The Romance and Reconstruction of National Identity in The Shadow Lines

Abstract

What are some of the consequences of imagined nationalism in a post-colonial world, particularly at the sub-national level? In Imagined Communities, Benedict Anderson argues nationality is "imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion" (Anderson 6). Edward Said, too, writes about imagined geography in Orientalism where the Orient is a mere concoction, an imaginary space. While Anderson discusses nationalism, nationhood and nation-space (all the while blurring the line between the terms) in a broader sense, Said limits his discussion to the Orient. Inarguably, the people of a nation do share a bond, a closeness that they cannot deny. However, the question Anderson and Said prompt us to ask is how authentic is that imagined quality of an imagined geography/community?