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<P>Eric </P>
<P>thanks for your commetns. I would just like to add few comments below.</P>
<P>"Maybe nationalism is even a 17th century Dutch invention, because the Dutch were the first to free themselves as a nation from the dominance of an emporer". </P>
<P>I have no problem nationalism being a dutch invention. This is not an issue. The issue is what you say below</P>
<P>"This doesn't mean however that the Tibetans in the 21th century, who also feel like a nation occupied by a strange army, have any knowledge of the becoming of the Dutch state or that you need to know this in order to understand what they feel. Many of them even cannot read!" </P>
<P>Now here, what I think, is missing and this is a glaring omission, is the role of imerpialism, the role of agency. The role of imperialism and imperial interests in promotion of Tibetian nationalism is missing in your account. Promoting and often buying charismatic leaders to promote these alien ideas (like nationalism) in the populace who can not even read! [just think of promotion Dalai Lama gets in Western press]. It is not that some truth of nationalism suddenly reveals on these 'illeterate' tibetians out of blue, thruth of nationalism is 'created' and promoted among them. It is strange that one can so easily despense with the probmlem of agency. This is how liberal and secular ideas including nationalism were promoted by British in subcontinent (for exmaple). It is all very well documented. </P>
<P>[ However, I am not implying that this is a unilateral process. Far from it. The elite imperialists create soon developes its own 'independent' agenda and also that same elite comes to believe in (at least some of the) ideals of imperialist (through the creation of a whole new education system etc) and hence the liberation movements etc. Hence Nathan was perfectly right in pointing, in another mail, towards this two way process but this two way processs is never equal]. </P>
<P>"I think you are too much influenced by Heidegger who thought that everything is historical and that philosophy is just as part of Western history as the battle of Waterloo. In 'Antropologie Structurale' Levi-Strauss mocks those who think that everything must come from influences from outside. Well, Levi-Strauss says it's very well possible that different people at different times in different places get similar ideas and I don't see how you can prove him to be wrong". </P>
<P>again i have no problem with what you are attributing to Levi strauss but whether this also applies to nationalism is an emprical question. And here I think it is hard to deny at least some sort of causal link between colonisation and the spread of nationalism and related ideas in colonoies afterwards. Here again we come across the question of agency and the question of the transformation of identities, which as Larry rightly pointed out with reference to Connoly, although they are historical thye are never that fulid and floating as it is assumed in these days.</P></DIV>
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<P>"I know Kurdish people who trace their identity back to pre-islamic times. I think the islamic identity is a myth (just as any identity)." </P>
<P>Well I know many of such Kurds, in fact one of my philosophy teacher was Kurd who had all but hate for his Islamic past. I think here again you are bit dismissive. Islamic identity, even though it is historical and hence contingent, is more deeply entrenched in Islamic societies than people often seem to think.</P>
<P>"The spread of western ideas may not be as important as you think. Science is western and it spreads because it's can prove itself to be effective, but maybe it also spreads, because it can be understood from within many ideologies".</P>
<P>I have no problem with this again, but this again is an empirical question and again I think you underestimate the force of western ideas and power in the modern world.</P>
<P> </P>
<P>" What however is spread much more everywhere are Western things. If Japanese wear skirts and suits with neckties in stead of kimono's and drink more Coca Cola then green tea, it doesn't mean that they have changed entirely. Even if they work in an scientific laboratory it might be hard to determine. I think it's quite difficult to find out in what way they have changed, because people alwayschange. You cannot say that people have been their own old original self all along untill an event X just made them to be something else". </P>
<P>here again you think that this coca cola or skirt thing or scientific laborateries have been spreading throughout the world without any reason, without any context [just think of recent feasco concerning Indian models winning one after another in world beauty contests. Several authros have noted the multinationals behind this deliberate promotion of indian models to sell in order to capture the big Indian market for their products. But while doing this they are transforming Indian culture. Indian is being Westernised as it never was in her history before]. Capitalism and Imperialism is the context and both are based on ideas which first originated in the west around its sucessful revolt against theology and Christianity and which are universalisable ideas and can be adopted and are adopted by the rest of world but these ideas need agency for their implementation and spread, both in the west and in the rest.</P>
<P>Cahnges are norm in human societies but changes are coupled with stablities and change from one identiy to another is not a joke. It is immensly a violent and often a painful process. You only have to read history of Europe right after the periods of industrialsiation and histories of third world colonies most of which have not actually completed this process yet.</P>
<P>i am sorry for being too long</P>
<P>regards</P>
<P>ali </P>
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<P>Eric </P>
<P>thanks for your commetns. I would just like to add few comments below.</P>
<P>"Maybe nationalism is even a 17th century Dutch invention, because the Dutch were the first to free themselves as a nation from the dominance of an emporer". </P>
<P>I have no problem nationalism being a dutch invention. This is not an issue. The issue is what you say below</P>
<P>"This doesn't mean however that the Tibetans in the 21th century, who also feel like a nation occupied by a strange army, have any knowledge of the becoming of the Dutch state or that you need to know this in order to understand what they feel. Many of them even cannot read!" </P>
<P>Now here, what I think, is missing and this is a glaring omission, is the role of imerpialism, the role of agency. The role of imperialism and imperial interests in promotion of Tibetian nationalism is missing in your account. Promoting and often buying charismatic leaders to promote these alien ideas (like nationalism) in the populace who can not even read! [just think of promotion Dalai Lama gets in Western press]. It is not that some truth of nationalism suddenly reveals on these 'illeterate' tibetians out of blue, thruth of nationalism is 'created' and promoted among them. It is strange that one can so easily despense with the probmlem of agency. This is how liberal and secular ideas including nationalism were promoted by British in subcontinent (for exmaple). It is all very well documented. </P>
<P>[ However, I am not implying that this is a unilateral process. Far from it. The elite imperialists create soon developes its own 'independent' agenda and also that same elite comes to believe in (at least some of the) ideals of imperialist (through the creation of a whole new education system etc) and hence the liberation movements etc. Hence Nathan was perfectly right in pointing, in another mail, towards this two way process but this two way processs is never equal]. </P>
<P>"I think you are too much influenced by Heidegger who thought that everything is historical and that philosophy is just as part of Western history as the battle of Waterloo. In 'Antropologie Structurale' Levi-Strauss mocks those who think that everything must come from influences from outside. Well, Levi-Strauss says it's very well possible that different people at different times in different places get similar ideas and I don't see how you can prove him to be wrong". </P>
<P>again i have no problem with what you are attributing to Levi strauss but whether this also applies to nationalism is an emprical question. And here I think it is hard to deny at least some sort of causal link between colonisation and the spread of nationalism and related ideas in colonoies afterwards. Here again we come across the question of agency and the question of the transformation of identities, which as Larry rightly pointed out with reference to Connoly, although they are historical thye are never that fulid and floating as it is assumed in these days.</P></DIV>
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<P>"I know Kurdish people who trace their identity back to pre-islamic times. I think the islamic identity is a myth (just as any identity)." </P>
<P>Well I know many of such Kurds, in fact one of my philosophy teacher was Kurd who had all but hate for his Islamic past. I think here again you are bit dismissive. Islamic identity, even though it is historical and hence contingent, is more deeply entrenched in Islamic societies than people often seem to think.</P>
<P>"The spread of western ideas may not be as important as you think. Science is western and it spreads because it's can prove itself to be effective, but maybe it also spreads, because it can be understood from within many ideologies".</P>
<P>I have no problem with this again, but this again is an empirical question and again I think you underestimate the force of western ideas and power in the modern world.</P>
<P> </P>
<P>" What however is spread much more everywhere are Western things. If Japanese wear skirts and suits with neckties in stead of kimono's and drink more Coca Cola then green tea, it doesn't mean that they have changed entirely. Even if they work in an scientific laboratory it might be hard to determine. I think it's quite difficult to find out in what way they have changed, because people alwayschange. You cannot say that people have been their own old original self all along untill an event X just made them to be something else". </P>
<P>here again you think that this coca cola or skirt thing or scientific laborateries have been spreading throughout the world without any reason, without any context [just think of recent feasco concerning Indian models winning one after another in world beauty contests. Several authros have noted the multinationals behind this deliberate promotion of indian models to sell in order to capture the big Indian market for their products. But while doing this they are transforming Indian culture. Indian is being Westernised as it never was in her history before]. Capitalism and Imperialism is the context and both are based on ideas which first originated in the west around its sucessful revolt against theology and Christianity and which are universalisable ideas and can be adopted and are adopted by the rest of world but these ideas need agency for their implementation and spread, both in the west and in the rest.</P>
<P>Cahnges are norm in human societies but changes are coupled with stablities and change from one identiy to another is not a joke. It is immensly a violent and often a painful process. You only have to read history of Europe right after the periods of industrialsiation and histories of third world colonies most of which have not actually completed this process yet.</P>
<P>i am sorry for being too long</P>
<P>regards</P>
<P>ali </P>
<DIV></DIV>
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