Violating prohibitions of tradition: real frontiers and imagined borders of nationalism studies

Abstract

The author analyzes theoretical and methodological problems of modern historiography of nationalism. Nationalism Studies are among the dynamically developing areas of Humanities. The author tries to answer the question why the nationalisms of the minor nations are more popular among historians than the nationalisms of the greater nations. The author believes that the origins of these theoretical and methodological contradictions can be localized and mapped in the early history of the academic Nationalism Studies. Marxist theories of nationalisms and nations became historical precursors of modern Nationalism Studies. The author believes that Marxist attempts to classify and typologize nationalisms, to imagine bourgeois nationalisms and nationalisms of the oppressed nations preceded academic classifications of nationalism as civil and ethnic trends and ideologies historically. The author suggests that some academic and pseudo-academic journals try to imagine the nationalisms of the greater nations as new subjects of academic studies, but this attempt was unsuccessful because the “new imperial history” actually became a private case of constructivism and modernism. The author believes that political conjuncture stimulates formal debate and inspires a new agenda in Nationalism Studies, but there are no real changes because the academic community is too stable and conservative.

Keywords

• nationalism, Nationalism Studies, modernism, constructivism, “minor” and “greater” nations