(no subject)

[juliet]

If anyone out there knows anything about political sociology, maybe they can give me their opinions on whether or not "nationalism is an epiphenomenon of modernity". Or maybe I should just do my own damn revision.. :-)

The trouble is, I've been revising solidly for 6 1/2 weeks or thereabouts now. And it is *very* *very* boring. Which means that I get more and more easily distracted... Current distractions include looking for Palm Vx-s on Ebay (this will be my post-Finals present to myself, I have decided. Queries about whether I actually *need* such a thing will be parried by reference to the 5th, or would be if we had such a beast over here. My defence is that I've wanted one for ages); playing on news; this (cos it was *such* a good idea to start a journal in the runup to Finals); emailing everyone I know; and planning my imminent retirement to a small cottage somewhere in the middle of nowhere with a dog, a goat, and some chickens, to grow vegetables and live the life of a hermit.

I may, actually, not carry through with that last one. I don't think they do broadband connections to the middle of nowhere (what do you mean, hermits don't need broadband?).

Comments

[wcg.livejournal.com]

For what value of 'modernity'? Nationalism has been around for at least the last 1900 years, since the advancing borders of the Roman empire got people to thinking of themselves as Romans who would never set foot in the City. On the other hand, the Romans thought of themselves as quite thorougly modern as opposed to the Gauls and the Germans.

[juliet]

Good point - when discussing this in tutorials we didn't go as far back as that. The standard arguments I've read tend to refer back about 300 or 400 years, and argue that until the 18th/19th century "nationality" wasn't important to the majority. People would think of themselves as being from Brittany, for example, rather than being French. (England is usually granted as a probable exception to this, at which point Shakespeare gets quoted). Or even as being from rather than from .

I suppose the question is how much those in the Roman Empire really *did* think of themselves as Roman, rather than of their own home area. After all, it *was* an empire rather than a nation.

Thanks!

[wcg.livejournal.com]

I understand about the resurgence of nationalism after the mideval feudal period, but it grew out of people looking back to classical times. Sure, the Athenians thought of themselves as Atehenian rather than Greek, but Athenians living in the colony city of Mytelene considered themselves to be Athenian. To that extent, at least, national identity transcended regional borders some 2500 years ago.

Depending on where you went in the Roman empire by, oh, the time of Marcus Aurelius (~180 AD) the people were quite thoroughly Romanized. The residents of the Roman Province (Provence) in southern Gaul were proud of their Roman citizenship and close ties to the City. Likewise the people in Britain around places like Chester (aka Castra) which grew up as a Roman town around a garrison. Similar things can be said for the Roman provinces in North Africa and Asia Minor. Those people definitely considered themselves Romans, not Lybians or Britons or Gauls.

It was different in Germania, but that's because the Germanii already had a strong national identity from the time of their migrations and wars 200-300 years earlier

[juliet]

Thats' interesting - I must admit that my Roman/Greek history isn't great, so this is good stuff to learn.

Thinking about it, I suppose that several of the reasons for the resurgence of nationalism in the last couple/few centuries were also similar to those in classical times. There's a strong argument that states, as they increased the amount of centralized admin they had, encouraged developments such as national languages (ease of admin), and by doing so encouraged nationalist feeling. The same issues would have applied to the Greek and Roman empires. Not to mention the fact that you encourage people to obey your central administration by encouraging them to feel part of the entity that you're administering - again, true at both times. I suppose the Romans didn't have the impact of industrialism helping them along; but they *did* have a higher expectation of being able to travel than people did during the Dark Ages, which also helps in generating feeling for a nation.


(hey, LJ can be revision too... bargain :-) )

[wcg.livejournal.com]

I suppose the Romans didn't have the impact of industrialism helping them along

Moreso than you might think. There were a huge number of towns throughout northern Italy, modern day Switzerland, and southern France that were created by wealthy Romans because deposits of good iron ore were closeby. These towns produced weapons and armor in bulk as the legions grew in number from four to thirty. As demand for weapons fell off in the 3rd century, these places shifted their production to all manner of manufactured consumer goods. By the 4th century, the Roman empire was on the verge of an Industrial Revolution of its own, and only the invasion of the Visigoths stopped it from occuring.

You're also right about travel. Roman roads extended from Hadrian's wall in Britania to the Indus River in India. One of the oldest existing maps is a copy of a road map commissioned by Augustus' right hand man, Marcus Agrippa, which showed all those roads as of 9 AD. While they were built as military transport routes, they were tremendously important to commerce too.