Imagining the Nation : - PowerPoint Presentation

1. Imagining the Nation: Ontological and Epistemic ObjectivityTomasz KamusellaReader in Modern HistoryUniversity of St AndrewsScotland, UKFriday, 9 June 2017Український Католицький УніверситетnstitutЛьвів

2. Nationalism & Modernity (1)AXIOMS OF THE IDEOLOGY OF NATIONALISMBelief that the Humankind is ‘naturally’ divided into nationsBelief that each nation has an inalienable right to its own state, not shared with any other nationBelief that the Earth’s entire habitable landmass should be divided among nation-states (Ergo, non-national polities are ‘illegitimate’ and should be liquidated)

3. Nationalism & Modernity (2)IMPLEMENTATION TIMELINETurn of the 19th c: First nation-states (USA, France, Britain, Serbia, Greece, Haiti, Brazil, Argentina etc) in W Europe, the Balkans & South America1871-1918: Nation-states in Central Europe1920s-1960s: Decolonization > nation-states across the entire globe1991: Breakup of the SU, the last non-national polity of an importance

4. Analyzing Nationalism (1)Nationalists believe that nations are natural and eternalCriticism 1: Nations are modern creations (no historical evidence of self-conscious nations earlier than some 2 centuries ago), See: Ernest Gellner, Liah Greenfeld, Eric J Hobswbawm, Terence RangerCriticism 2: Concept of the nation is a western idea formulated in the late 18th cCriticism 3: Western idea of the nation was imposed on all the world’s population through western imperialism, decolonization carried out in agreement with the ideology of nationalism, and because the postcolonial global order has been dominated by the west

5. Analyzing Nationalism (2)Criticism 4: Because all other models of legal statehood and politically valid group organization were sidelined, delegitimized and destroyed, nationalism became the first-ever infrastructural ideology of modernity (ie, accepted by the world’s all states, be it communist China, theocratic Iran or democratic Belgium. Now all the extant polities are nation-states, with the rare exception of the Vatican City State)Criticism 5: Hence, the current norm and perceived ‘normalcy’ of nationalism, typically (and anachronistically) projected backward in the past, and thus nations are proposed to be a ‘product of nature’ and, as such, even eternal

6. Nations: Imagined CommunitiesBenedict Anderson: Nations are imagined (1983)Does it mean that nations do not exist?No, they do exist, at present practically all people identify as members of nation X or YBut it is impossible to see, kiss or embrace the nation; let alone detect it with a telescope, microscope, weighing machine or any other detector used by scientists for probing into the material realityThe Question: What is the mode of existence of the nation?

7. Analyzing the Reality (1)BIOSPHERENOOSPHEREUNIVERSEMATERIAL REALITY = UNIVERSE + BIOSPHERESOCIAL REALITY =NOOSPHERE(Vladimir Vernadsky, 1925)

8. Analyzing the Reality (2)SEMIOSPHEREEXTRASEMIOTIC SPHEREMATERIAL REALITY = EXTRASEMIOTIC SPHERESOCIAL REALITY =SEMIOSPHERE(Yuri Lotman, 1984)

9. Language: What Is It For (1)?PREVAILING VIEW: For communication > utterances of a logical value (affirmative sentences, negations, questions): True vs FalseBUT: In the totality of all utterances, those of a logical value are a tiny percentageERGO: MOST utterances are NOT for communication > phatic (‘just to speak’; Bronisław Malinowski, 1923)J L Austin (1962) SPEECH ACTS: utterances that ‘do things’ > ‘happy’ when successful (effective), ‘unhappy’ when unsuccessful (ineffective)

10. Language: What Is It For (2)?Evolutionary (PRIMARY, biological) function of language > FOR BONDING HUMAN GROUPS (social cohesion) (Robin I M Dunbar, 1992), achieved through SPEECH ACTS, or utterances that ‘do things’SECONDARY function of language > COMMUNICATION (that is, conveying information), achieved through utterances of a logical value (true vs false)

11. Language: What Is It For (3)?FACE-TO-FACE human groups (all meet maintain relations with one another), TOTAL SIZE > 150 members (RIM Dunbar, 1993) > NOT-IMAGINED, achieved through INDIVIDUAL SPEECH ACTSNON-FACE-TO-FACE human groups (even over 1 billion members, never meet), IMAGINED into being when all the members successfully share the idea of their group (eg nation), achieved through COLLECTIVE (GROUP) SPEECH ACTS (NB: In both cases, language-bonding generates the social reality)

12. Language and the Reality SEMIOSPHERE= CULTUREEXTRASEMIOTIC SPHERELANGUAGE is a PRODUCT OF BIOLOGY (EVOLUTION)LANGUAGES are actualizations of the biological propensity for LANGUAGEHumans’ USE OFLANGUGES producesCULTURE= BIOSPHERE

13. Modes of Existence (1)Material (ontological) reality is visible to all observers (both human and non-human, including hypothetical extraterrestrials), and is detectable with the use of microscopes, telescopes, spectrometers etcSocial (epistemic) reality is ‘visible’ only to ‘those in the know,’ that is, to producers of the social reality, which is constantly produced and maintained through the use of languages(John Searle, 1995)

14. Modes of Existence (2)Opposition OBJECTIVE (existing) SUBJECTIVE (non-existent)From the ONTOLOGICAL perspective (of the MATERIAL REALITY) nations (universities, states or any other element of the social reality) are ONTOLOGICALLY SUBJECTIVE (that is, non-existent)From the EPISTEMIC perspective (of the SOCIAL REALITY) nations (universities, states or any other element of the social reality) are EPISTEMICALLY OBJECTIVE (that is, existing)

15. Ontologically Sub-/ObjectiveThe Sun, the electron or radiation are ONTOLOGICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING); from these elements the material reality is built (that is, matter and energy)Falsely or mistakenly proposed actually non-existent elements of the material reality (unicorns, yetis, ether) are ONTOLOGICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT)(Biological propensity for) LANGUAGE as part of the biosphere (a subset of the material reality) is ONTOLOGICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING)All elements of the SOCIAL REALITY (nations, god, fairies, states, universities) are ONTOLOGICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT)LANGUAGES (as actualizations of the biological propensity for LANGUAGE) are ONTOLOGICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT)

16. Epistemically Sub-/ObjectiveAll objective (existing) elements of the material reality (the Sun, the electron, radiation, LANGUAGE) are EPISTEMICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING) Falsely or mistakenly proposed non-existent elements of the material reality (unicorns, yetis, ether) may be EPISTEMICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING) if the majority of a human group act as if they existed, or EPISTEMICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT) if the majority of a human group acknowledge these elements do not existThese elements of the social reality in line with which humans act and believe that they exist (nations, universities, states, LANGUAGES) are EPISTEMICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING) These elements of the social reality in the existence of which humans do not believe (fairies, Greek gods, Mickie Mouse) are EPISTEMICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT)

17. Human WillThe existence of the material reality is completely independent of human willThe existence of the social reality is fully dependent on human will, or more exactly, on a human group’s willHuman groups through their COLLECTIVE (group) SPEECH ACTS (that is, shared believes, ideas, attitudes, goals etc) generate (make and remake) the social reality(NB: From the individual’s perspective, the social reality into which one is socialized [‘born into’], appears as ‘external,’ ‘immutable,’ and as ‘really existing’ and ‘independent of human will,’ as the material reality. This illusion imbues the social reality with the feel of ‘solid,’ ‘material’ thingness.)

18. Imagining the NationConcept of the nation, and its actualizations in the form of the currently extant nations belong to the social realityWhen human groups had not developed the concept of the nation yet (before the 18th c), it was EPISTEMICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT) When the concept of the nation, had already been formulated (in the late 18th c), it became EPISTEMICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING)When human groups did not believe that they constitute nations (prior to the 19th/20th c, depending on the world’s area), nations were EPISTEMICALLY SUBJECTIVE (NON-EXISTENT) When human groups began believing that they constitute nations (from the turn of the 19th c to 1991, depending on the world’s area), nations became EPISTEMICALLY OBJECTIVE (EXISTING)

19. Imagining Things and the Social RealityImagining is just another term for denoting a human group’s collective speech acts through which the social reality is being generated and maintained

20. Postscript 1: On the Material Location of the Social RealityAssumption: All the reality that we know is part and parcel of the material realityErgo, the social reality is part of the material realityQuestion: How is the social reality embedded in the material reality?Reply 1: the social reality is stored in the brain (neocortex, neurons)Reply 2: the social reality is successfully generated by a human group whose members act in line with some shared ideas stored in their brains

21. Postscript 2: How Do the Material Location and the Social Reality Interact?From the perspective of the species Homo Sapiens Sapiens, its biological (immediate material) reality is produced and determined by the process of biological evolutionOn the other hand, the social reality (culture) is the foundation of cultural evolution (change)Cultural evolution is secondary, as it is made possible by pre-existing biological evolution which is primaryBoth evolutions, biological and cultural, interact; however, ‘the clock’ of cultural evolution is much faster than that of biological evolution. For instance, the spread of a gene from one population to another, or of a genetic mutation across the species takes thousands or tens of thousands of years. The adoption of a new language by a speech community is usually a matter of 3 generations (100 years) See: Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza and ‎Marcus W. Feldman (1981); Robin I M Dunbar, ‎Chris Knight and ‎Camilla Power (1999)

22. AbstractIn the last century and a half scholars from different disciplines began to distinguish between the material reality (universe), the biosphere, and the social reality (semiosphere), as three important heuristic categories. In the latter half of the 20th century, the philosophers John L. Austin and John Searle proposed that language and its use (languages) enable humans to generate social reality. They also analyzed the mechanisms of the process. From another perspective, the evolutionary anthropologist Robin Dunbar offered an explanation of how language was selected in the process of human evolution, and argued that its primary function is group-building, that is, the generation of social cohesion. Drawing on these insights, the dilemma of whether nations exist objectively or are subjective entities can be resolved by analyzing this problem in the light of Searle’s distinction between ontological objectivity / subjectivity and epistemic objectivity / subjectivity.

23. See More on the Subject by T KamusellaNations in the Bubble of Social Reality: Language and All That (pp 1-21). 2016. Sprawy Narodowościowe. Vol 48. https://www.academia.edu/27505648/Nations_in_the_Bubble_of_Social_Reality_Language_and_All_That_pp_1-21_._2016._Sprawy_Narodowościowe._Vol_48Chto my izuchaem, izuchaia mir? [What We Study When We Study the World?] [translated from the English by A Mitrofanova] (pp 52-65). 2015. Vek globalizatsii. Vol 8, No 1. Moscow: Russian Philosophical Society and Volgograd: Izdatelstvo “Uchitel.” https://www.academia.edu/22105656/Chto_my_izuchaem_izuchaia_mir_What_We_Study_When_We_Study_the_World_translated_from_the_English_by_A_Mitrofanova_pp_52-65_._2015._Vek_globalizatsii._Vol_8_No_1._Moscow_Russian_Philosophical_Society_and_Volgograd_Izdatelstvo_Uchitel._