Comparing Anderson And Nietzsche's Views On Nationalism

Different aspects of society are built up from conceptual ideas that were made solid after years of practice. Friedrich Nietzsche argues that our notions of morality and justice were manufactured while Benediction Anderson argues it was our sense of nationalism that was practiced into existence. Nietzsche argued that humanity was bred with with the “prerogative to promise.” Through means of maintaining memory, humans were made to freely choose to follow pacts and that choice in action is what society has been allowed to be built upon. The means of which these pacts are memorized are not necessarily through the full understanding of the pacts themselves but how one is treated if they are not followed. Understanding punishment, or at least

Nationalism emerged around the late 1500’s as a response to humanism and a decline of the church as a general unifying, force. This change is marked explicitly through the change of languages used print. While most printings prior to 1500 were in Latin, which was considered the highest language to be used by scholars, most printings after 1550 used different, more localized languages. Through this shift, people not only sought to pair themselves with others through their country of origin and shared media but through other actions like the practicing of certain political ideals or reading the newspaper. The newspaper is an interesting example that “creates this extraordinary mass ceremony: the almost precisely simultaneous consumption of the newspaper as fiction,” (Anderson 35) which, according to Hegel, “serve modern man as a substitute for morning prayers.” There are two major effects from the creation and reformulation of imaginary communities. One effect is the shift from (and loss of) Latin, which acted as a unifying language. The other effect is that man is made open to different ideas regarding themselves and others. Anderson talks about the change as though it is a welcome one.

Both of these ideas are similar because they are responses to religion and hegemonic power respectively. Nietzsche explains that the expression of violence and power dates back to the beginnings of society, as a means of pleasing Gods through the form of “Jubilee” or “festival” which included punishments and human sacrifices. Anderson’s explanation imagined communities was one in response to the shifting of authority from religion to other types of leadership as well as media and the