Nations Divided: America, Italy, and the Southern QuestionIn Nations Divided, Don H. Doyle looks at some unexpected parallels in American and Italian history. What we learn will reattune us to the complexities and ironies of nationalism. During his travels around southern Italy not long ago, Doyle was caught off guard by frequent images of the Confederate battle flag. The flag could also be seen, he was told, waving in the stands at soccer matches. At the same time, a political movement in northern Italy called for secession from the South. A historian with a special interest in the long troubled relationship between the American South and the United States, Doyle was driven to understand the forces that unite and divide nations from within. The Italian South had been at odds with the more prosperous, metropolitan North of Italy since the country's bloody unification struggles in the 1860s. Thousands of miles from Doyle's Tennessee home was an eerily familiar scenario: a South characterized in terms of its many perceived problems by a North eager to define national ideals against the southern "other." From this abruptly decentered perspective, Doyle reexamines both countries' struggle to create an independent, unified nation and the ongoing effort to instill national identity in their diverse populace. The Fourth of July and Statuto Day; Lincoln and Garibaldi; the Confederate States of America and the secessionist dreams of Italy's Northern League; NAFTA and the European Union--such topics appear in telling juxtaposition, both inviting and defying easy conclusions. At the same time, Doyle negotiates the conceptual slipperiness of nationalism by discussing it as both constructed and real, unifying and divisive, inspiration for good and excuse for atrocity. "Americans like to think of themselves as being innocent of the vicious ethnic warfare that has raged in the Old World and over so much of the globe," writes Doyle. "Europeans, in turn, enjoy reminding Americans of how little history they have." This enlightening, challenging meditation shows us that Europeans and Americans have much to learn from the common history of nationalism that has shaped both their worlds. |
From inside the book
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... importance of the series to the university and the community . Wesley Sumner of the public relations office assisted with publicity , and graduate students from the History Depart- ment served as ushers during the lectures . Malcolm ...
... and the values she cherished will endure in the lecture series that bears her name . Anastatia Sims Co - chair , Averitt Lecture Series Committee PREFACE This book deals with the two most important features xii Foreword.
... important features of American history : the creation of a new nation and the secessionist rebellion that tore it apart . The American Revolution and the American Civil War define one nation's special history , but they also have ...
... importance to our ability to live together , to imagine a community capable of embracing diverse citizens . Instead of casting the American example into an amorphous transnational study , I have chosen instead to begin working within a ...
... importance of research and supports it generously . Thanks to Vanderbilt University's College of Arts and Sciences for granting me leave and to the University Research Council for a travel grant . During the fall of 1999 I enjoyed ...
Contents
1 A Death at Gettysburg | 1 |
2 Making Nations | 11 |
3 The Daily Plebiscite | 35 |
4 Imagined Enemies | 65 |
5 Nationalism Reconsidered | 90 |
Notes | 97 |
Bibliography | 109 |
Index | 125 |