Nations and Nationalism
I. The most salient common theme, running through all three sections, isthe divergence between the way colonial powers view nationalism, and theway the conquered nations view it, if they view it at all. A. For the first part of a colonial period, the indigenouspopulation is often unaware it is being considered a nation; it is stilloperating under a more organic system in which things are not enumeratedand particularizes; in which places are not located according to scientificprinciples, and; in which the 'artifacts' used by a conquering nation todisplay the 'national' character of the colony are reduced to logos. B. Later in the colonial period, the indigenous people may separateinto two groups, the 'nationalists,' or those who militate against thecolonizer and the colonizer's ways, and nationalists who h
Human beings are reduced to counted heads. First, a colonizer attempts to define the characteristics of a'nation' on the basis of ethnicity, but that ethnicity might be based onparameters of the colonizer's own, and not on any identity the colonizedpeople would recognize. The second most common theme revolves around the way a colonizer'creates' national identity by defining it, particularizing it, and thenextolling it in a denatured form. The artworks and institutionsthrough which the population made sense of its own world are reduced toliteral representations of the real. Additional classification of themes A. Reducing multiple organic ethnicities lived in a traditional wayto a mechanical nationality lived by virtue of power imposed B. Making a realistic painting into a mechanical grid F. In this way, the colonizer displays the 'nationhood' ofthe place, although the place has lost some of its inherent cohesive valuein the process. Distilling generalization to particularization; exchangingorganic, intuitive alliances for concepts of country and national allianceson a grander scale. In terms of nation/nationalism, thismeans that those so enumerated and eviscerated of the life-forces they haveknown to date can either identify with the new 'created' nation, or becomevirtual pariahs, identifying with a nation (although it might really beonly a neighborhood, or a sect) that exists more visibly in colonialdocuments than in actuality.
Common topics in this essay:
Common Themes,
IV Additional,
national identity,
colonial period indigenous,
common theme,
colonial period,
colonizer makes,
period indigenous,
conquering nation,
indigenous people,
world reduced,
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Acceptance Essays
