Narrating Empires: Between National and Multinational Visions of Belonging

Chovanec, Johanna; Heilo, Olof

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-55199-5_1

Cited by 2 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…The concept of ‘Empire’ is ‘commonly understood as a particular form of governing expanding geographical regions with flexible borders through vertical mechanisms of power and through the subjugation of peoples’ (Chovanec and Heilo 2021b, 11; see Münkler 2014, 16–21). Empires, however, can not only ‘be defined by means of legal, dynastic, historical or religious formations and foundations but should also be understood by means of the cultural “texts” written in relation to and about them’ (Chovanec and Heilo 2021b, 11). Empires are thus not only political, juridical and social entities but also complex narrations entailing sets of symbolic and cultural values and attributions.…”

Section: The (Post-)imperial Narrative As a Genrementioning

confidence: 99%

Literature and the legacy of Empire: Approaching Turkey’s post-imperial condition through Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

Chovanec

2024

Philosophy & Social Criticism

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How does literature engage with the legacies of Empire? This article examines how imperial decline and nation building are reflected in textual production after the First World War. With Turkey as a case study, it focuses on the post-imperial narrative as a form of narration dealing with the experience of imperial loss, political contingency and possibilities of national belonging. I argue that Turkey’s post-imperial condition is shaped by coming to terms with the loss of the Ottoman Empire, on the one hand, and a nationalising present embedded in the experience of Western-dominated modernity, on the other. Against this backdrop, I examine essays from the compilations Yaşadığım Gibi (1970, ‘As I lived’) and Beş Şehir (1946, ‘Five Cities’) by Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar, a key intellectual of the early republican era. The analysis of these post-imperial narratives reveals how Tanpınar tries to root Turkey’s national modernity in selected elements of the imperial past. For Tanpınar, continuity with (Turkified) imperial heritage is a prerequisite for a strong nation-state.

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Section: The (Post-)imperial Narrative As a Genrementioning

confidence: 99%

Literature and the legacy of Empire: Approaching Turkey’s post-imperial condition through Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

Chovanec

2024

Philosophy & Social Criticism

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“…The cocktail of glorification, romanticization and overt defense of the colonial past, characteristic of “post‐imperial nostalgia” (Chovanec and Heilo 2021) is not limited to the Dutch iteration of right‐wing nativism. Such attitudes toward historical colonialism are prevalent in other Western settings as well, and often surface at important political events such as the Brexit referendum and the Trump election shows (Russo 2020).…”

Section: The Past In Nativist Nostalgiamentioning

confidence: 99%

Nativism and Nostalgia in the Netherlands¹

et al. 2022

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This article scrutinizes the employment of temporality in nativist discourse. Looking at nostalgia in the context of contemporary nativism reveals that the operative temporality is not limited to just the past. The perception of "threat," central to nativism, does not only inform historical claims made by nostalgic nativists, but also refers to the present and to the future in which this threat is to be overcome. After defining nativism, the article focuses on nostalgic invocations of the national past. To what (imagined) times do nativists refer when they speak about the "good old days"? What exactly is perceived as attractive about those days? The next section deals with the dystopian and utopian invocations of the future. As for the empirical scope of this article, we focus on the two most influential representatives of the Dutch radical right: Partij voor de Vrijheid and Forum voor Democratie. We conducted a discourse analysis of textual and verbal material from the period between 2006 and 2021. By analyzing the entanglements of past, present, and the future in nativist discourses, this article seeks to enrich our understanding of the role temporality plays in the dominant debates about national belonging.

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Narrating Empires: Between National and Multinational Visions of Belonging

Cited by 2 publications

References 75 publications

Literature and the legacy of Empire: Approaching Turkey’s post-imperial condition through Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

Literature and the legacy of Empire: Approaching Turkey’s post-imperial condition through Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

Nativism and Nostalgia in the Netherlands¹

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Narrating Empires: Between National and Multinational Visions of Belonging

Cited by 2 publications

References 75 publications

Literature and the legacy of Empire: Approaching Turkey’s post-imperial condition through Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

Literature and the legacy of Empire: Approaching Turkey’s post-imperial condition through Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

Nativism and Nostalgia in the Netherlands1

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Nativism and Nostalgia in the Netherlands¹