This is a continuation of the piece I wrote in February on my trip to Morocco. At this rate, I’ll be finished sometime next year...

You can read about Day One here.

The scenery on the road to Marrakech was breathtaking. After leaving the last of Agadir’s suburbs, we drove through dry, but surprisingly lush, savannah for about half an hour, and got to see a good number of wild goats along the way. Then, rather suddenly, the Atlas Mountains opened up before us and we entered a valley. As we progressed through the mountains, the vegetation grew more and more sparse, finally giving way to desert on the other side of the range, which we reached after about an hour and a half.

At about noon, Luis, Syarif and I arrived in Marrakech. The historic, pre-colonial city centre, called the medina, is characterised by a chaotic maze of narrow alleyways, enclosed by a set of fortifications. This is where our hotel was supposed to be. Outside the medina, mostly extending to the west and to the north, lie the newer parts of the city developed under the French colonial administration.

When we told the cab driver the name of the hotel, he stared blankly for a few moments, and then declared, very unconvincingly, ‘Oh. Yes. I know that one. (Pause.) Yes.’ We got to talking about our plans for the rest of the trip. When asked how long we would be staying, Syarif, in all his eternal wisdom, started simply making things up and got us caught in a ridiculous spiral of lies. He claimed that we wanted to go back to Agadir early and spend the last two days there. This was not true; we were planning to stay until the last day, only returning to Agadir for our flight back. Hearing Syarif’s version of reality, the driver became visibly upset and went off on a rant about how superior Marrakech is to Agadir. He tried to convince us to stay in the city and do a hiking tour in the nearby mountains. He even pulled out his phone (while he was driving) to show us pictures of the trails. I had a horrible feeling that any minute he was going to start ‘making arrangements’ for us. Luckily, it didn’t happen. Syarif went along for the ride, happily acquiescing to all the man’s suggestions, and inventing even more nonsense to keep the conversation going.

The driver let us out somewhere on the edge of the medina and pointed us in the direction of our hotel. After he drove off, Luis and I asked Syarif what the hell he had been on about. He said all he had wanted to do was create a good rapport in hopes of getting better treatment. What kind of treatment? I still don’t know...

The ‘guide’ was still waiting for us just around the corner. In spite of all his convincing, we were determined that we did not require his services. I don’t remember what he said exactly, but I do recall very well that he spoke to us in English, with an accent which was still influenced by his native Arabic, but, remarkably, sounded very Australian. We kept walking, albeit slowly, hampered by Syarif’s heavy ‘Republic of Indonesia’ suitcase. We insisted that we knew where we were going, to which he retorted, with his long outback vowels, ‘Bullshit, you know where you’re going! I say bullshit!’ He followed us for a while, cursing us (we assume) in Arabic, but soon gave up.

‘Okay, then.’ I put the coin back in my pocket.

As the boy turned back to leave, he chuckled and declared, in a menacing tone, ‘Good luck.’

Our hotel, the Dar Salam, was a traditional Moroccan riad – basically, a rectangular house built around a lavishly decorated courtyard. These structures are inwardly focused islands of seclusion, designed in accordance with Islamic notions of privacy. Because the bottom of the courtyard receives very little sunlight, it stays cool, thereby acting as a sort of air-conditioning system; warm air entering the riad is cooled, and then flows upwards, cooling the rest of the building on its way out through the top.

When my friends and I went back out into the street, we were approached by another scallywag, this one wanting to sell us hashish. ‘I am businessman; I have good quality!’ he proclaimed. The boy was thirteen, at the most.

We spent the next few hours wandering through the medina, the core of which is essentially a single gigantic open-air market. Rather quickly, we learned to always keep walking and avoid eye contact with the shopkeepers. If one of them saw us even glance at his wares, he would start screaming at us, not just to come in and look, but to buy specific products. ‘Just looking’ wasn’t really an option. We did eventually stumble upon a collection of four or five shops in a riad, where the vendors were very friendly and not nearly as pushy.

For lunch, we ended up at a small restaurant a bit off the beaten path. Tajine is a Moroccan slow-cooked stew prepared and served in an earthen pot. It consists of small pieces of meat, usually lamb or chicken, seasoned with a vast number of herbs and spices, which combine to produce an absolutely mouth-watering sauce. We tried it here for the first time, and we were hooked. It was quite cheap too; the three of us ate for less than 100 dirhams.

After our meal, we explored the main square, Jemaa el-Fnaa. It is a chaotic, bustling place, filled with snake-charmers, storytellers, musicians, men with monkeys and row upon row of food stands. The excess of colours, voices and smells is a lot for the senses to take in. More than a simple tourist attraction, it is a truly lively place. Because of this function as a dynamic site of discourse and living tradition, it has been included on Unesco’s list of ‘Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity’.

When we finally did get to the centre of Gueliz, we found it to be rather like the marina in Agadir: full of affluent people, expensive European shops, and generally quite superficial and boring. It was interesting to see and compare to the medina though. The most obvious difference, aside from the architecture, was in dress; while traditional garb predominates in the medina, especially amongst women, most people here were dressed in Western fashion. I’m embarrassed to admit that, once again, we ended up at McDonald’s, as it was the only thing there that we could afford.

On our way back to the tent, just after entering the medina, a teenage boy in the street looked Luis straight in the face, started laughing and said, ‘Brother, you like the shit!’ He just kept walking, and didn’t care to explain what it was that he meant precisely, so we were left to guess. Luis was unnerved.

That was enough absurdity for us for one day. It was time to go to bed.

Days Three and Four are coming soon(ish).

As the title suggests, Liah Greenfeld’s Nationalism: Five Roads to Modernity (Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1992) is a modernist theory of nationalism, based on an historical analysis of nationalism’s development in five different cases. The nationalisms investigated are those which appeared in England, France, Russia, Germany and the United States, respectively.

Greenfeld begins by analysing the semantic transformation of the term ‘nation’. She posits that the idea associated with the Latin word natio, which originally denoted a certain ‘group of foreigners’ of common birth, evolved over time, thereby changing its meaning in response to historical circumstances. The first change was brought on by the founding of mediaeval universities, whose student bodies were organised into ‘nations’. Each of these represented the entirety of students coming from a particular vaguely defined geographical area. They kept in close contact during their studies, and upon finishing generally returned to the same places whence they came. While still at university, they were sent to church councils as representatives of their ‘nations’ to debate on ecclesiastical questions. These ‘nations’ were thus ‘communities of opinion’. Through these church councils, Greenfeld claims, ‘nation’ took on the new meaning of ‘political, cultural, and then social elite’.

The author claims that the ‘nation’ as we think of it today was born in England around the early sixteenth century. There, the term ‘nation’, understood to mean ‘an elite’, was applied to the entire population of the country, thus signalling that every Englishman was thought to be free and sovereign. It is important to note that it was the individual who was sovereign, not the people collectively, though he drew his sovereignty from his ‘national’ identity as an Englishman. Thus Greenfeld’s ‘Type I’ was born, which she refers to as ‘individualistic-libertarian nationalism’. It is this sort which the American colonials would later inherit and take to its logical consequence by applying it to their late-eighteenth-century experiment in anti-monarchical waywardness.

After appearing in England for the first time, nationalism began to spread. In all but the English case, the idea was imported from a different society, which was used as a model to be adapted to local conditions. Greenfeld explains this in the broad terms of a collective identity crisis, which stems from large-scale structural change in the form of ‘anomie’, a new lack of the usual social or ethical standards. She notes that nationalism develops from structural, followed by cultural, then psychological change, though the distinction, especially between the latter two, remains a bit vague and imprecise. The fact that a foreign ‘model’ nation was being emulated implies a feeling of inferiority in the society of the incipient nation. As such, this inferiority complex frequently, but not always, provoked ressentiment, suppressed envy and hatred, strengthened by the impossibility of satisfying those feelings. Whilst the new nationalism always drew on pre-existing cultural traits and traditions, it took on ‘particularistic pride and xenophobia’ in cases where ressentiment flourished.

In this way described above, two new types of nationalism emerged, both of which can be classified as ‘collectivistic-authoritarian’. Here, the nation is sovereign only when seen as a whole; its national will is collective and unified. This development coincided with a further transformation of the term ‘nation’, which, once societies outside of England had started to define themselves as ‘nations’, had also come to mean ‘a unique people’, that is, a nation unique from other nations by virtue of shared collective traits. The two conceptions of ‘nation’ correspond to individualistic-libertarian and collectivistic-authoritarian nationalism; however, Greenfield makes a further distinction amongst the latter. ‘Type II’ developed where the ‘civic’ aspect of English nationalism, the extension of nationality to all those willing to join the nation, was retained. These societies, which include the notable example of France, were driven to nationalism by anomie alone. ‘Type-III’ nationalism emerged where a great deal of ressentiment was present, as was the case in Russia and Germany. This nationalism is not only collectivist-authoritarian; it is also ethnically based. Since Type-III nationalisms are driven by xenophobia and focus on their own cultures’ greatness, they are unwelcoming to newcomers who seek to join the nation. As a result, nationality can only be inherited, and never changed. Individualistic-libertarian nationalism cannot be ‘ethnic’ in this sense, as its very essence is individual liberty; hence the freedom of each person to choose his national community.

Thus Liah Greenfeld offers her take on the emergence of nationalism and a corresponding typology.

Contemporary Catalan nationalism is a broad movement which comprises numerous disparate political programmes. What these groups all have in common is that language represents the very core of their ideology. Indeed, it is central to Catalan politics in general.

Most contemporary studies on nationalism are based on a modernist conception, whereby the nationalist phenomenon is seen as something relatively new, that is, in one way or another, a product of the social changes which have occurred in the past few centuries. If one accepts this premise, it follows that Catalan nationalism must be a dynamic force. It must have some history of development, in which language has come to play a certain role, a role which has likely been just as subject to variation as the ideology itself.

This paper seeks to answer the question: What role did language play in the development of Catalan nationalism in the nineteenth century?

The role of language in the development of Catalan nationalism in the nineteenth century

In Nations and Nationalism (2nd ed., Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2006) Ernest Gellner puts forth a modernist theory of nationalism, which explains the phenomenon’s emergence as a result of fundamental changes in the structure of society.

Nationalism, for him, is the demand that the political and cultural units, that is, the state on one hand and the nation on the other, coincide directly. The nation in this respect is a social entity united by a common ‘high culture’. The role and meaning of ‘high culture’ can be best understood by first taking a look at the way in which the author systematises human history. For now, it suffices to say that he bases his argument on a broad, purely anthropological definition of ‘culture’ as ‘a system of ideas and signs and associations and ways of behaving and communicating’, as opposed to the term’s frequent use in the sense of ‘high culture’.

Gellner divides the social history of mankind into three phases: the pre-agrarian (hunter-gatherer), the agrarian and finally the industrial, thereby focussing on the latter two in illuminating his theory of nationalism. In so doing he strives to avoid the idea of teleological development propounded by Marxism. In agrarian societies, the vast majority of the population consists of agricultural producers, who live generally stationary lives (in social terms). It follows that these groups are highly isolated from one another (‘laterally’), thereby resulting in extreme cultural heterogeneity, thus a large number of overlapping and intertwining ‘folk cultures’. Any kind of specialised knowledge is passed down from generation to generation. The ruling classes, be they aristocrats, clerics or military elites, spread over an area encompassing numerous ‘folk cultures’, conversely share a ‘high culture’ of their own, which is in turn different and very clearly demarcated from that of their subjects. It is often literate and associated with a language different from the vernacular tongues of the masses.

Nationalism emerges when agrarian societies become industrial. Masses of workers, in ever increasing numbers, now need to be trained in one the many new, rapidly changing occupations. Moreover, they are often required to be flexible in changing from one post to the next as circumstances call for. Whilst education in agrarian society is limited to learning a single trade in a specific cultural context, education now needs to be more explicit and consequently needs to make use of universal symbols and means of communicating. Most forms of work require the same general education (literacy in a common language to be used in further training and communication at the workplace, arithmetic, basic technical skills etc.), upon which a minimal amount of training specific to a certain trade can then be added. The new social and economic reality means, therefore, that all those belonging to an economic community need a common language and a common culture; industrialisation demands the universalisation of high culture. This in turn necessitates an educational system, which can only be supported by one kind of institution: the state. Nationalism is the demand for such a state, which is meant to impose one’s own high culture on the remainder of the state’s population.

After establishing what nationalism is and why it emerges, Gellner offers a typology of it. His scheme is derived from a system of three variables, each analysed for two groups. The variables are political power, access to modern-style education and cultural homogeneity in relation to the other group. It is assumed that one group is always in possession of political power, while the other is not, i.e. there are always elites. The final two variables can be either present or lacking, thus producing eight possible combinations. In the first two, the rulers have access to education while the ruled do not. Where the ruled are not culturally different from the rulers, the situation can be classified as ‘early industrialism without [an] ethnic catalyst’ (line 1). ‘Habsburg nationalism’ exists when the two groups are culturally dissimilar (line 2). In the next two cases, both rulers and ruled have access to modern education. When culture is brought into the mix, homogeneity represents ‘mature homogeneous industrialism’ (line 3), whilst heterogeneity leads to ‘classical liberal Western nationalism’ (line 4). In lines 5 and 6, the ruled enjoy modern education while the rulers do not. When there is no difference in culture, the situation is described as ‘Decembrist revolutionary, but not nationalist’ (line 5). ‘Diaspora nationalism’ is present when a cultural cleavage exists (line 6). The final two types are characterised by a complete lack of access to modern education. An ‘untypical pre-nationalist situation’ is in place when the rulers and the ruled share the same culture (line 7), whereas the opposing situation, one of cultural disparity, is ‘typical[ly] pre-nationalist’ (line 8).

Gellner contends that, because its goal is the imposition of a high culture, nationalism can only emerge when cultural differences are visible. As such, lines 1, 3, 5 and 7 do not count as nationalism. Furthermore, lines 7 and 8 can also be excluded (7 now twice over), as a complete lack of modern education precludes the existence of high culture. This leaves us with three forms of nationalism: Habsburg nationalism, classical liberal Western nationalism and diaspora nationalism. The first is an ethnic nationalism, whereby undereducated, repressed cultures seek to turn their low cultures into the high culture of a new state. The second revolves around achieving a state to offer political protection to an already existing high culture, as was the case with German and Italian nationalism. These two roughly correspond to Plamenatz’s (and Kohn’s) ‘Eastern’ and ‘Western’ nationalisms. But Gellner adds a third. Diaspora nationalism arises amongst cultural groups relegated to some specialised, but politically powerless, position. They become educated and develop a high culture of their own in an otherwise uneducated, agrarian society. Examples include the Jews, Greeks and Armenians. These three forms of nationalism, despite their differences, all have the same function of creating congruency between the state and the cultural unit.

Nationalism is a modern phenomenon linked to recent social changes. According to Gellner, is a necessary part of the transition from agrarian societies to industrial ones. While he regrets what he recognises as the some of its disastrous consequences, the author maintains that nationalism was indispensible in creating functioning economic units in the industrial age and keeping them together.

The first widely recognised genocide of the twentieth century took place from 1904-7 in the German colony of South-West Africa, present-day Namibia. What began as a series of colonial uprisings rapidly transformed into an attempt to exterminate the native Herero and Namaqua peoples, thus resulting in the deaths of up to 90,000 persons at the hands of German colonial troops.

Despite the severity of these events, and the obvious parallels which can be drawn to the Holocaust, the genocide is hardly ever spoken of in German public discourse. Indeed, Germany’s entire colonial past is rarely made the subject of discussion, except as a sort of curious footnote.

Why are the atrocities committed in South-West Africa excluded from the German culture of remembrance? I have just finished writing a paper, in which I have attempted to answer this question. The paper, written in German, is linked to below:

Die Abwesenheit des Völkermords an den Herero und Nama in der deutschen Erinnerungskultur