Re-Imagined Communities

Before taking this class, I had only vague conceptions of what the terms nationalism, transnationalism, and post-nationalism implied. My prior studies focused on state interactions have always been more or less based on theories of game theory and power/resource maximization strategies. These strategies rely on the concept of nation-state defined by territorial boundaries and a sovereign government and do nothing to link cultural interactions to political ones.

After reading the theories and case studies provided by the course, I now question whether or not the nation-state even exists. I think out of all the concepts, the idea of post-nationalism seems the most true for today’s world—that we are in fact living in a post-modern world where people’s allegiances to the nation-state vary. While I in no way think that the concept of nation-state is extinct (people identify themselves generally through citizenship, will rally around the flag in times of war, will vote in national elections, etc), the underlying concepts of Anderson’s nation—imagined community, sovereign, and bounded, are now much more flexible. As a result, an imagined community does not have to be defined by borders (be them territorial or cultural) but can be more defined by ideologies (such as terrorism, environmentalism, feminism) and the global institutions that support these ideologies. Although few would identify themselves as an environmentalist first and American second or even as an Environmental-American, the increase in “tribal” relationships around ideologies may cause someone for instance to lose their traditional identity as a citizen of one nation in order to go work in an NGO or international organization that supports their primary allegiance. This may not be the best example but it underscores the idea the nations are too interconnected now—through technology, economics, and nature, to really decipher themselves as one entity completely separate from another.

In another, unrelated note, for the sake of the closing blog, I think my favorite book in this class was McAlister’s Epic Encounters. I enjoyed the new way of dissecting media and art and looking for the “deeper” cultural meaning in movies, ads, campaigns, paintings etc. Media is all about attention grabbing in the moment and is reflective of how people perceive the time—it reveals people’s attitudes and primary concerns of the moment. Consequently, media offers a huge advantage as to assess the current state of the nation-state and I enjoyed McAlister’s approach on delving into this topic.

Lisa Duggan’s The Twilight of Equality is easily my least favorite thing we’ve read all semester.  I agree with a lot of her points: liberalism separates public from private and yet liberal politics often works through what is supposedly private, multiculturalism is problematic, etc.  What I really have trouble with is her obnoxious and contemptuous tone and the fact that she has caricatured “liberalism” – and spends almost no time outlining it – even as she castigates supposed “neoliberal” authors for not understanding all the nuances of each faction of left politics.

I also think her assessment of the vast neoliberal conspiracy is totally silly.  She presents the conservatives who protested the SUNY New Paltz conference as taking advantage of a lurid story to achieve a larger economic aim.  They did not care about the conference so much as see an opportunity to achieve a larger-scale political goal.  This is wrong.  The fact that private or “moral” issues have been yoked to a pro-business agenda does not mean that conservatives do not really believe in what they are saying about moral issues.  Conservative ideology makes the two seem related.  It seems that Duggan refuses to allow conservatives (neoliberals) to have convictions at all.  That isn’t really fair.  One thing I learned from my government classes is that ideologues can identify the contradictions in their opponents’ arguments but not their own.  This is Duggan’s basic problem.  She should go read Philip Converse.

In terms of wrapping up the semester, I especially appreciate the focus on arguments – identifying their strengths and weaknesses, pointing out gaps and trying to fill gaps.  That has been really helpful because I haven’t had many classes really get into the argument the way we did.  I also really appreciate the fact that I was able to work on my thesis.  Getting the input I got from our class helped me realize what wasn’t going to work and what more I could do before I start working on it next fall.

Although the ideas of transnationalism and postnationalism have been tossed around a lot in my other classes, I had never read as many authors or addressed the concepts as explicitly as we did this semester.  It seems like both of these concepts have been stretched to the breaking point and mean so many things for so many different authors that perhaps some new terms will catch on soon.  Of those theories, I was most convinced by Ngai and Briggs’ versions of transnationalism and Buell’s version of postnationalism.

In terms of readings, I am especially glad that I read McAlister; I found her book really interesting, and it helped me shift the way I was thinking about my thesis.  I would give a solid thumbs up to everything except Fishkin (who I think is setting her sails with the wind and making some contradictory and unhelpful arguments), Borstelmann (who repeats himself a lot), and Duggan, for reasons already mentioned.   But overall I thought the readings were engaging and very applicable to other classes.  They were new to me as well, so I learned a lot.

In Twilight of Equality, historian Lisa Duggan argues using historical background that social and cultural issues are not separate from economic issues, but politicians have failed to make the connection between them, and that neoliberalism furthers the divide. She examines the ways in which the US has adopted policies that have shoved aside ideas of welfare and prosperity for all and opted for policies that promote capitalism and benefit the wealthy few. She claims, that although this maneuver was marketed as being beneficial to all, it was clearly for private interests. So, although the United States tried to say it was being “multicultural”, its economic policies toward distribution of economic resources, clearly illustrates its different goals.

Duggan, like many of the authors we have read from this semester has asked us to consider connections often not made in the examination of history and current affairs. For her it’s the connections between economic policy and social policy, for others it’s the connection between domestic relations and foreign relations. It has been our goal this year to examine the connections that are sometimes ignored and we have learned: foreign affairs are related to domestic affairs, economic policy is related to social policy, and what one country says might be different than what they do. Only by looking at both intention and action, can we see the complete picture.
Furthermore, looking at theories of nationalism presented by Gramsci and Anderson, theories on transnationalism presented by Levitt, Felicity Schaeffer-Grabiel, Shelley Fischer Fischcan and Mae Ngai, and at theories on post-nationalism presented by Appadurai and Buell, offer us multiple points of views from which we can look at the idea of a nation.

Though at times, there were theories presented that seemed conflicting, what was most important was that they each taught us something about deconstructing an argument, testing its validity and applicability, and building on them. I look forward to working on my project proposal and actually seeing it through, partially because I like the ideas that were presented in this class and feel as if I can use some of them to further my work.

Finally, as I am sure this question will come up at some point, the readings were all very interesting. Yet, if I had to pick my favorite from them, I would have to say, I enjoyed our readings on transnationalism. I liked reading Ngai last semester and enjoyed her point of view on transnationalism especially concerning others’ agencies. I also really enjoyed reading Richard Rodriguez’s story, however I felt I was too distracted by some of its others themes to really notice its relationship to our class. I enjoyed it, but didn’t read it in the context I was supposed to. It might have also been more powerful to read excerpts from his other autobiographies. Overall, I enjoyed the monographs we read in class and found they all lent to the class discussions.

I had always thought myself well read on the Presidents, politics, and history of the United States post 1945, but I was pleasantly surprised by how much I learned this year. I also appreciated that I found our discussions and our readings applicable to other classes as well.

McAlister’s main purpose for writing this book and examining these case studies was to analyze the role culture plays in constructing a people’s social and political world. Her argument is that culture is not only a part of history, but as she says, “the field of culture is history-in-the-making” (307). I don’t think I ever doubted her theory or ever saw any serious flaws in it either. I simply felt her cultural references and case studies she explored in the first half of her book were a little hard me to follow, a little outdated.        However, with the second half of the book dealing with a United States and Middle East post 1970, many of her cultural references are much more familiar and meaningful to me. Also in light of reading Hunger of Memory and the articles from Buelle and Apparudai on post-nationalism, some of her arguments have more appeal.
Her examination of Betty Mahmoody’s story, Not Without My Daughter, story particularly out to me. I never read the books, but I was very young when I first saw the film adaption starring Sally Field. I remember how much viewing that movie created my perception of the Middle East and more than that, the perception of all Islamic countries. I was certainly not old enough to note like McAlister does, the fact that Betty by feeling the necessity to clean and cook “properly” is almost equally as subservient as the Iranian women. Nor was I familiar enough with Iran’s history especially at the time the movie was set, as McAlister notes, most Americans were not. I was young, unfamiliar with the Middle East as a whole, and viewed the film as a representation of the Middle East in its most general form. What’s more, never once did I hear anyone bring up the arguments McAlister is making in reference to early American captive narratives. The whole notion of comparing Betty Mahmoody to Mary Rowlandson, never crossed my mind.
McAlister’s  theory though relies on  communication as a tool for spreading culture. She emphasizes the role television played in the Olympic hostage crisis or the Iranian crisis. The images and the memories I have of 9/11 revolve around what I witnessed on television, heard on the radio, and later saw in iconic images captured. A few weeks ago, I was touring the American History Smithsonian with a group of classmates, and we started talking about our memories from that day. It’s amazing how many people can say they were glued to the t.v. It was something that united us. Yet, I wonder, today with an expansion options to get news, spread news, and interpret news, how will this change?
While McAlister only published this work a few years ago, I think her work is already starting become a little outdated. I can think of almost a million ways technology has advanced in just the last few years. It really is changing the ways in which we get our news. Nowhere in her book, does McAlister address Twitter, Facebook, or ireporters. While, yes, television is still the number one source for news and we are still glued to it daily, we no longer seem to have iconic images from tragedies anymore. When the earthquake in Haiti happened, I wondered what iconic image would remain as the symbol for that tragedy. Yet, I don’t think we saw one particular image stand out.

After reading the rest of Epic Encounters and the articles on postnationalism, the organization of the chapters – and the fact that McAlister included the chapter on black nationalism – makes more sense.  Americans come into contact with more immigrants, our relationship with Israel changes, separatism yields to multiculturalism, but the Middle East is equally important in all the phases, although it is doing something different ideologically for different groups at different times.  I think it made sense to go chronologically and trace some of these changes.

We’ve discussed multiculturalism before in class, with Rodriguez and also with Buell last week.  McAlister tries to bring the two together by connecting coverage of the military and the debate over the canon and multiculturalism in the university. I had not thought about the fuss about the canon and political correctness as a response to postnational circumstances, but that makes sense.  What’s interesting about the canon is that it is not primarily “American” but rather “Western” – so maybe the pro-canon people really have the idea of “Western civilization” on their minds, which could maybe be postnational (in Huntington’s sense), or prenational?  Maybe the idea is that the canon exists before politics (and before nationality).

Her argument about military multiculturalism sounds a lot like Buell’s – a nationalism can be built around the fact that the US can sustain a multicultural society and must lead (or police) the world.  Particularly potent when that multicultural society yields a strong military in its diversity.  But McAlister’s understanding of multiculturalism also ties in with Anderson’s argument that the nation is limited and someone must be imagined out – and if multiculturalism widens the tent for the nation, there must be someone that we still keep out.  I think the West-Islamic World binary is still holding today; I remember one story arc on 24 a few years ago where Kal Penn played an Arab teenager named Ahmed who chose terrorism even though a white family down the block was kind to him.  In one dramatic scene, he told the white family that they couldn’t even pronounce his name. The message was clear – despite the best efforts of its citizens, American society cannot integrate Middle Easterners.

McAlister also references Anderson and argues that TV watching during the Gulf War was a “hyperextension” of the role of novels and newspapers in imagining the nation (241).  At the beginning of the semester we talked a bit about how electronics changed that facet of imagining the nation.  One important difference is that reading a newspaper is basically an individual activity, whereas watching TV (or listening to the radio) is not.  In addition to the fact that the TV inserts itself into the domestic space in a much more dynamic way than newspapers and books do, people often watch TV in their homes with people they know – family and friends.  TV seems to have the potential to make the domestic sphere even more important as people connect their own family to the nation as a whole; their family represents the nation.  This ties in with McAlister’s examples of Not Without My Daughter and the focus on the families of the Iran hostages.

I don’t buy the argument that a homogenized television viewing experience erases social difference; although the networks themselves want to produce a product that appeals to everyone, different viewers will interpret that product differently and can resist the intended reading.  I agree with Anderson that the more important factor is the shared act of watching and the commodity we watch on rather than what’s actually being watched.  I also think it is problematic to say that public support for Desert Storm was so high because it was the “first postmodern war” in terms of wall-to-wall television coverage. It is difficult to gauge media persuasion (not a simple they say – we believe), and there are a number of other factors to account for – specifically, how well the war is going and how fast, why we are fighting it, etc.  McAlister sort of bypasses that whole body of literature (on media persuasion and media and public opinion).  But aside from a few small issues like that, I liked this book a lot.

McAlister argues that America’s national identity and construction are based upon our relationship with the Middle East. For her, the nation-state seems to be the primary mode of looking at cultures as she writes about narratives of how art, movies, TV, newspapers, and photos become more or less symbols that are vital texts for interpreting the identity of the nation. Expanding on Anderson’s idea that the nation emerged with print capitalism, McAlister represents cultural texts as contributing to the idea and definition of the “imagined communities.” Reading McAlister however after reading more about transnational and post national theory, I am more inclined to view many of her cases as pertaining to a post-national world. Many of her case studies depend on information flow which as both Buelle and Apparudai point out has contributed to a post-national world. The cultural information flow that she examines can be viewed perhaps then as not so much strengthening national identity but more tribal identity. As people in the United States have more options of how to receive and evaluate cultural information (movies to see, newspapers to read, books to buy, blogs to follow), does this change how the intersection between cultural contexts and foreign policy? For example, her last segment about the photographs in a post 9-11 world highlights the divergence of the nation. The toppling of Saddam’s statue for instance meant different things to pro-war and anti-war groups. While some saw the picture as increasing national identity other citizens may disassociate with the event. Furthermore, the picture meant different things around the globe as not all countries supported the U.S.’s mission in Iraq. Does the spread of the picture in this case then make it so anti-war United States citizens associate more with the views of other nations who may portray the importance of the picture differently?

Additionally I thought it was interesting to consider how a single symbol may mean two things for different nations. For instance the hostages in Iran were symbolic to both the United States and Iran. Although the hostages were viewed by both nations as symbolic of the United States, what those symbols actually implied and did for each nation was drastically different. What happens when nations share common symbols with clashing symbolic meanings? Is the same symbol equally defining to the national identity of both countries?