The Austrian idea: An idea of nationhood in the kingdom and realms of the emperor Franz Joseph I

This article considers the nature of communitarian thought in late twentieth century Anglo-American political philosophy. It argues that communitarianism arose out of a critique of modernist theories of justice such as that of John Rawls shared by a group of writers committed to idealist principles that emphasised narrative approaches to the study of political thought, the importance of historical context, and popular participation in political life. It then focuses on one particular American strand of communitarian thought, exemplified by the work of Michael Walzer and Michael Sandel, which draws on a tradition of radical democracy and, in so doing, helps both to create and to transform a new American republicanism. An important connection between Walzer and Sandel is that they share the view that egalitarian politics must draw on shared traditions of social criticism rather than on the abstract individualism that they associate with Rawls. A key difference is that Walzer's vision of American life is pluralist and enthusiastic about difference, whereas Sandel's is republican and concerned above all with fostering civic virtue and identification with the state and political community.     

The idea of German cultural regions in the Third Reich: the work of Franz Petri

This article considers the German idea of the cultural region between the wars, with particular reference to the work of Franz Petri. Drawing on a self-consciously ‘modern’ integration of archaeological, historical and geographical research, Petri was a pioneering figure in the so-called Kulturraumforschung school. Petri's method involved an attempt to reconstruct Germanic cultural traditions and legacies in Belgium and northern France through a detailed investigation of Medieval field and place names, burial sites and skeletons. Although Petri's research had initially no explicit ideological or geopolitical objectives, his research into Germanic settlement and ‘soil’ beyond the nation's contemporary political and linguistic borders was used by those German political activists who rejected the Treaty of Versailles and who sought to re-establish a greater German Reich, including some leading National Socialists.     

The MuseumsQuartier,Vienna: An Austrian Cultural Experiment

This paper focuses on an important Austrian development, which on closer examination enables consideration to be given to: (1) Austrian government cultural‐sector policy, ­practice and funding attitudes; (2) the nature of the structures, organisation, stakeholders, and legal relationships chosen to manage and market the MuseumsQuartier; (3) the tension between the individual autonomy of institutions and a state‐imposed umbrella organisation; (4) the characteristics of creativity in comparison with the requirements for conformity; and (5) the compatibility of facility and programming management. There is no pretence in providing a survey of museum cultural or creative quarters throughout the world or analysis of the theoretical and conceptual frameworks that may be associated with this approach to urban regeneration. It is unashamedly a detailed analysis of a major cultural development, which may have value for the future management of similar projects. Perhaps more significantly it provides a useful insight into the Austrian approach to arts policy and management.     

The importance of the emperor: Lothar I and the Frankish civil war, 840–843

Lothar I's perspective on the Frankish civil war has not previously been explored. Close analysis of the distribution and wording of the most significant body of evidence produced by Lothar's circle, his charters, casts new light on the politics of the civil war. The imperial title and questions of legitimate inheritance emerge as factors of crucial importance, which shape not only Lothar's self-presentation in the charters, but also Nithard's influential account of the war, and negative portrayal of Lothar.     

The lenses of nationhood: an optical model of identity

ABSTRACT. This paper tries to make the case for a model of political identity based on an optical metaphor, which is especially applicable to nations. Human vision can be separated into sentient object, lenses and inbuilt mental ideas. This corresponds well to identity processes in which ‘light’ from a bounded territorial referent is refracted through various lenses (ideological, material, psychological) to focus in certain ways on particular symbolic resources like genealogy, history, culture or political institutions. Distinguishing between referent, lenses and resources helps us more precisely situate many hitherto disparate problems of national identity. These include the ‘ethnic‐civic’ dilemma, the mystery of national identity before nationalism, and the relationship between local and national, and individual and collective, identities. The model also clarifies the place of universalist ideology, which currently fits poorly within the leading culturalist and materialist theories of nationalism.     

Franz Joseph Gall came to Copenhagen,and for a brief moment the brain was the talk of the town

ABSTRACT

When the inventor of phrenology, Franz Joseph Gall, came to Denmark in the fall of 1805, he was met with great enthusiasm and fascination among the general public, as well as within the scientific community. His visit was an event that was covered by the newspapers unlike any other scientific lecture. However, as soon as Gall left, public interest in phrenology almost instantaneously vanished. Different theories have been put forth in the attempt to answer the question as to why phrenology never found a audience in Denmark. The Danish phrenologist Carl Otto explained it by referring to the poor quality of the Danish phrenological publications. Danish historians have argued that phrenology was too incompatible with the dominant scientific paradigm, Natürphilosophie. This article argues that the newspaper coverage of phrenology was more about sensational news stories than about science, and ultimately phrenology was a fad that wore off when the newspapers shifted their focus to other news.     

The expansion of the kingdom of Strathclyde

The kingdom of Strathclyde was focused on the Clyde valley and ruled by a Brittonic‐speaking dynasty. Historians have traditionally argued that the kingdom expanded southwards in the early tenth century, with the result that there was a revival of Brittonic language. Several scholars have recently challenged this interpretation, but in this article I defend the view that Strathclyde expanded southwards, and I propose a new model for the process. I argue that the kings of Strathclyde took submissions from the local nobility, who included Northumbrian and Gaelic‐Scandinavian magnates. This accounts for the multicultural nature of the kingdom in its heyday.     

Secular nationhood? The importance of language in the life of nations

ABSTRACT. Because of their failure to distinguish enough between interpretation and creation, scholars of nationhood have tended to neglect the role of creativity in both the genesis and persistence of national communities. Giving creativity its due leads us to question the standard conception of nations, and of the states that recognise them, as secular. This, in turn, suggests that we need to interpret the significance that language has for nationalists in a new way. After showing how, the paper concludes with an argument about what this new interpretation should mean for language politics.     

Between cosmopolitanism and nationhood: Italian opera in the early nineteenth century

The revival of interest in music evident in recent historiography has led to an investigation of the specifically transnational nature of musical languages and practices. This article explores the possibility of re-reading in a transnational perspective the classical theme of the relationship between the Risorgimento and opera. It focuses on two different points of view: on the one hand, the construction of the librettos as a delicate balance between European romantic narratives and dramatic themes evoking nationalistic sentiments; on the other, the fact that ideas and practices of the theatre as a vehicle of political mobilisation developed in a broad international context where Mazzini and many other nationalists found inspiration in multinational political experiences and discourses. The article concludes by saying that the meanings of terms such as cosmopolitanism and nationalism need to be carefully weighed when we look at nineteenth-century opera production. Only in the closing decades of the century did genuine competition between national traditions arise, which led in Italy to a veritable ‘obsession’ with ‘Italianness’ in music.     

Geographies of everyday nationhood: experiencing multiculturalism in Melbourne

In this article, we explore the geographies of nationhood manifest in everyday life, arguing that our quotidian surroundings continually reproduce the nation as we engage with them. We show that nationhood is obvious and ubiquitous in the lives of people when they are asked to attune to it, and that even when not in the forefront of attention, it partly informs how we make sense of our daily experiences. This is not to claim that nationhood is fully formed or coherent, a separate substratum waiting to be tapped into or closely defined by an identifiable symbolic repertoire, if only we pay attention. Instead, we demonstrate that nationhood is emergent in everyday life, is reproduced continuously and intimately entangled with the sensations, routines, material environments, public encounters, everyday competencies, memories, aspirations and a range of other affective and embodied qualities that comprise how we understand and inhabit our worlds. This mundane experience involves shifting between reflexive and unreflexive states, and the method we deploy ‐ photo‐elicitation ‐ is devised to draw out these oscillations and heighten the attunement of participants to the usually unreflexively apprehended taken‐for‐granted national qualities of everyday space. Here, we aim to empirically foreground the neglected spatial dimensions that characterize the experience of banal nationalism.     

Locating strangers: multiculturalism, citizenship and nationhood in Australia

Questions over identity politics, difference, and associated claims of authenticity, now occupy centre-stage in many countries. In this paper we focus on the nature of multiculturalism, citizenship and identity politics as they are emerging in Australian society. Essentially, we argue that the demands of political recognition of cultural particularity by specific groups are presenting complex challenges to the public institutions of contemporary liberalism that rest on the neutrality of the public sphere in its treatment of free and equal citizens regardless of race, gender or ethnicity. The ideas of nationhood and national consciousness still present themselves as essential aspects of contemporary political life, even though many questions concerning a re-conceptualization of nation and citizenship abound. This is the context through which the paper examines nationhood in Australia, particularly the points of tension arising from contrasting notions of citizenship and national culture. Our intention is to provide a glimpse of Australian society in the face of these changes and to draw some theoretical and analytical conclusions concerning the challenges to state and civil society.