1988 The University of North Carolina Press
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Zelinsky, Wilbur, 1921
Nation into state: the shifting symbolic foundations of American nationalism / Wilbur Zelinsky.
p. cm.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-8078-6750-0 (alk. paper)
1. NationalismUnited StatesHistory.
2. PatriotismUnited StatesHistory.
3. Signs and symbolsUnited States.
4. United StatesCivilization. I. Title.
E 169.1.239 1988 88-4211
973dc19 CIP
APOLOGIA PRO SUO LIBRO
When I began this project six years ago, I had no clear idea of its outcome. The root cause is a lifelong, insatiable curiosity about all aspects of the American scene, but, more recently and particularly, the conviction that it is essential to know as much as possible about nationalism and its symbols if one is to make the maximum amount of sense out of the past or present United States.
The initial intention was to examine a large number of countries, comparing their nationalistic practices with those of my native land. But it quickly became apparent that such an ambitious work plan far exceeded my grasp. The relevant literature is spotty, and the effort to fill in the gaps in field and library would have been prohibitively expensive in terms of time and money and well beyond my finite linguistic capabilities. Realistically, then, what I had thought of doing may be very much worth doing, but is actually a lifelong program for some obstinate young scholar. At this stage in my career I was obliged to limit scrutiny to the United Statesand to Canada, the only other country where my ignorance is not totally scandalous. For reasons of internal coherence in the final product, a chapter in the first draft that dealt with Canada does not appear in this volume, but may eventually see the light of day elsewhere.
The initial approach to the data was naive. I had no idea where they would lead or what sort of grand scheme, if any, might materialize. As the evidence accumulated, I began to be deeply troubled by contradictory trends in the historical development of certain nationalistic items. Only after much painful cogitation did I hit upon the rather obvious formula that strikes me as the only possible way to interpret the life history of nationalism in the United States. The title of this work telegraphs my discovery, one that is spelled out in greatest detail toward the end of .
Many of the inadequacies in a volume conceived in a fit of foolrushery can be ascribed to my mere smattering of knowledge and lack of technical skills in the various scholarly disciplines that must be involved in any definitive treatment of nationalism. It is indeed a phenomenon that straddles a multitude of conventional academic areas, including history, geography, social psychology, theology, semiotics, political science, sociology, landscape architecture, and all of the humanities, among other items. I bring to it only my professional background as a human geographer, a fact that will be obvious to any attentive reader.
Because of the sheer immensity and diversity of subject matter, I have relied mainly on secondary sources. But in a few instances, notably in the treatment of flag, eagle, nationalistic place-names, and visits to nationalistic sites, I have been able to carry out field observations or exploit primary sources. Unfortunately, for many of the topics which I hoped to discuss in detail, the literature and statistics are either nonexistent or deficient in quantity or quality. I have flagged these deficiencies at the appropriate points in the hope that others will take up the challenge.
I lay down my pen (or, to be less anachronistic, switch off this electric typewriter) with the nagging sense of having only nicked the surface of an enormous subject. Even though I may not have succeeded more than very partially in attaining my goal, there is the likelihood that others will improve upon this effort, and that, in the meantime, I have suggested some of the ways in which an understanding of nationalism and its symbols can illuminate the much larger issues of societal change.
The fun part of this apologia is to acknowledge gratefully the special assistance received along the way from the following generous individuals: Richard Ahlborn, George F. Cahill, Daniel G. Connors, Michael Frisch, Alan Gowans, Helen A. Harrison, Deryck Holdsworth, J. B. Jackson, Michael Kammen, Victor Konrad, Peirce Lewis, David Lowenthal, Donald Meinig, Hugh Prince, Alan Rayburn, Carl Scheele, Beatriz Schiller, Thomas Schlereth, Daniel Walden, and Gladys and Hollis Zelinsky. A courtly bow to June Irvin, the most cheerful and sympathetic of typists. I owe a special debt of gratitude to the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and the Earhart Foundation for grants that helped make this endeavor possible.
Wilbur Zelinsky
University Park, Pennsylvania
NATION INTO STATE
ONE
SETTING THE STAGE
Nationalism is the reigning passion of our times. Here is what breeds the energy that drives the nation-state. And unless we probe the intense emotions at the core of nationalism, we cannot hope to comprehend the world order of nation-states governing us today.
Such assertions carry us well beyond the truism that all but the most remote or primitive (and cosmopolitan?) members of humankind today regard themselves as citizens of some 150-odd more or less sovereign states or nation-states, or that their lives and conduct are controlled in decisive fashion by the rulers of these entities. They ratify the elemental fact that such well-nigh universal acquiescence, even joyous acceptance of the nation-state system, would be utterly unthinkable in lieu of some powerful emotional commitment. Perhaps no one has stated the matter more pungently than George Orwell. One cannot see the modern world as it is unless one recognizes the overwhelming strength of patriotism, national loyalty Christianity and international socialism are as weak as straw in comparison with it (Orwell, 1953:192). Indeed, the allusion to religion may be more than a figure of speech because, as Carlton Hayes has noted, nationalism of the present age has an ever growing number of jealous and quarrelsome sects. It is also, as a whole, the latest and nearest approach to a world religion. Its cult is now universal, and is accompanied as well by African tom-tom as by European or American fife and drum (Hayes, 1960: 172).
In any case, it follows, quite logically, that if we are to have any luck in coping with the many crises that bedevil human societies along that entire worrisome continuum from the local to the global, it is not enough to consider the economic, military, and political aspects of domestic and international affairs. We must know as much as possible about the spirit or faith, that remarkable obsession we call nationalism, that fuels the system, for there is nothing more powerful, outside the realm of inanimate forces, than a triumphant idea.
