Nations and Nationalism

4 credits · Undergraduate

This course explores the history, politics, and recent literature on the formation of nations and the development of nationalism. Theories of the nation have moved from ideas of their essential, primordial quality through a moment of social construction featuring the processes of modernization to a more cultural, discursive approach emphasizing the role of imagination and invention. We will both develop a narrative of the emergence of nations and explore some of the ways in which social science has employed and developed the body of theory on nationalism, looking at paradigms taken from international relations, identity theory, anthropology, and various psychological theories.