Posted: August 3rd, 2015

Imagined Communities: The nation, or why you still call Australia home

Imagined Communities: The nation, or why you still call Australia home

Photo source: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article68181.ece
Read article: (copy and paste the following link onto your internet browser)
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/black-and-white-twins/story-e6freoof-1111112395449

This week, we will look at the concept of the ‘nation’, its history, different perspectives about how it can be defined, and projections about its future. It will discuss the ways in which the ideology of nationalism portrays a territory as the natural, and often exclusive, home for a particular cultural group, and in so doing builds the concept of national identity. Starting with the American War of Independence (1776-1783), through the French Revolution (1789), on through German and Italian unification, fascist theories of blood and soil, the dissolution of Yugoslavia, and the end of the Russian Empire, we will survey events; but we will also pause to think more carefully about the imagery of the nation. While using a historical approach, the lecture will also consider sociological analysis and the anthropology of national symbols, such as the flag.

.Questions for dossier:
1. How is the nation reproduced?
2. Consider the above case of twins born in Queensland in 2006. What would you say was their (a) nationality? (b) race (c) ethnicity?
3. Reflect on your own national identity, race and ethnicity. How do you know where you belong?