In Nepal, there is a term called ' Brahmanism' which is considered to be an identity of the community of Brahman. No Brahman has yet accepted the concept of Brahmanism neither claim as an identity.
Thus, it is created outside of the community of Brahman and imposed to them as their identity.
Brahman are also called Khas-Arya and this term is written in the Constitution of Nepal which also seems baseless. Khas and Arya are different entities.
There are ethnic groups in Nepal which are created against the community of Khas-Arya. Khas-Arya community which was never owned and entertained - is constructed at outside of the community in order to validate other ethnic groups.
Dear Purushottam Kandel , I'm wondering whether the 'nigga' (or 'nigger') black identity in the last (say) 70-100 years or earlier attributions such as 'Yiddish' to Jewish people in Europe, weren't these at least partly examples where outsiders were imposing identity traits to groups and then these groups appropriated these traits as their own?
I would argue social and national identity is always formed in opposition to the other, what one is not. This can be related also to relations of power, especially regarding colonialism, or even Europe, post-Enlightenment doing the classifying (I am thinking of 1st and 3rd world classifications, as well as race, and Evolutionary theories). I know this is broad, but I am reading Rosi Braidotti's Posthuman at the moment, a most useful text. She discusses the writings of people like Foucault, Said and Fanon, as well as post-colonial theories more generally. This can be the individual self/other or replicated to the national level, something Nationalism has managed to harness quite easily. Religions also do the same. It seems easier for understanding to seize upon a stereotype and reduce to a simple formula than entertain the overwhelming complexity of peoples. In this way we have imposed terms like Indigenous or Aboriginal to encompass whole populations of peoples who are markedly different (including languages and customs), terms they might, or might not, choose to adopt themselves, a shorthand. More generally, we are lazy, so avoid the complexity.
Dear Harry Freemantle , many thanks for your reply, very enlightening! I guess the reply to Purushottam Kandel 's question will also depend on whether one is a constructivist or not (is it perennialist or eternalist or naturalist? I don't remember the terms, it's been a while since i studied a bit of nationalism) about identity. For example, if we define identity as a construct that was born out of colonialism or anyway around the 18th century in Europe (or even a bit earlier as per the Imagined community thesis) then we can imagine groups before that self-defining more, either because they lived in multinational empires or in small enough groups that didn't often go to war with other groups. If, on the other hand we are anti-constructivists (again, please forgive my terms) about identity, we may see it as a more rigid construct that may always be born out of the in-group - out-group relation.
What do you think?
I agree Haris. It turns on the notion of nature or culture. Braidotti is essentially writing about the path of Humanism in Western thought, and critiquing where it has led. Social constructivism has been a dominant force in the humanities and social sciences for many years. In psychology self/other posits our identity there.
Dear Harry Freemantle , really happy that we agree! Unfortunately my origins are in a very natural science oriented Philosophy Department (University of Bristol Department of Philosophy 2003-2013) so I had to discover social constructivism and relativism (i defended the latter regarding (natural) scientific knowledge) on my own. Also, to come back to identity, maybe the first instance of identity talk resembling our modern one is the declaration of human rights, as in the first identity consisting in a-b-c being that of a human?
Identity can be built outside a community,because in most cases it is based on external assessment. So a people can be viewed from a particular perspective and be labelled as the spectator(s) deems fit. However, what matters is how individuals or communities interpret their own identity.
Dear Abigail Onowosemenmen Oaikhena , welcome to our little discussion! Interesting perspective, that identity essentially requires an outside perspective but that it also matters how the ones to which the identity is attributed interpret that attribution (if i hear you correctly). Like a relational and dialectic conceptualisation of the concept of identity - i don't know if the identity literature has picked up on this relational view (as I said i only had a very brief interaction with the identity literature - any ideas Harry Freemantle ?)
Dear Purushottam Kandel, from a South American perspective, at least:
Following the work of anthropologist Alejandro Grimson (Los límites de la cultura, Siglo XXI, 2011), who understands identity as a filial phenomenon -and consequently driven by a collective decision of identification-, we cannot think of an external imposition of identity. Those meanings that are imposed "from outside" the community on the collective are not identity, but stereotype, and respond to the politics of otherness, which support asymmetrical power relations. Taken to an extreme, the fact that we picture the potential inhabitants of another planet according to our own imagination does not determine them at all: it only speaks of our imaginaries and their possibilities.
National identity is imposed over regional identities. In El Salvador, for example, all native languages, except Nahuat, have been suppressed in the name of a Mestizo uniform society. Since independence in 1821 to 2023, there is not one multilingual compilation of oral traditions. It is supposed that only Spanish —Castilian— is able to provide an accurate map of reality. From elementary university education, the denial of regional Native languages is an axiom of inventing a nation.
Dear Rafael Lara-Martinez , I can relate to this a bit with my native Cyprus, where even the existence of a cypriot identity is a contested and heavily politicized issue. Regarding 'language', we have a dialect (of greek) vs language (develop it as its own language) for what we speak - we don't write or read what we speak, and of course foreigners in Cyprus are taught a language (Greek) which is not what is spoken. The situation is entirely symmetrical with our Turkish Cypriot brethren, even though sometimes they have proclaim a Cypriot identity against their own Motherland's (Turkey) efforts to claim them as their own.
The same problem —or worst— happens in Guatemala, where the multiple Mayan languages are hidden by Castilian, the official language of the Nation...
Language is the bearer of culture. When it is suppressed or forbidden, cultural moorings are lost. Attempts are made to reconstitute language from the archives, if they exit, in order to resuscitate culture. These efforts are hampered by incomplete archives, particularly in places that have been colonized by external forces. A rudimentary language is constructed (names, descriptions, features) but a deeper philosophical discussion is not available because these concepts have been lost. Often too the younger generations are brought up in the imposed, dominant language and are not interested in re-constituting that which is lost. All this answer is considering of course is one overarching language, when often people can speak a number of different languages and dialects. A complex mix of identities then become available. Nationalism (ultimately an imagined community) spends a great deal of energy destroying difference. That comes back to Frederico's answer above.
Dear Harry Freemantle , almost totally agreed with you on the importance of language as the bearer of culture - only hesitation is the consideration of things such as dance and, but anyway I think that's nitpicking on my part (as I said I agree with you on the importance of language).
More significantly, I agree with you more and cannot understatee enough what you say about nationalism and how its essence is to destroy diversity and difference in the name of the imagined community. However, a worry for me would be about what happened before nations (before let's say the 17th century) and in other places. People (or shall i say rulers) still constructed alliances on the one hand (for example the Hellenes, who had this perceived Hellenic unity despite them belonging in different city-states who sometimes went to war with each other) or went to war at other times. It seems to me too easy to go Marxist on this question, yet i think it is somehow related to our discussion about (national) identity.
Yes, Nationalism is the Western term since the late 1800s, particularly generated in France following Napoleon, and people like Barres who resuscitated Jean D'Arc.
I think it is worth broadening the definition of language to include art, music, dance, humour and so on. These languages are also bearers of culture.
And to this point religion and class hasn't entered our discussion!
In the seminal work in anthropology on identity, Fredrik Barth and colleagues designated self-identity and identification by others as two interacting dimensions of ethnicity. Certainly, many identities originating under colonialism were imposed on subordinate groups. Additionally, I have written about the identity of Chumash in California which was created by 19th century linguists and ethnographers and only later adopted by those communities. But the adoptees included entire communities of people lacking that heritage. This neo-indigenous identity is a modern phenomenon gradually coming into focus in many parts of the world, and every single instance represents a case where the neo-indigenous group has appropriated an identity of outside origin.
Dear all Scholars: Salam. Identity refers to mental storm and humanism norm where there is all who are human being. This is the greatest identity. The person who covers all human beings are equal, they never think about apartheid or racism or cultism. The people of the world are introduced as the super powers, economic power, language power and religious power. The subcontinent of Indian mainly thinks about identity. As a Bengali, I denounce the cultism. I prefer all kinds of people of the world.