ANDERSON’S CONCEPTION OF A NATION AS AN IMAGINED POLITICALCOMMUNITY

Abstract

In  Benedict  Anderson’s  ‘Imagined  Communities’,  he  explains  what  a  nation  is  and  how its existence   came   into   being.   Following   Anderson’s   contention,   one   can   possibly   delve   into   the fundamental  question  of  ‘what  is  a  nation?’  Despite  the  various  views  on  the  idea  of a  nation,  the inevitable problem lies within the inadequacy of the  answer since there is no objective criterion that fulfills to the  definition  of a nation.3  But  generally,  by nation,  it  is  understood  and  interpreted  as  a political boundary where large number of people is linked by common elements like language, culture, ethnicity,  history,  religion  and  so on. Anderson on the other  hand, conceptualized a nation as “an imagined political community— and both inherently limited and  sovereign” .4  This imagination as  a successful activity was made possible with the advancement of print-capitalism. Print-capitalism, with the enrichment in the field of communication that takes the form of newspaper and novel has inked in the mind of the people filtering an idea of national consciousness. Hence, communication in terms of Anderson’s opinion plays a fundamental role in allowing people to picture themselves not as a disparate population but to see themselves in terms of a unified whole. The present paper is an attempt to specify and analyze some of the issues that has been undermined in Anderson’s  conception of a nation. The issues are articulated on two accounts—

(1) The importance of spontaneity of individuals in developing the sense of nationalism and

(2) The problem of hierarchy in the field information and communication.

The paper is structured into two sections and a conclusion. In the first section, the paper examines some of the shortcomings associated with the materialist fashion of articulating the concept of nation. And in the second section, the paper discusses on how communication to certain degree may fail to cause the arousal of nationalism among individuals.