Reimagining The Nation-State: The Contested Terrains of Nation-Building (Contemporary Irish Studies)

This book assesses competing modes of nation-building and nationalism through a critical reappraisal of the works of key theorists such as Benedict Anderson and Eric Hobsbawm. Exploring the processes of nation building from a variety of ethnic and social class contexts, it focuses on the contested terrains within which nationalist ideologies are often rooted. Mac Laughlin offers a theoretical and empirical analysis of nation building, taking as a case study the historical connections between Ireland and Great Britain in the clash between 'big nation' historic British nationalism on the one hand, and minority Irish nationalism on the other. Locating the origins of the historic nation in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Mac Laughlin emphasises the difficulties, and specifities, of minority nationalisms in the nineteenth century. In so doing he calls for a place-centred approach which recognises the symbolic and socio-economic significance of territory to the different scales of nation-building. Exploring the evolution of Irish Nationalism, Reimaging the Nation State also shows how minority nations can challenge the hegemony of dominant states and threaten the territorial integrity of historic nations. This book assesses competing modes of nation-building and nationalism through a critical reappraisal of the works of key theorists such as Benedict Anderson and Eric Hobsbawm. Exploring the processes of nation building from a variety of ethnic and social class contexts, it focuses on the contested terrain within which nationalist ideologies are often rooted. Mac Laughlin offers a theoretical and empirical analysis of nation building, taking as a case study the historical connections between Ireland and Great Britain in the clash between'big nation'historic British nationalism on the one hand, and minority Irish nationalism on the other. Locating the origins of the historic nation in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Mac Laughlin emphasises the difficulties, and specificity, of minority nationalism in the nineteenth century. In so doing he calls for a place-centred approach which recognises the symbolic and socio-economic significance of territory to the different scales of nation-building. Exploring the evolution of Irish Nationalism, Reimaging the Nation State also shows how minority nations can challenge the hegemony of dominant states and threaten the territorial integrity of historic nations. The Naturalisation Of Nation-building In The Nineteenth Century -- English Nation-building And Seventeenth Century Ireland -- Political Arithmetic And The Early Origins Of The Ethnic Minorities -- Theorising The Nation -- Nationalising People, Places, And Historical Records In Nineteenth Century Ireland -- Social And Ethnic Collectivities In Nation-building Ireland -- Pressing Home The Nation -- Political Pamphlets And Provincial Newspapers In Protestant Ulster -- The Surveillance State And The Imagined Community -- Local Politics And Nation-building. Jim Mac Laughlin. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [272]-284) And Index. Traditional approaches to nationalism tend to exaggerate the antiquity of the nation-state while ignoring the 18th and 19th century origins of nation-building in western Europe and North America. Jim McLaughlin argues for a more grassroots, place-centred approach to understanding nation building in the works of key theorists such as Gellner, Hecter, Nairn and Smith, and puts forward an alternative dialectical model grounded in historical and geographical specificity Reassesses traditional concepts of nation building, to offer a new look at how and why nations are created