This course will examine the importance of Washington D.C.’s museums, monuments, libraries, newspapers, and archives in shaping American nationalism. Students will be introduced to key arguments and texts that have been used by scholars and public intellectuals to define the concept of “nationalism” in modern history. We will examine how theorists of nationalism argue that institutions were constructed for the very purpose of shaping and reinforcing nationalism for citizens. A key component of the class will involve visiting select institutions in Washington to measure the robustness of the theoretical arguments about nationalism. Are the theorists correct in their interpretations of how nationalism is formed and strengthened? Or do these scholars overlook key dimensions and meanings of nationalism in the contemporary world?
About the Instructor:
Vinayak Chaturvedi is Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Peasant Pasts: History and Memory in Western India (2007) and the editor of Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial (2000) and The Pandemic: Perspectives on Asia (2020). He studied at the University of California, Los Angeles and the University of Cambridge.