“No” to nationalism won in Scotland yesterday and in Quebec earlier this year.
Now I need to see the same in Catalonia because that’s the one I really care about.
No to Nationalism
Opinions, art, debate
Opinions, art, debate
“No” to nationalism won in Scotland yesterday and in Quebec earlier this year.
Now I need to see the same in Catalonia because that’s the one I really care about.
Clarissa's Blog 
Россияне проголосовали за независимость Шотландии
http://marko19511.livejournal.com/1196176.html#comments
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You could just as easily argue that this is a victory of nationalism (British, Canadian) over localism. These cases are about competing models of nationalism not nationalism vs something else.
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People are choosing comfort, money, stability, security, etc. over a desire to wave “a flag of their own.”
In Quebec, it wasn’t that anybody were more into Canadian flags than Quebec flags. It was simply that life is so good, there is so much money everywhere that nobody was willing to mess with such a good system.
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—In Quebec, it wasn’t that anybody were more into Canadian flags than Quebec flags.
Apparently, you have not been to Cote-St.-Luc lately. 🙂 There are still two flags (Canadian and Quebec) on every lamppost on Cavendish and Fleet, since long time ago. Which to me is a clear message – we respect Quebec, but insist it is Canada. But there is a place in the end of Chemin de la Cote St. Luc where they apparently ran out of Quebec flags and each lamppost has two Canadian ones. 🙂
Cliff, am not sure I agree with “These cases are about competing models of nationalism, not nationalism vs something else.”. If one model of “nationalism” is much more tolerant to diversity and freedom of choice than the other – is the former really nationalism or already post-nationalism?
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“Apparently, you have not been to Cote-St.-Luc lately. 🙂 There are still two flags (Canadian and Quebec) on every lamppost on Cavendish and Fleet, since long time ago. ”
– I was speaking metaphorically. Hello, literary critic here! 🙂
“But there is a place in the end of Chemin de la Cote St. Luc where they apparently ran out of Quebec flags and each lamppost has two Canadian ones.”
– Hilarious. 🙂
“If one model of “nationalism” is much more tolerant to diversity and freedom of choice than the other – is the former really nationalism or already post-nationalism?”
– These local nationalisms keep cropping up precisely because the nationalistic thrust of larger entities is running out of steam. Catalonia and Scotland are attempts to revive the dying flame. History of nationalism is my most long-standing research interest. I’ve been researching nationalism for 13 years, and I find the processes under way today to be fascinating. I’m still afraid Catalonia will not say “no” to nationalism because they have a recent and very real historic trauma to build nationalistic feelings upon. But overall, the whole things is definitely losing steam.
Collectivities erode whenever you make individual rights achievable.
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Against Catalan, northern Italian, and Quebec independence because they are right wing ultimately. But the Scottish one was trying to break away from Thatcherite policies, was my understanding.
What is not clear to me is whether they have enough oil to be rich. I have heard conflicting reports and tend to believe they do not.
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USA and Canada should return to their British roots. God save the Queen!
And Ukraine should return to Russia! Hell yeah!
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And David Gendron should return to New Zealand! Yippee! 🙂
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“The parliament in Spain’s Catalonia region overwhelmingly gave its leader the power to call an independence referendum, a move that the central government in Madrid has denounced as illegal, just a day after Scotland’s own independence poll.”
http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/top-stories/catalan-mps-vote-to-hold-independence-referendum-1-3547520
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As I said, I fear that Catalonians will be the only geniuses who will chose nationalism at this late stage.
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An article in a mainstream press, which shares your views about nationalism:
Nationalists build walls to keep their people in and the rest out. They create ‘us’ and ‘them’. Friends and enemies. If you disagree, if you say they have no right to speak for you because not all Scots/Serbs/Germans/Russians/Israelis think the same or recognise their lines of the map, you become a traitor to the collective. The fashionable phrase ‘the other’ is one of the few pieces of sociological jargon that enriches thought. All enforcers of political, religious and nationalist taboos need an ‘other’ to define themselves against, and keep the tribe in line.
…
Sometimes foreigners see us with a clarity we lack. Britishness was immensely useful to immigrants and ethnic minorities. It gave them a space where racists could not reach them. No one could say that they were not ‘really’ British, because in multinational, multi-ethnic and multi-confessional Britain the ‘real’ Briton did not exist.
Last week The Times published a letter from a Jewish refugee from Hitler, who made my point for me. More by luck that anything else, she saved her life by receiving citizenship in 1939. When she applied for her first job, her employer asked her nationality.
‘English,’ she said as she embraced her new land.
‘No you’re British,’ he replied. ‘You will never be truly English.’
The best reason for voting “No” has nothing to do with pounds and oil. If Salmond wins, the people who want to check accents and bloodlines will everywhere be strengthened. Britain has had few successes recently but one has been pushing to the margins the small-minded obsessives who want to ask whether you are ‘really’ English or ‘truly’ Scottish. The margins are the best place for them. Let’s keep them there.
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/nick-cohen/2014/09/scottish-nationalism-turning-neighbours-into-foreigners/
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These isn’t my views. 🙂 When I talk about the nation-state on this blog, all I do is retell the knowledge that other people developed and disseminated and that now is the matter of a very wide consensus.
I would be very interested to know how the birth of nationalism and the XVIIIth century are taught in Israel.
“All enforcers of political, religious and nationalist taboos need an ‘other’ to define themselves against, and keep the tribe in line.”
– Actually, absolutely any identity does it in order to survive. So let’s not single out enforcers.
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\\ I would be very interested to know how the birth of nationalism and the XVIIIth century are taught in Israel.
At school, I only remember studying about the Springtime of the Peoples in Europe, and Jewish nationalism Zionism arising at the same time. Nothing about the things you tell about the nation-state, the Other, etc. Only heard them at your blog. However, I doubt mainstream American schools do a better job in this matter.
I don’t think secular mainstream Israeli schools are more propagandistic than usual American schools. National-religious and Haredi schools are another matter, but they too can be compared to faith schools in Europe and America, most likely.
As for universities, I suppose, they teach all those things. Again, like American universities. There are very Left and very Right professors, and sometimes one can tell who is who.
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\\ I would be very interested to know how the birth of nationalism and the XVIIIth century are taught in Israel.
I’ve already linked to Uri’s column about the education of Israeli school children from 1st grade to possibly visiting Auschwitz at high school:
http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1130062008
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Of course, I meant higher education. This stuff is too heavy for younger students.
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It’s not taught at high school not because it’s too heavy for 11-12 graders, but because of other reasons. On one of news sites, there was an honest comment (I paraphrase here from memory): “I don’t want our school children learning ‘objective’ history, I want them learning Jewish narrative of history. When religious become a majority, they will unsure that.”
I wanted to say it would be fine only for the more intelligent among 11-12 graders, then thought I was too elitist (*), but then decided the ability to understand this may not improve with age anyway.
As for higher education, not everybody goes there, and even among those who go most don’t hear a word about the topic. Unless one goes to study humanities, but even there it’s not a given, imo.
(*) Though it is often true, specially with an average high school teacher. Not to put down school teachers, I had great ones, but to bring such ideas to an average Israeli class, one must have a gift. Not everybody can be that talented, even if one would choose university professors for the role.
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““I don’t want our school children learning ‘objective’ history, I want them learning Jewish narrative of history.”
– Oh Lordy.
“When religious become a majority, they will unsure that.”
– I don’t understand this sentence.
“Not to put down school teachers, I had great ones, but to bring such ideas to an average Israeli class, one must have a gift. Not everybody can be that talented, even if one would choose university professors for the role.”
– It isn’t hard to teach in the least. Students love the subject because it’s so dramatic. What’s hard is making present perfect subjunctive exciting. 🙂
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\\ – I don’t understand this sentence.
“I want them learning Jewish narrative of history. When religious become a majority, they will unsure that.”
Meaning:
” When religious Jews (national-religious and Haredi) become the majority (of Israeli-Jewish population), they will make sure that Israeli school children learn history ‘correctly.’ ”
Of course, it’s only a comment of one person. However:
Israeli schools are divided into four tracks: state (Mamlachti), state-religious (Mamlachti dati), Independent (Haredi) schools (Chinuch Atzmai) and the Arab.
…
The proportions of pupils attending schools in the Haredi and Arab sectors are increasing; according to a demographic study published in 2009, Haredim and Arabs together will amount to 60% of Israel’s elementary school population by 2030. Haredim and Arab citizens are underrepresented in both the Israel Defense Forces and the workforce.
\\ – It isn’t hard to teach in the least. Students love the subject because it’s so dramatic.
Imo, many adults think it’s very hard and even impossible to teach the subject without
1. contradicting teaching the national ethos
and
2. hurting the degree of psychological preparation (motivation) for IDF service among high school students.
Some students may have a similar reaction: “Do you tell me not to be patriotic? Bringing Leftist values into the classroom?” May be, I don’t trust students enough, but think am right about the adults.
Personally, I would study this at high school with great interest, without becoming less ready to serve in IDF. If Israel needs a regular army and I chose to live here, I must do my part.
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