"can Nations Be Anything Other Than Imagined Communities?"

Can nations be anything other than 'imagined communities'? Any attempt to evaluate the concept of 'nation', or the associated notions of 'nationhood' and 'nationalism' must first acknowledge the concept of 'ethnicity'. Ethnicity is often discussed without precise definition, for the most part due to complexity and nuances that are not apparent at first glance. Ethnicity is commonly characterized as a claim to cultural consistency within a particular group of people, achievable through a combination of common history, blood, language, phenotype and/or religion. This 'ethnic group' is held as possessing a unique identity distinctive from that of other 'ethnic groups'. Two problems immediately arise; the first being the issue of how cultural homogeny can be defined 'within a group' when it is the degree of acceptable divergence from homogeneity is itself the definition of the group. The second is consideration that the socio-cultural boundaries by which 'ethnic groups' delineate themselves are often surprisingly insubstantial - for example, in Moerman's ethnography of the Thai Lue, he notes that they are in many ways identical to surrounding cultural groups and that 'someone is a Lue merely by virtue of believing and calling himself Lue, and of acting in ways that validate his Lueness' (Moerman 1965: 1219). Early anthropology held a rather opposing view, built on the foundations of social Darwinism and essentialist primordialism, theorizing that ethnic groups are a natural state of human beings rooted in racial heritage and kinship. Weber levelled the first serious challenge to this conception of ethnicity, stating that ethnic groupings were not self-evident and biologically inherent, but künstlich (artificial) and formed around the axis of Gemeinschaft (community) (Weber 1922). In essence, ethnic boundaries were and are not 'natural', but are formed consciously or subconsciously by a group of people and subsequently self-applied to delineate themselves as an ethnic group.

This more sophisticated analysis is complemented by the understanding that ethnicity cannot be conceived of as an isolated category, a 'sound from one hand clapping' (Bateson 1979: 78), but as a product of interaction between individuals and groups of people. If a group existed in total seclusion, it would be meaningless to label them as an 'ethnic group'. Ethnicity is not a category but a form and process of continual definition of identity; primarily forged not by inclusive criteria but by the exclusion of the 'Other'. A process of dividing the world between 'us' and 'them' can only take place when multiple groups come into contact, for it is by creating a distinction from outsiders that an ethnic group draws its own boundaries. One must also consider that ethnic identity, by virtue of its exclusive properties, is often based on some measure of historical distortion or ignorance; for example, the Huron tribe in Canada which reshaped its history as a romanticized pan-Native struggle against the invasion of an evil colonial power, failing to note their initial voluntary contact and trade with the settlers and their long-standing enmity with the Iroquois (Roosens 1989). An anecdote concerning Roosens' decision to study the Huron details how many fellow anthropologists advised him not to on the grounds that their ethnic identity had been recently fabricated for political reasons and that they were 'no longer real Indians' (Eriksen 2010: 158). This, however, innacurately draws a distinction between 'real' and 'fake' ethnic identity, and raises a discussion that cuts through the various mystifications into the heart of the matter. If we go back barely two centuries, nearly every 'ethnic identity' on the planet is the product of ethnogenesis. Indeed, Hobsbawm (1983) flatly states in his theory of modernist constructivism that ethnicity is essentially a modern phenomenon where people felt the need to strongly define an 'ethnic identity' to give themselves a sense of place and direction in a rapidly globalizing and modernizing world. The definition of ethnic boundaries, as we have previously discussed, is not dependent on any inherent or natural fact, and the legitimization and acceptance of such boundaries as 'true' is merely a result of the passage of time which leads people to believe that the ethnic identity in question is immutable and everpresent. It is therefore not an innate self-definition that gives the concept of 'ethnicity' credibility, but the willingness of the people who apply it to themselves to accept it as being so.

The reason that ethnicity must be discussed before nation is that nationalism is broadly defined as a belief that 'political boundaries should be coterminous with cultural ones' (Gellner 1983: 1), i.e. the belief that the demarcation of states should be congruent with ethnic groupings. Ideology of a nation holds that the community is self-evident and natural, as well as 'inherently limited and sovereign' (Anderson 2006: 6). By definition, therefore, it must encompass a certain group of people over which it claims political authority, and excludes those who fall outside the ethnic delineation. The nation can never be 'more' than an imagined community; the cohesion of the nation and the political society it encompasses can never be logistically accomplished through face-to-face personal bonds and loyalty between individuals, as in the case of stateless societies (e.g. the Nuer), but by collective loyalty and adherence to the ultimately abstract and intangible notion of a 'national' (often built on an 'ethnic') identity. Anderson argues that nationalist ideology rose out of the ashesof 'three fundamental cultural conceptions (religious universalism, cosmological origins of power and temporal ignorance of humankind/the world's origins) [which] lost their grip on men's minds' (Anderson 2006: 35). The transition from a feudal agrarian society based on local community allegiance to a mass-based form of authority and hierarchy in the modern industrial state required a new form of control to bind together a vast number of people into a contiguous unit (Gellner 1983). Interpersonal bonds would be insufficient for this task where they had previously been adequate, due to the sheer scale of modern populations. Nationalism emerged as the solution to this problem; an ideology that solidified an 'ethnic identity', proposed the concept of a nation of people constituting this identity, argued that the state was congruent with this ethnic identity, and thus concluded that by nature of belonging to the identity people should be loyal to the state. The imagined community based on shared culture is an example of 'metaphoric kinship' on a grand scale, where allegiance is granted to a concept of homogeneity with a vast group of people, 'rather than to members of their kin group or village' (Eriksen 2010: 126). Nationalism is, by definition, an 'imagined political community' (Anderson 1991: 6) - despite the fact that 'nations' may hold their existence to be self-evident and 'rooted in the remotest antiquity' (Hobsbawm 1983: 14), they are in fact constructed and continue to be constructed by modern human groups. The 'imagined' nature of the nation can be explored through the efforts made to maintain it through the extensive use of symbology, ritual, tradition, attempts at physical manifestation and crucially interaction with ethnicminorities within the nation.

The national flag and anthem are prime examples of ritualistic nation-building practise. We can see the modern character of nation in the relative youth of the concepts - the first flag (the French Tricolore) only came into usage c.1790s whilst the first official anthem (God Save the Queen) only precedes the Tricolore slightly, conceived in 1745. National anthems are designed to evoke emotions of passion, loyalty and patriotism to the ideal of a nation, often invoking glorious battles or events, or the protection/blessing of some form of deity. Flags serve a similar purpose, providing a visual axis around which people can form a sense of national identity and cohesion; often, they may incorporate historical or semi-mythic imagery, such as the soapstone eagle standard of Great Zimbabwe present on the current Zimbabwean flag, or the Vergina Sun (a symbol of the ancient Macedon kings) on the Macedonian flag. Both are intended to highlight the perceived antiquity of the nation and underline the conviction that the nationalist ideology is natural and rooted in historical precedent. Sometimes, the signifiers of a 'national identity' are often exaggerated or deliberately constructed to enforce the idea that one nation is separate and distinctive to another. Eriksen provides the example of Norwegian nationalism following peaceful secession from the Swedish Union in 1905. Culturally, Norwegians were practically homogenous with the Swedes, but in order to announce their independence and national uniqueness the urban bourgeoisie set about appropriating aspects of life from remote valley communities and presented them as 'authentic Norwegian-ness'. Dress, music, food and language were all re-interpreted and set up as a model of distinctive Norwegian culture. It is crucial to note that many of these symbols and practises were totally invented, or rooted in the cultural precedents of other countries; such as 'the painted floralpatterns depict[ing] grapevines from the Mediterranean' (Eriksen 2010: 124). This again serves to illustrate the inherently fictitious nature of the 'nation'; but also its remarkable power to provide a cohesive framework of identity in which members of a nation feel deep attachment to a common identity, no matter how fabricated it may be. Of particular interest is the concept of 'banal nationalism' (Billig 1995), which relies not upon spectacular demonstrations of national power and pride, nor on purposefully designed physical manifestations such as monuments, but on subtle, everyday representations of the concept of the 'nation', such as symbols on money, divisions of news into 'domestic' and 'international', sports teams, etc. Because of their constant repetition in 'common' life and their understated, subliminal nature, they are able to insinuate and enforce the notion of a national identity, separate and distinct from other national identities far more effectively than brash displays of nationalist sentiment.

When analysing the connection between nation and ethnicity, one can reach a superficial conclusion. By simple definition, nation is simply when an ethnic group is politically aware. However,the links between the two concepts in reality are often far more complex, and encompasses multiple issues. The first issue that we must note is that the nation is not always based on ethnic delineation; multi or supra-ethnic nations being the obvious exception. Eriksen provides the example of Mauritius, in which the 'mosaic of cultures' is maintained in a delicate balance of equality by allowing each to express itself evenly and simultaneously, whilst using colonial symbols and heritage as the physical conception of nationhood, in order to provide an over-arching national identity that cannot be conceivably claimed by any of the ethnic groups therein (Eriksen 2010: 140). Singapore is a similar example, whereby children are raised with their 'mother-tongue' and 'homeland culture', but also with a regimented vision of a singular Singaporean identity, emphasized through National Day parades, the use of English as a common-denominator language and a plethora of constant visual symbolism and imagery depicting the multicultural unity of the various ethnic groups under a single banner. The phenomenon of colonialism leading to multi-ethnic nationalism is also brilliantly represented by the disintegration of the Spanish Empire in South America and the subsequent emergence of new countries based on the administrative units of the Viceroyalties, which 'came to be conceived as fatherlands' (Anderson 2006: 53). For example, the current population demographics of Colombia are 58% Mestizo, 20% European, 14% African ancestry, and the remainder indigenous Amerindians. It would seem that these vastly different cultural backgrounds were too different to unite into a single nation, but this conception is evidently false. The origin of the Colombian 'nation' lie in its past status as a semi-autonomous, economically, geographically and politically discrete unit of the Spanish Empire, isolated from other bordering departments, such as Venezuela and Ecuador. Because of this separation, a national identity gradually formed, based on the common experiences and lives of people living in the Colombian department rather than and transcending the ethnicity of their origin. This pattern is reflected also in African states, although with the slight difference of unifying primarily indigenous rather than immigrant ethnic groups to form a nation.

Supra-ethnic nationalism has been so successful in creating an overarching identity that 'outsiders' fail to recognize the sheer diversity of a country at a glance; one only has to look at India, for example, to see an astounding patchwork of cultures, languages and ethnicities. To a greater or lesser extent, all states are multicultural. In fact, we can assert with some certainty that the vast majority of modern states are not mono-ethnic. This raises the question of 'ethnic minorities' and the various ways in which they are treated by the nationalist ideology created by the ethnic majority. Eriksen argues that nationalism can take three possible paths in dealing with the issue of what Gellner terms 'entropy resistant groups' (non-conformist ethnic pockets); assimilation, repression or multiculturalism. Assimilation refers to the cultural envelopment of an ethnic minority such that their identity becomes submerged and folded into the identity of the ethnic majority in an attempt to create a mono-ethnic nation. This tactic has been historically effective to the point that today we have essentially forgotten many of the subsumed ethnic minorities; for example, the Cornish identity in England, or the Provencal identity in France; their descendants are in essence indistinguishable from 'English' and 'French' people (Eriksen 2010: 149-150). The most contentious reaction to ethnic minorities is domination and repression by the ethnic majority. This realizes the inability to assimilate the ethnic minority, and combined with an unwillingness to incorporate them into a national identity, leads to a hierarchical system where the minority ethnicity is subjugated to a greater or lesser degree. The asymmetrical power dynamics created can vary widely in scale; on the relatively more benign end of the spectrum, we see a slight bias in society towards minorities, e.g. Japanese disdain for the Ainu, which is not enshrined in official law; to much more extreme examples, such as the brutal apartheid regime that existed in South Africa up to 1990.

Multiculturalism is the transcendence of ethnic nationalist ideology, allowing for a nationalist ideology which either acknowledges multiple ethnic identities as equally contributing to the nation, or holding ethnicity to be irrelevant to being a member of said nation. An interesting case is that ofthe 55 'official' minorities: Miao, Uyghurs, Zhuang, Hui, Mongols, etc. in China, where their status as ethnic minorities is central to the presentation of the modern Chinese nation (Gladney 1994). Gladney describes how, in various official ceremonies and celebrations, as well through historical or cultural films commissioned by the government, ethnic minorities play a part disproportionate to their demographic composition (around 8.5%). They are presented as eroticized (especially the women), exoticized, colourful, vibrant and free; but most importantly different from the ideal conception of the modern, sober, socially and economically advanced Han Chinese individual. Whilst not condemned as barbarians, minorities in the PRC are presented as in a more 'primitive' and less 'cultured' state of social development. The Han Chinese ideal is never explicitly stated, but it is byconfiguring the 'Other' in such a manner that the state subtly instructs its citizens on the proper norms of behaviour and appearance for acceptance as one of the Chinese nation. Ethnic minorities in this case serve not as a problematic issue for the nation, but as a vital manifestation of the 'Other' crucial to the creation and maintenance of national boundaries for the Han Chinese majority.

In conclusion, it is reasonable to assert that ethnicity, and its offshoot 'writ large' in political consciousness, the nation, are 'imagined communities'. Despite holding themselves to be self-evident and natural, they are in fact the product of past and continual construction through mediums such as symbolism and ritual. The nation is a grouping of individuals who will never see each other face-to-face and will never interact with every other member of the nation; yet cohesion exists because of their dedication and loyalty to the abstract ideological conception of the nation. In this way, drawing upon anthropological theory and ethnography, we can demonstrate that the nation is a political tool and a socio-cultural fiction that exists only when we believe it to be so.

Bibliography

Anderson, B. (2006) "Imagined Communities" 3rd edn. London: Verso Bateson, G. (1979) "Mind and Nature" New York City: Bantam Eriksen, T.H. (2010) "Ethnicity and Nationalism" 3rd edn. London: Pluto Press Gellner, E. (1983) "Nations and Nationalism" Oxford: Blackwell Gladney, D. (1994) "Representing Nationality in China: Refiguring Majority/Minority Identities" in The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol.53(1) pp.92-123 Hobsbawm, E. (1983) "The Invention of Tradition" Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Moerman, M. (1965) "Who are the Lue" in American Anthropologist, Vol.67 Roosens, E.E. (1989) "Creating Ethnicity" London: SAGE Weber, M. (1922) "Economy and Society" (translated on GoogleBooks)