Weekend Reading, 7/18/2014

H-Nationalism’s Weekend Reading series highlights recent and thought-provoking reviews, blogposts, brief articles, and op-ed pieces.  Visit our main page for more info about H-Nationalism, including how to: get involved; become a book reviewer; add your works to our monthly publications update; blog about current events, the state of the field, or teaching; and write us a testimonial. We’re also on Twitter, @HNationalism.

Dear All,

We have multiple readings from the subcontinent this week… The Telegraph of Calcutta, India, has an excellent editorial on two strains of nationalism in Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh.  The New Indian Express contains the following defense of Indian nationalism.  The Nation of Sri Lanka also has an interesting piece that addresses the country’s need for nationalism and nation-building.  CNN has a helpful report on Buddhist nationalism in Sri Lanka. You’ll be jumping into a conversation mid-stream, but some of you may want read the following opinion-piece about territory, nationalism, and resistance in Kashmir.

From the rest of the world… allAfrica.com has an editorial about patriotism, nationalism, and the politics of division in Kenya.  Heather McRobie at AlJazeera reports on the memory of the Srebrenica massacre. Gerd Hentschel asks in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung whether the conflict in Ukraine is also a battle of languages (text in German).  The New York Review of Books has an interview with Albert Ho that includes a discussion of why state-sanctioned nationalism has failed to appeal to people in Hong Kong as well as an interesting piece on Iraq, Kurdish independence, and oil.  In The New Yorker, you find a piece on France and the issue of collecting ethnic and racial data. EqualTimes has a blog post about asylum policy in Germany and the Ohlauer crisis that is worth a read.  Menachem Keren-Kratz writes for Tablet about the life of Satmar Rebbe Yoel Teitelbaum, looking at both the Holocaust period and his later extremism. The text is in two parts: here and here.  Prof. Karube Tadashi offers a timely, thought-provoking alternative view of Japanese nationalism in The Illusion of “Rising Nationalism”.

With reviews… Jeremy M. Rich reviews two books on Zimbabwe. The first, by Terence Ranger, Bulawayo Burning: The Social History of a Southern African City, 1893-1960, tackles Zimbabwe’s colonial history. The other, The Urban Roots of Democracy and Political Violence in Zimbabwe: Harare and Highfield, 1940-1964 by Timothy Scarnecchia, covers nationalism in Zimbabwe.  Robbie Ethridge reviews Brian Klopotek’s book, Recognition Odysseys: Indigeneity, Race, and Federal Tribal Recognition Policy in Three Louisiana Indian Communities, which discusses sovereignty and recognition of Native American Tribes.  Peter Mansoor reviews Culture, Conflict, and Counterinsurgency, edited by Thomas H. Johnson and Barry Scott Zellen, which discusses the importance of cultural knowledge and understanding in regards to foreign policy.

Kind Regards,

Cristian Cercel, Justin Collier, Tiffany Florvil, and David Prior