{"id":10945,"date":"2017-01-12T08:28:23","date_gmt":"2017-01-12T16:28:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dminlgp.com\/?p=10945"},"modified":"2017-01-12T08:28:23","modified_gmt":"2017-01-12T16:28:23","slug":"imagined-communities-by-benedict-anderson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/imagined-communities-by-benedict-anderson\/","title":{"rendered":"“Imagined Communities” by Benedict Anderson"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth;<\/em> \u00a0(John 17:15-17a)<\/p>\n

\u201cThis world is not my home I’m just a passing through;
\nMy treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Summary<\/u><\/p>\n

Dr. Anderson proposed the following definition of a nation: \u201cit is an imagined political community \u2013 and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign.\u201d[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

– It is imagined<\/em> because ‘Or l\u2019essence d’une nation est que tous les individus aient beaucoup de choses en commun, et aussi que tous aient oubli\u00e9 bien des choses.\u201d[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

In other words, it is imagined because most members of even the smallest nations will never meet their fellow-members, yet in the minds of each there is an image of their community.<\/p>\n

-It is limited <\/em>because even the largest communities have boundaries. They do not believe that their own community will encompass the whole planet.<\/p>\n

-It is sovereign<\/em> because each nation dreams of being free and ruling themselves.<\/p>\n

-It is a community<\/em> because regardless of any inequalities that may exist it sees itself as a horizontal comradeship.<\/p>\n

Though this community is \u201cimagined\u201d it does not mean that it isn\u2019t real. Countless thousands of comrades have willingly sacrificed their lives for their nation.<\/p>\n

After defining what he means by \u201cimagined communities\u201d or \u201cnations\u201d, Dr. Anderson notes that they developed in the last two centuries. While many historiographical researchers would argue that nationalization began in Europe, Dr. Anderson believes it began in the Americas, in the United States and former Spanish colonies. Dr. Anderson reasons that \u201cprint-capitalism\u201d, \u201ccreole pioneers\u201d, and a new conceptual model of the national state (comradeship) led to nationalization.<\/p>\n

Anderson explains that nations emerged after two powerful belief systems were weakened: elite languages (Latin, Hebrew, Greek) and rulers who led with \u201cdivine\u201d powers.<\/p>\n

The \u201cprint-capitalism\u201d or the mechanical reproduction of printed matter enabled people to come together like never before in history and understand each other. They could now make themselves part of a community.<\/p>\n

What are the benefits of nationalism? Dr. Anderson believed that nationalism helps the community to feel solidarity for strangers. \u201cit is useful to remind ourselves that nations inspire love, and often profoundly self-sacrificing love. The cultural products of nationalism \u2013 poetry, prose fiction, music, plastic arts \u2013 show this love very clearly in thousands of different forms and styles. On the other hand, how truly rare it is to find analogous nationalist products expressing fear and loathing.\u201d[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

Reflections<\/u><\/p>\n

Dr. Anderson\u2019s book has gone through several printings. I have the 2016 edition. He kept the original text from 1983 pretty much in tact and added to it. His historical analysis would have remained the same up to that point. He added the unique parts that \u201ccensus, maps, and museums\u201d play in the imaginings of cultures. He also further elaborated on the concepts of parallelism and simultaneity in time in the forming of new nations (see below).<\/p>\n

I have to wonder what his thoughts were on the European Union. He certainly lived through the forming of it in the 1990\u2019s. (He died in 2015.) Then what would he have said about Brexit? Would he possibly think that the British were trying to re-establish their own idea of nationhood apart from the EU?<\/p>\n

I would have other questions for Dr. Anderson.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. He said that nations are limited and it is not possible for say, \u201cChristians to dream of a wholly Christian planet.\u201d[4]<\/a> But don\u2019t Marxists dream of spreading their ideology to the whole world? Maybe he is mixing \u201cChristendom\u201d up with \u201cChristianity\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Constantine and Charlemagne began \u201cChristendom\u201d. It is a subject for another time whether or not Christians should establish political nations. For now though I believe that Jesus died on the cross for everyone in the world no matter what nation they live in. Christianity spreads across all cultures and nations. And, by the way, the Muslims have stated publicly that they would create a Muslim world if they could.<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. I don\u2019t think that Latin, Greek, or Hebrew are completely dead. Yes, nations have modern languages, but I went to Latin mass until I was 15 years old. The reason given was that Catholics could go to mass anywhere in the world and be able to understand. Christian scholars still study Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Would Dr. Anderson like to have one single\u00a0language for the whole world? Would it be French maybe? Actually Dr. Anderson could read Dutch, German, Spanish, Russian, and French and was fully conversant in Indonesian, Javanese, Tagalog, and Thai. He claimed that he often thought in Indonesian.[5]<\/a><\/li>\n
    2. Dr. Anderson seemed so familiar with so many places in the world. (Chapter 6 especially seemed very global to me.) I looked him up. He was born in China to Anglo-Irish parents. His family had to flee to California in 1945 when the Japanese invaded. Then they went to Ireland. In the disruption over the Suez Canal he sided against the \u201cBritish Imperialists\u201d. At Cambridge he began his journey into Marxism and became an anti-colonialist scholar. However, if he had any homeland at all it would be Indonesia. (This explains the examples of Southeast Asia in the book.) Dr. Anderson died in his beloved Indonesia. Because I understand his journey, I appreciate his view better.Conclusions<\/u><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Terms like \u201ccapitalism\u201d, \u201celite\u201d, and \u201ccomradeship\u201d are typical for Marxist historiographers. Perhaps as a Marxist this life is all that Dr. Anderson thought there was. As a Christian I believe that we live in a sort of \u201cparallel and simultaneous\u201d world of our own. I have my United States citizenship and my home in heaven. (Phil. 3:20)<\/p>\n

      As I reflect on the concepts of nationalism I will remember that most of the people we will interact with have some sort of national pride. I hope to point them to a more permanent\u00a0home.<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      [1]<\/a> Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism <\/u>(London, Verso, 2016) p.6<\/p>\n

      [2]<\/a> “‘ But the essence of a nation is that all people have many things in common, and all have forgotten many things.”<\/p>\n

      [3]<\/a> Ibid, pgs. 141, 142.<\/p>\n

      [4]<\/a> Ibid., p. 7<\/p>\n

      [5]<\/a> What do you think about that, Stu?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      \u00a0I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; \u00a0(John 17:15-17a) \u201cThis world is not my home I’m just a passing through; My treasures are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[775,585],"class_list":["post-10945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-benedict-anderson","tag-imagined-communities","cohort-lgp7"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10945"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10945\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}