93261 - Narrations of Political-Cultural Crises in the Contemporary Age

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course students will recognise the various kinds of source and criterion for historical interpretation of nation-building processes, tackling constitutional, political, economic and social issues including the structures and models of education. Their methodological approach will vary according to the timescale and size of area, and will adopt a comparative perspective. They will be able to explain nation-building processes using comparisons and linkages, recognising interrelations among phenomena and processes differing in nature and scale, and using relevant sources and concepts. They will have a critical methodological approach and apply theoretical models of interpretation to social and institutional processes, displaying independence of judgment.

Course contents

The teaching will be developed, from a global and long-term perspective, in two distinct, though thematically intertwined parts. The first part (weeks 1-6), will be aimed at analyzing the main socio-political junctures that marked the evolution of national processes from the late 18th to the late 20th century. In the second part (weeks 7-10) - insights into specific issues concerning both the 19th and the 20th-20th centuries will be offered. The course will be started with an introductory part of a conceptual, methodological and historiographical nature, what will constitute the analytical framework of the complex of lectures. Schematically, the following structure will be followed:
Part I: National processes in global and long-term perspective
1. The concepts of nation and nationalism in history; introductory excursus of conceptual, historiographic and methodological character. Euro-Atlantic and European connections: "National" political revolutions and circulation of ideas, principles and practices (from the Glorious Revolution to the American and French revolutions, to independence movements in the Caribbean and Latin American areas). Analysis of social forces, political subjects and different political dynamics underlying the formation of modern nation-states in the West in global perspective.
2. The European dimension of the "spring of nations" and political implications: national processes between mobilizations from above and nationalization of the masses. The role of transfuges and exiles in the formation of transnational discourses; peculiar nation-building processes with special regard to the founding of the Italian and German nation-states.
3. National processes and modernization processes between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries - tensions and contradictions: from the case of Zionism to macro-nationalisms in the Asian and Middle Eastern area (from Japan to the Ottoman Empire via China).
4. The Great War and the harsh postwar period: geopolitical reorganization and the principle of territoriality in the postwar context; the “Wilsonian moment” and the initiation of national processes in colonial contexts. From the nationalization of the masses to the fascistization of the nation in the Italy of the Fascist Twenty Years.
5. Wars, anticolonial nationalisms and decolonization. Asia and Africa in the international arena: the principle of self-determination of peoples from the Franco-Indo-Chinese War, to the Algerian War and the role of the United Nations Organization in the international system of the Cold War.
6. The end of the Cold War and the revival of ethno-nationalism and new regionalisms. From European secessionist movements to Balkan wars to African wars (e.g., Rwanda) and resistance to globalization.

Part II: Thematic topics 

7. National processes, citizenship, and gender dimensions between “universal” principles, mechanisms of exclusion, and struggles for inclusion: from the Declaration of the Rights of the Citizen and the Woman (1791) to suffragist movements and political processes of acquiring full citizenship rights.
8. Socialism and alternative conceptions of nationality and citizenship: from the thought of Austro-Marxism (K. Renner, V. Adler) to “nativization” policies in the Soviet Union and other socialist contexts.
9. Europe and post-national constellations: reconfiguration of national conceptions and self-representations in postwar Europe. Debates and trends around visions of European federalism and constitutional patriotism. The idea of Europe in radical right-wing movements between the 1970s and 1990s.
10. Populism, sovereignism, nationalism, patriotism: mutations and re-actualizations of ambivalent semantic fields for understanding the present time. From "banal nationalism" to digital nationalism: media and reconfiguration of "imagined communities."

Readings/Bibliography

1.Bibliography for written exam:

Benedict Anderson, Comunità immaginate. Origini e fortuna dei nazionalismi, Bari-Roma: Laterza, 2018;

Hans-Ulrich Wehler, Nazionalismo. Storia, forme, conseguenze, Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 2002;

Yael Tamir, Le ragioni del nazionalismo, Milano : Bocconi, 2020

Michael Billig, Nazionalismo banale, Soveria Mannelli, Rubbettino 2018;

Anthony D. Smith, Le origini culturali delle nazioni: gerarchia, alleanza, repubblica, Bologna: Il mulino, 2010;

Berger Stefan, Chris Lorenz (eds.), The contested nation: ethnicity, class, religion and gender in national histories, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011

Florian Bieber, Debating nationalism: the global spread of nations, London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2020;

Elie Kedourie, Nazionalismo, a cura di A. Mingardi, Macerata, Liberilibri 2021 [1960];

Umut Ozkirimli, Theories of nationalism: a critical introduction, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000;

Anthony D. Smith, Nations and nationalism in a global era,
Cambridge: Polity press, 1995;

 

2.Bibliography for oral exam:

Andrea Avalli, Il mito della prima Italia. L'uso politico degli etruschi tra fascismo e dopoguerra, Roma, Viella 2024

Hakim Adi, Pan-Africanism: a history, London: Bloomsbury, 2018;

David Armitage, The declaration of independence. A global history, Cambridge, Mass.-London: Harvard University Press, 2007;

Alberto Mario Banti, Sublime madre nostra. La nazione italiana dal Risorgimento al fascismo, Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2011;

Raffaella Baritono, Elisabetta Vezzosi (a cura di), Oltre il secolo americano? Gli Stati Uniti prima e dopo l'11 settembre, Roma, Carocci 2011;

Christopher A. Bayly, Eugenio F. Biagini (eds.), Giuseppe Mazzini and the globalisation of democratic nationalism, 1830-1920, Oxford: Oxford university press, 2008;

Stefan Berger, Angela Smith (eds.), Nationalism, labour and ethnicity, 1870-1939, Manchester-New York 1999

Ida Blom, Karen Hagemann, Catherine Hall (eds.), Gendered nations. Nationalisms and gender order in the long nineteenth century, Oxford-New York: Berg, 2000;

John Breuilly, La formazione dello Stato nazionale tedesco, 1800-1871, Il mulino, Bologna 2004;

John Breuilly, Il nazionalismo e lo Stato, Bologna: Il mulino, 1995;

Rogers Brubaker, Cittadinanza e nazionalità in Francia e Germania, Bologna: Il mulino, 1997;

Rogers Brubaker, I nazionalismi nell'Europa contemporanea, Roma: Editori riuniti, 1998;

F. Bruni, Idee d’Italia. Da Napoleone al Quarantotto, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2021;

Marco Buttino e Giuseppe Rutto (a cura di), Nazionalismi e conflitti etnici nell'Europa orientale, Milano: Feltrinelli, 1997;

Marina Cattaruzza, (a cura di), Nazionalismi di frontiera. Identità contrapposte sull'Adriatico nordorientale: 1850-1950, Rubettino, Catanzaro 2003;

Marina Cepeda Fuentes, Sorelle d'Italia. Le donne che hanno fatto il Risorgimento, Torino, Blu, 2011;

Emilio Gentile, La Grande Italia. Il mito della nazione nel XX secolo, Roma-Bari, Laterza 2006;

J. Habermas, La costellazione postnazionale. Mercato globale, nazioni e democrazia, Milano, Feltrinelli 1999 (o edizioni successive);

Miroslav Hroch, Social preconditions of national revival in Europe: a comparative analysis of the social composition of patriotic groups among the smaller European nations, Cambridge: Cambridge University P., 1985;

Oliver Janz, Lutz Klinkhammer (cur.), La morte per la patria. La celebrazione dei caduti dal Risorgimento alla Repubblica, Roma: Donzelli, 2008

Rebecca E. Karl, Staging the world: Chinese nationalism at the turn of the twentieth century, Durham; London: Duke University Press, 2002;

Maurizio Isabella, Risorgimento in esilio. L'internazionale liberale e l'età delle rivoluzioni, Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2011;

Erez Manela, The Wilsonian moment: self-determination and the international origins of anticolonial nationalism, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007

rturo Marzano, Storia dei sionismi : lo Stato degli ebrei da Herzl a oggi, Roma: Carocci, 2017

Mark Mazower, The Balkans. A short history, New York, The Modern Library 2002;

Michael A. Morrison and Melinda Zook (eds.), Revolutionary currents: nation building in the transatlantic world, Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2004;

George Mosse, La nazionalizzazione delle masse, Bologna: Il Mulino, 1989;

Elena Musiani (a cura di), Non solo rivoluzione. Modelli formativi e percorsi politici delle patriote italiane, Roma, Aracne, 2013;

Patrick Pasture, Johan Verberckmoes (eds.), Working-class internationalism and the appeal of national identity : historical debates and current perspectives, Oxford-New York 1998;

Roberta Pergher, Dalle Alpi all'Africa. La politica fascista per l'italianizzazione delle "nuove province" (1922-1943), Roma, Viella 2020;

James W. Peterson, J. Lubecki (eds.), Globalization, Nationalism and Imperialism. A new history of Eastern Europe, CEU Press, 2023;

Rolf Petri (a cura di), Balcani, Europa. Violenza, politica, memoria, Torino : Giappichelli, 2017;

Jeremy D. Popkin, A concise history of the Haitian revolution, Malden, Mass.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012;

Lucy Riall, Garibaldi. L'invenzione di un eroe, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2007;

Federico Robbe, Vigor di vita. Il nazionalismo italiano e gli Stati Uniti (1898-1923), Roma, Viella 2018;

Paola S. Salvatori (a cura di), Il movimento nazionalista dalla guerra di Libia al fascismo (1911-1923), Roma: Viella, 2016

Marina A. Santoru, Politica coloniale e nazionalismo in Kenya : le donne e il movimento Mau Mau, Torino: L'harmattan Italia, 1996;

Ronald Grigor Suny, The revenge of the past. Nationalism, revolution, and the collapse of the Soviet Union,
Stanford UP 1993;

O. Ueberegger, All'ombra della guerra. Storia del Tirolo 1918-2020, Roma, Carocci 2020;

N. Yuval-Davis, Gender and Nation, London: SAGE 1997.

 

Teaching methods

The teacher will hold lectures to illustrate some major issues  related to national processes and the history of nationalism. The "materiale didattico" - see "Virtuale" platform - proposed to the students should be of support for their active participation in commenting and debating the readings (sources, articles or book chapters).

Assessment methods

To be considered as attending student, you have to attend at least 75% of the lectures.

For attending students, the exam will consist of two parts, a written and an oral, to be taken at two separate times:

A written test (50% of the final grade), preceding the oral exam, will consist of six open-ended questions on two books of your choice from those listed in the Bibliography for Written Test.
The oral test (50% of the final grade) will be on two books of your choice from those listed in the Bibliography by Oral Test.
For non-attending students, the same syllabus and exam procedure apply, but for the oral test, one source and two articles of your choice from the teaching materials uploaded on Virtual will also need to be prepared.

Mode of conducting the exam:
It is necessary to register for two separate calls, with respect to Part I and Part II of the exam. In order to take Part II, you must have passed Part I; the two parts of the exam may be spaced out in time; however, they must take place within the academic year of course attendance.
Part I of the exam consists of open questions, 3 questions per book, to be answered in 90'. The partial grade will be recorded on Almaesami.
At the roll call for the oral examination (Part II), there will be recorded the final grade, resulting from the average of the marks achieved in the written and oral examination. 

The following in particular will be assessed: expository ability (written and oral), accuracy in the use of historical concepts and analytical categories, mastery of the knowledge acquired, and the ability to reflect critically on the topics addressed.

Both the written and the oral test are intended to ascertain:
knowledge of general issues and more specific aspects with respect to the history of nationalism and national processes in the modern and contemporary ages;
mastery in the use of historiographical categories and concepts covered, awareness of historiographical approaches addressed in class and awareness with respect to the specificity of the sources used; expository ability in written form; the ability to synthesize and logically organize arguments; the mastery of appropriate vocabulary.

For each of the above criteria, the following grading scale will be followed:
Excellent (30 cum laude)
Very Good (28-30)
Good (25-27)
Fair (22-24)
Sufficient (18-21)

During the academic year, 6 appeals for Part I and 6 appeals for Part II of the exam will be guaranteed.

N.B.: Students with learning disorders and\or temporary or permanent disabilities: please, contact the office responsible ( https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en/for-students ) as soon as possible so that they can propose acceptable adjustments. The request for adaptation must be submitted in advance (15 days before the exam date) to the lecturer, who will assess the appropriateness of the adjustments, taking into account the teaching objectives.

Teaching tools

Audiovisual sources, documentarie or films will be proposed to integrate some lessons.

Teaching materials such as articles or short essays will be provided by uploading in the "materiali didattici" linked to the course

 

Students who require specific services and adaptations to teaching activities due to a disability or specific learning disorders (SLD), must first contact the appropriate office: LINK

Office hours

See the website of Marica Tolomelli