Be Specific About Regarding Books Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (Revised Edition)

Title	:	Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (Revised Edition)
Author	:	Benedict Anderson
Book Format	:	Paperback
Book Edition	:	Deluxe Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 224 pages
Published	:	July 17th 1991 by Verso/New Left Books Ltd. (first published May 1983)
Categories	:	History. Nonfiction. Politics. Sociology. Philosophy. Anthropology. Theory

Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (Revised Edition) Paperback | Pages: 224 pages

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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 a 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 territorialization 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 develpment of Third World nationalism, while the other analyses the processes by which, all over the world, nations came to imagine themselves as old.

List Books To Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (Revised Edition)

Original Title:	Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism
ISBN:	0860915468 (ISBN13: 9780860915461)
Edition Language:	English
Setting:	South America Asia Africa

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Ratings: 4.1 From 10668 Users | 562 Reviews

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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

A now classic book on the origins of nationalism and how it became a global phenomenon. Within this presents the theories about the birth of nationalism, with particular emphasis on regional differences. Excellent book, essential for anyone who thinks outside the box. It offers several answers and you generates even more questions for further study of the issue.

As the original text on nationalism as an idea, you would think that this would be a better read. Indeed, the plethora of translations that the author catalogs in the Afterword written for this expanded edition, you would think it would be best thing on nationalism ever. And while it does have a few great ideas, it is a barely developed, almost completely nonsensical book. The first few chapters start out alright as he identifies native languages, bueracratic language requirements, and

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

Anderson has a good point about how language and the collapse of religious absolutism created nationalism but he fails on two points. First his language is haughty and over the top, including references to obscure stuff. I got most of them but others will be lost. Second he fails to elaborate on other things that caused nationalism to rise, such as technology, revolution, ideology, and warfare. Instead it is mostly presented as a matter of language and media. Also whenever he steps out of the

bias flag: I am a former student of Professor Anderson. More accurately, he was my undergraduate thesis advisor. I have a neutral memory of my sessions with him, which is to say I don't remember much; I believe he wore flip-flops, which I thought a bit unusual for 42 degrees north latitude. I do carry great shame, even to this day, from my underwhelming academic effort. In my mind, Professor Anderson, as navigator aboard my ship, bears at least some responsibility; if only he told me to ....

What makes this text well worth reading are his intriguing examples and the methodical way he develops his highly original yet relatively straight forward argument. What I found particularly useful were his marxist explanation for how print capital helped create conditions for a nation as an imagined community, his exposition of the fact that nationalism developed in the Americas before Europe, and the wonderful way he shows how colonial administration and education sowed the seeds of rebellion