳﻢ: ﻋﺰﻣﻲ ﺑﺸﺎﺭﺓ
ﺗﺮﺟﻤﺔ، ﺗﺤﻘﻴﻖ: ﺛﺎﺋﺮ ﺩﻳﺐ
ﻗﺪﻣﺲ ﻟﻠﻨﺸﺮ ﻭﺍﻟﺘﻮﺯﻳﻊ
271 ﺻﻔﺤﺔ
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ﻧﺒﺬﺓ ﺍﻟﻤﻮﺯﻉ:
ﺣﻴﻦ ﺗﻨﺎﻗﺶ ﻣﺴﺄﻟﺔﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔﻏﺎﻟﺒﺎً ﻣﺎ ﻳﺘﻤﺤﻮﺭ ﺍﻟﺤﺪﻳﺚ ﺣﻮﻝ ﺗﻌﺮﻳﻔﺎﺕﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ. ﻭﻣﺠﺮﺩ ﺇﻧﺘﺸﺎﺭ ﻫﺬﻩ ﺍﻟﻌﺎﺩﺓ ﻋﻨﺪ ﻣﻨﺎﻗﺸﺔ ﻫﺬﻩ ﺍﻟﻤﻮﺍﺿﻴﻊ ﻳﻮﺿﺢ ﺍﻟﻔﻘﺮ ﺍﻟﻨﻈﺮﻱ ﻓﻲﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﺎﺝ ﺣﻮﻝﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ. ﻭﻟﻠﺘﺪﻟﻴﻞ ﻋﻠﻰ ﺍﻟﻀﻌﻒ ﺍﻟﻨﻈﺮﻱﻓﻲ ﺩﺭﺍﺳﺔ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻲ ﻳﺴﺘﺨﺪﻡ ﺃﻧﺪﺭﺳﻦ ﻣﺄﺯﻕ ﺍﻟﺘﻌﺮﻳﻔﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﺬﻱ ﻳﻌﺒﺮ ﻋﻦ ﺷﺒﻪ ﺇﺳﺘﺤﺎﻟﺔ ﺗﻌﺮﻳﻒﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻣﻊ ﺃﻧﻬﺎ ﻇﺎﻫﺮﺓ ﻗﺎﺋﻤﺔ ﻣﻮﺟﻮﺩﺓ ﻳﺪﺭﻛﻬﺎ ﺍﻟﺠﻤﻴﻊ، ﻭﻻ‌ ﻳﺘﻔﻘﻮﻥ ﻋﻠﻰ...more "ﺍﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﻤﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ ﺗﺄﻣﻼ‌ﺕ ﻓﻲ ﺃﺻﻞ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻭﺍﻧﺘﺸﺎﺭﻫﺎ
ﺑﻨﺪﻛﺖ ﺃﻧﺪﺭﺳﻦ
ﺗﻘﺪﻳﻢ: ﻋﺰﻣﻲ ﺑﺸﺎﺭﺓ
ﺗﺮﺟﻤﺔ، ﺗﺤﻘﻴﻖ: ﺛﺎﺋﺮ ﺩﻳﺐ
ﻗﺪﻣﺲ ﻟﻠﻨﺸﺮ ﻭﺍﻟﺘﻮﺯﻳﻊ
271 ﺻﻔﺤﺔ
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ﻧﺒﺬﺓ ﺍﻟﻤﻮﺯﻉ:
ﺣﻴﻦ ﺗﻨﺎﻗﺶ ﻣﺴﺄﻟﺔ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻏﺎﻟﺒﺎً ﻣﺎ ﻳﺘﻤﺤﻮﺭ ﺍﻟﺤﺪﻳﺚ ﺣﻮﻝ ﺗﻌﺮﻳﻔﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ. ﻭﻣﺠﺮﺩ ﺇﻧﺘﺸﺎﺭ ﻫﺬﻩ ﺍﻟﻌﺎﺩﺓ ﻋﻨﺪ ﻣﻨﺎﻗﺸﺔ ﻫﺬﻩ ﺍﻟﻤﻮﺍﺿﻴﻊ ﻳﻮﺿﺢ ﺍﻟﻔﻘﺮ ﺍﻟﻨﻈﺮﻱ ﻓﻲ ﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﺎﺝ ﺣﻮﻝ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ. ﻭﻟﻠﺘﺪﻟﻴﻞ ﻋﻠﻰ ﺍﻟﻀﻌﻒ ﺍﻟﻨﻈﺮﻱ ﻓﻲ ﺩﺭﺍﺳﺔ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻲ ﻳﺴﺘﺨﺪﻡ ﺃﻧﺪﺭﺳﻦ ﻣﺄﺯﻕ ﺍﻟﺘﻌﺮﻳﻔﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﺬﻱ ﻳﻌﺒﺮ ﻋﻦ ﺷﺒﻪ ﺇﺳﺘﺤﺎﻟﺔ ﺗﻌﺮﻳﻒ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻣﻊ ﺃﻧﻬﺎ ﻇﺎﻫﺮﺓ ﻗﺎﺋﻤﺔ ﻣﻮﺟﻮﺩﺓ ﻳﺪﺭﻛﻬﺎ ﺍﻟﺠﻤﻴﻊ، ﻭﻻ‌ ﻳﺘﻔﻘﻮﻥ ﻋﻠﻰ ﺗﻌﺮﻳﻔﻬﺎ ﻓﻲ ﺍﻟﻮﻗﺖ ﺫﺍﺗﻪ. ﻳﺘﻀﻤﻦ ﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﻤﺎﺀ ﺇﻟﻰ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻧﻮﻋﺎً ﻣﻦ ﺍﻟﻤﺴﺎﻭﺍﺓ، ﻛﻤﺎ ﻗﺪ ﺗﺘﺤﻮﻝ ﺇﻟﻰ ﻏﻄﺎﺀ ﺩﻳﻤﺎﻋﻐﻮﻏﻲ ﺷﻌﺒﻮﻱ ﻹ‌ﻧﻌﺪﺍﻡ ﺍﻟﻤﺴﺎﻭﺍﺓ. ﻫﺬﻩ ﺟﺎﺫﺑﻴﺔ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ، ﻫﺬﻩ ﻓﺮﺻﺘﻬﺎ، ﻭﻫﺬﺍ ﺧﻄﺮﻫﺎ. ﻟﻜﻦ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻟﻴﺴﺖ ﺟﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺻﻐﻴﺮﺓ ﻳﻌﺮﻑ ﺍﻟﻔﺮﺩ ﺃﻓﺮﺍﺩﻫﺎ ﺷﺨﺼﻴﺎً، ﺃﻭ ﻳﻌﺘﻘﺪ ﺃﻧﻪ ﻳﻌﺮﻓﻬﻢ ﻛﺈﻣﺘﺪﺍﺩ ﻟﺸﻲﺀ ﻳﻌﺮﻓﻪ ﺑﻤﻮﺟﺐ ﻗﺮﺍﺑﺔ ﺍﻟﺪﻡ ﻣﺜﻼ‌ً ﻛﻤﺎ ﻳﻔﺘﺮﺽ ﺑﺎﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺍﻟﻌﺎﺋﻠﺔ ﺍﻟﻤﻤﺘﺠﺔ ﻭﺍﻟﻘﺒﻴﻠﺔ ﺃﻭ ﺍﻟﺤﺎﺭﺓ. ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻫﻲ ﺇﺫﺍً ﺟﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﻣﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ، ﻳﺘﺼﻮﺭﻫﺎ ﺍﻟﻤﺮﺀ ﻓﻲ ﻧﺘﻤﻲ ﺇﻟﻰ ﺍﻵ‌ﻻ‌ﻑ ﻭﺍﻟﻤﻼ‌ﻳﻴﻦ ﻣﻦ ﺍﻟﻨﺎﺱ ﺍﻟﻨﺘﻤﻴﻦ ﺇﻟﻴﻬﺎ ﺃﻳﻀﺎً ﺩﻭﻥ ﺃﻥ ﻳﻌﺮﻓﻬﻢ ﺃﻭ ﻳﺮﺗﺒﻂ ﺑﻬﻢ ﺑﺮﺍﺑﻄﺔ ﻃﺒﻴﻌﻴﺔ، ﻭﻟﻜﻨﻪ ﻗﺎﺩﺭ ﻋﻠﻰ ﺗﺨﻴﻞ ﺭﺑﺎﻁ ﻛﻬﺬﺍ. ﻭﻛﻮﻧﻬﺎ ﻣﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ ﻻ‌ ﻳﻘﻠﻞ ﻣﻦ ﺇﻧﺘﻤﺎﺋﻪ ﻟﻬﺎ، ﺑﻞ ﺍﻟﻌﻜﺲ، ﺭﺑﻤﺎ ﻳﻀﻄﺮﻩ ﺍﻟﺘﺨﻴﻞ، ﺃﻭ ﺗﻀﻄﺮﻩ ﺿﺮﻭﺭﺓ ﺍﻟﺘﺨﻴﻞ ﺇﻟﻰ ﺗﻘﻮﻳﺔ ﻭﺷﺤﺬ ﻫﺬﺍ ﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﻤﺎﺀ ﺑﺨﻴﺎﺭ ﺃﺭﻓﻊ ﻭﺑﻮﺳﺎﺋﻞ ﺃﺭﻗﻰ. ﻗﺪ ﻳﻨﺘﺞ ﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﻤﺎﺀ ﺍﻟﻤﺒﺎﺷﺮ ( ﻏﻴﺮ ﺍﻟﻤﺘﺨﻴﻞ ) ﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﻣﺒﺎﺷﺮﺓ ( ﻏﻴﺮ ﻣﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ ) ﺗﻌﺒﻴﺮﺍﺕ ﻓﻨﻴﺔ ﻭﺟﻤﺎﻟﻴﺔ ﻓﻲ ﺇﻃﺎﺭ ﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﻤﺎﺀ ﻗﺒﻞ ﻣﻤﺎﺭﺳﺔ ﺍﻟﻤﻮﺍﺳﻢ ﻭﺍﻹ‌ﺣﺘﻔﺎﻟﻴﺎﺕ ﻭﺍﻟﻄﻘﻮﺱ ﻭﺍﻟﺸﻌﺎﺋﺮ ﻭﻏﻴﺮﻫﺎ، ﻭﻟﻜﻨﻪ ﻻ‌ ﻳﻨﺘﺞ ﺃﺩﺑﺎً ﻭﻻ‌ ﻣﻮﺳﻴﻘﻰ ﺭﺍﻗﻴﺔ ﻣﺜﻼ‌ُ ﻭﻻ‌ ﻳﻨﺘﺞ ﻋﻼ‌ﻗﺎﺕ ﺣﻘﻮﻗﻴﺔ...ﻻ‌ ﻳﻌﺎﻟﺞ ﺃﻧﺪﺭﺳﻮﻥ ﻫﺬﺍ ﺍﻟﺘﺄﺳﻴﺲ ﺍﻟﻨﻈﺮﻱ ﻟﺤﻘﻴﻘﺔ ﺍﻟﺘﺨﻴﻞ. ﻭﻃﺒﻌﺎً ﻻ‌ ﻳﻌﺎﻟﺞ ﻓﻲ ﻛﺘﺎﺑﻪ ﻫﺬﺍ ﻛﻴﻒ ﺗﺰﺩﺍﺩ ﺍﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺍﻟﻤﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ ﺃﻫﻤﻴﺔ ﻭﻭﺍﻗﻌﻴﺔ ﻛﻠﻤﺎ ﺗﻔﻜﻜﺖ ﺍﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺍﻟﻤﺒﺎﺷﺮﺓ ﺍﻟﻤﺤﻠﻴﺔ. ﻷ‌ﻧﻪ ﺣﻴﻦ ﺗﺘﻔﻜﻚ ﺟﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺍﻹ‌ﻧﺘﻤﺎﺀ ﺍﻟﻤﺒﺎﺷﺮ ﺗﻘﻮﻡ ﺍﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺍﻟﻤﺘﺨﻴﻠﺔ ﺑﺎﻟﻤﻬﺘﻤﻴﻦ: ﺍﻟﻤﻬﻤﺔ ﺍﻟﺘﻌﻮﻳﻀﻴﺔ ﻋﻦ ﺍﻟﺠﻤﺎﻋﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﺤﻤﻴﻤﻴﺔ ﺍﻷ‌ﻫﻠﻴﺔ ﺍﻟﺘﻲ ﺇﻧﺪﺛﺮﺕ، ﻭﻣﻬﻤﺘﻬﺎ ﺍﻟﺤﺪﻳﺜﺔ ﺍﻟﻤﺘﻤﺜﻠﺔ ﺑﺈﻗﺎﻣﺔ ﺟﻤﺎﻋﺔ ﺳﻴﺎﺳﻴﺔ ﺗﺴﻌﻰ ﻧﺤﻮ ﺍﻟﻮﺣﺪﺓ ﻭﺍﻟﺴﻴﺎﺩﺓ ﺑﺘﺄﺳﻴﺲ ﺍﻟﻜﻴﺎﻧﻴﺔ ﺍﻟﺴﻴﺎﺳﻴﺔ ﻛﻤﺎ ﻳﺘﺒﻴﻦ ﻓﻲ ﺛﻨﺎﻳﺎ ﺍﻟﻜﺘﺎﺏ. ﺑﻌﺪ ﻫﺬﻩ ﺍﻹ‌ﺿﺎﺀﺓ ﻳﻤﻜﻦ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻝ ﺑﺄﻥ ﻫﺬﺍ ﺍﻟﻜﺘﺎﺏ ﺍﻟﺬﻱ ﺇﺷﺘﻬﺮ ﻓﻲ ﺛﻤﺎﻧﻴﻨﻴﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﻘﺮﻥ ﺍﻟﻌﺸﺮﻳﻦ ﻭﺗﺴﻌﻴﻨﻴﺎﺗﻪ، ﻓﻲ ﻣﺮﺣﻠﺔ ﺻﻌﻮﺩ ﺍﻟﻨﻘﺎﺵ ﺣﻮﻝ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺎﺕ ﻓﻲ ﻭﺳﻂ ﺃﻭﺭﻭﺑﺎ ﻭﺷﺮﻭﻗﻬﺎ، ﻳﻤﻜﻦ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻝ ﺑﺄﻥ ﻫﺬﺍ ﺍﻟﻜﺘﺎﺏ ﺳﺪ ﺛﻐﺮﺓ ﻛﺒﻴﺮﺓ ﺑﻴﻦ ﺍﻟﻨﻈﺮﻳﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﺘﻲ ﺗﻌﺘﺒﺮ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﺍﺛﻨﻴﺔ ﻣﺤﺪﺛﺔ ﻛﻤﺎ ﻳﻌﺘﺒﺮﻫﺎ ﺃﻣﺜﺎﻝ ﺃﻧﻄﻮﻧﻲ ﺳﻤﻴﺚ ﺣﺎﻟﻴﺎً، ﻭﺗﻠﻚ ﺍﻟﺘﻲ ﺗﻌﺘﺒﺮﻫﺎ ﻣﺠﺮﺩ ﺇﻳﺪﻳﻮﻟﻮﺟﻴﺔ ﺑﺮﺟﻮﺍﺯﻳﺔ ﻛﻤﺎ ﻳﻔﻌﻞ ﺫﻟﻚ ﻣﻨﻈﺮﻭﻥ ﻣﺎﺭﻛﺴﻴﻮﻥ، ﻭﺛﺎﻟﺜﺔ ﺗﻌﺘﺒﺮﻫﺎ ﻧﺘﺎﺝ ﺍﻟﻤﺠﺘﻤﻊ ﺍﻟﺼﻨﺎﻋﻲ ﻛﻤﺎ ﻓﻲ ﺣﺎﻟﺔ ﺇﻧﺮﺳﺖ ﻏﻠﻨﺮ، ﻭﺭﺍﺑﻌﺔ ﺗﻀﻊ ﻟﻬﺎ ﺗﻌﺮﻳﻔﺎﺕ ﺟﺪﻳﺪﺓ ﻣﻨﺰﻭﻋﺔ ﻣﻦ ﺳﻴﺎﻕ ﺗﺎﺭﻳﺨﻲ ﻭﻣﻌﻤﻤﺔ ﻋﻠﻰ ﺍﻟﻌﺎﻟﻢ ﺑﺄﺳﺮﻩ ﻛﻤﺎ ﻓﻌﻞ ﺟﻮﺯﻳﻒ ﺳﺘﺎﻟﻴﻦ ﻣﺜﻼ‌ً ﻓﻲ ﻛﺘﻴﺐ ﻋﻦ ﻣﺴﺄﻟﺔ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺎﺕ، ﻭﺧﺎﺻﺔ ﺗﺮﻯ ﻓيﻫﺎ ﻣﺠﺮﺩ ﺇﺧﺘﺮﺍﻉ ﻋﺎﺑﺮ، ﻛﻤﺎ ﻓﻌﻞ ﺇﻳﻠﻲ ﺧﺪﻭﺭﻱ ﻓﻲ ﺍﻟﻴﻤﻦ، ﻭﺇﻟﻰ ﺫﻟﻚ ﻓﺈﻥ ﺍﻟﻘﺎﺭﺉ ﺇﻧﻤﺎ ﻫﻮ ﺃﻣﺎ ﻋﻤﻞ ﺑﺤﺜﻲ ﺗﺨﺼﺼﻲ ﺃﻣﻴﻦ، ﻭﺭﺅﻳﺔ ﻧﻈﺮﻳﺔ ﺛﺎﻗﺒﺔ ﻻ‌ ﻳﻤﻜﻦ ﺍﻹ‌ﺳﺘﻐﻨﺎﺀ ﻋﻨﻪ ﻓﻲ ﺩﺭﺍﺳﺔ ﺍﻟﻘﻮﻣﻴﺔ ﻭﺍﻟﻬﻮﻳﺔ ﻓﻲ ﺍﻟﻌﺼﺮ ﺍﻟﺤﺪﻳﺚ."

المصدر: http://goo.gl/JFNMG (less)

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Jul 19, 2010 Khalid rated it 2 of 5 stars

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 imper...more

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Mar 11, 2008 Vip Vinyaratn rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: social science/history/philosophy student

Ben Anderson is one of the most cited and recited scholars in almost every department in my university. 'Imagined Communities' is a "must-read" for history and social science students, espeacially those who are interested in, and desire to comprehend the world after 20th century that is being shaped by, a metaphysical entities called Nation.

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Sep 10, 2011 unperspicacious rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nationalism, philosophy, state-formation, better-late-than-never

A few points that resonated:

1. Imagined Communities (IC) is a thoroughly modernist reading of nationalism(s), classifying their constructions into 4 types in chronological order: the original creole citizen-republican nationalisms in the Americas, European 'populist' vernaculars, the notoriously conservative 'official nationalisms' of dynastic rulers, and the polymorphous nationalist movements of Asia and Africa. Each wave has contributed to successive types by being copied and adapted to suit n...more A few points that resonated:

1. Imagined Communities (IC) is a thoroughly modernist reading of nationalism(s), classifying their constructions into 4 types in chronological order: the original creole citizen-republican nationalisms in the Americas, European 'populist' vernaculars, the notoriously conservative 'official nationalisms' of dynastic rulers, and the polymorphous nationalist movements of Asia and Africa. Each wave has contributed to successive types by being copied and adapted to suit new political contigencies. (Hobsbawm has made similar but less systematic distinctions between these 4 types prior to the publication of IC's initial 1983 edition (eg. see Age of Capital)). Presumably, part of IC's novelty in the 1980s lay in its single-minded dissection of print-capitalism's historical significance as well as the idea that circuits of pilgrimages (mostly once religious, now more bureaucratic and educational) could help to build the ideological foundations of new nations. More personally relevant - the substantial emphasis on Southeast Asia's states as richly textured empirical examples to be studied in comparative perspective with others outside the region.

2. While IC is, on one level, a genealogy of successive varieties of nationalisms which are distinctly modern and non-primordial, it also clearly inserts itself into a number of other debates which do not necessarily have anything to do with nationalism (the 2006 Verso english paperback edition notes some of these debates in the coda section entitled 'Travel and Traffic'). For instance, with regard to the perennial arguments over ideas vs. materialism, two out of three of the key broad factors responsible for the rise of nationalism(s) are in areas at the heart of Marxist and structuralist historical thought: capitalism's search for new markets, and state-building (the third broad factor being changes in print-language itself). In short, tracing out the history of political thought and discourse matters, but in Anderson's interpretation, materialism + statist politics are still the deeper founts of change for his chosen topic.

3. The book strongly argues against the notion that the modern idea of nationhood was 'born' in the France of 1789 (as is claimed by, amongst other books, http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/70..., pp. 26-28). Its origins are instead much more indeterminate, possibly earlier on the old continent: Hungary's Magyars in the 1780s, albeit no doubt less internationally influential than that of revolutionary France. More importantly, Anderson places very strong weightage on the view that non-European citizen-republican 'nationalisms' (Latin America 1810, North America's Thirteen Colonies 1776 onwards) influenced Europe's; transmitted back via print-capitalism, no less. At the very least this downplays the purported singular significance of the French Revolution for subsequent nationalisms in 19th Century Europe.(80-82)

4. Chapter 10's examination of the colonial state's triumvirate of instruments used to govern, dominate and instill political authority (the census, map and museum), have immediate parallels with James Scott's extended polemic concerning the oversimplifying, high modernist state (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20...). However, neither book investigates whether today's international political economy is currently perpetuating and reinforcing new forms of neo-colonial interventions by stronger states and capitals, and what effects these have on weaker states around the world, not to mention the latter's own nation-building projects.

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Oct 18, 2009 Manuel rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

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Standard work on the origins of nationalism. "Creole Pioneers" is a revealing chapter. It demonstrates that nationalism is not language or ethnic based. Just look at what happened in the Spanish-American revolutions from 1806-1821.

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Apr 22, 2012 Rafi Srik'inra rated it 5 of 5 stars

A very insightful literature by Prof. Emeritus Benedict Anderson. The book tells us of the importance of Nationalism in a very new aspect and a way of looking at it, for example the author introducing a new concept of 'state of mind' in an imagined community rather than the community that extremely considered sentiment of ties of blood relationship, history, culture and identity are of importance. I met him once and interviewed him too in the conference in 2009 which he told me that most of his...more

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Jul 26, 2011 Michelle rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: academic, politics, linguistics, history

Having not been schooled too much in political science but heavily in Linguistics and languages, I found Arnold's thesis on the origin of nationalism, relying heavily on an imagined linguistic community through the rise of print-capitalism (i.e. nations are younger than you would think) to be quite eye-opening. It was intuitive to me that most national communities are somewhat artificial projections (granfalloon, anyone?) but the deconstruction and analysis of the concept were a fascinating argu...more

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Apr 10, 2013 Matt Ely rated it 5 of 5 stars

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An excellent and simple account of the ways in which societies only very recently started to define themselves according to their nationhood. How did these arbitrary lines in the sand become emotional touchstones for billions of people? How do people unhesitatingly die for their countries? I sound a bit like a book jacket here, but I really think that the book comes to believable conclusions that honestly changed my outlook on international politics. There are a few formulas that, again and agai...more

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