Multiple Modernities and Nationalism: Theoretical Exploration

Abstract

The previous chapter has reviewed the ‘problems’ of conventional theories of modernity as a way of aiding our engagement with the theory of multiple modernities and has identified the teleological assumptions stemming from their inherent Eurocentricity as the major contested points. The chapter has also reviewed the modernity of nationalism as discussed in various theories of nationalism and found that the key to understanding the modernity of nationalism is whether nationalism is seen as a product of modernity or as a constitutive element of modernity. We are now ready to examine the theory of multiple modernities with a view to identifying what insights into the investigation of nationalism the idea of multiple modernities contributes. The review offered in this chapter is exploratory rather than systematic with the main aim to identify relevance of the theory of multiple modernities to the study of nationalism. The chapter then proposes a different perspective to nationalism as a quintessentially modern form of human self-reflexivity.