The Summer School New approaches to the history of nationalism of the Research School Political History, will take place online, participants are informed. Registration is closed.

Topic
Nations are ‘imagined communities’ that are constructed through ‘invented traditions’. Based on the classical studies by Benedict Anderson, Eric Hobsbawm and Ernest Gellner, this still is the dominant modernist interpretation of nations and nationalism. Recently, however, various innovative studies have provided fresh interpretations of the rise and evolution of nationalism over the last few centuries. During the summer school, we will discuss a number of these perspectives and also explore how these can be applied in practice. Well-known experts will present new views on the early modern origins of nationalism, the role of banal nationalism, the concept of national indifference, the influence of the spatial turn, the rise of right-wing populism and the impact of nationalism on the decolonization process. The keynote speaker will be Siniša Malešević (Professor of Sociology, University College Dublin), one of the most prolific voices in the field of nationalism studies today. Although the geographical focus of the course will be on Europe, it will be possible to give a presentation dealing with other parts of the world.

Coordinators: Eric Storm and Diederik Smit (Institute for History, Leiden University)

Program