Introduction : workers into Belgians, Flemings, and Walloons -- A socialist pillar of a hyper-liberal state -- Voting the nation -- Nationalist celebrations and mass entertainment -- An anti-militaristic state in militaristic times -- The royal and colonial paradox -- Schooling the nation -- Encounters with the Belgian flag and the national anthem -- Proletarian tweets -- Language, the Flemish movement, and the nation -- Epilogue : the First World War
Summary
In this book, Maarten Van Ginderachter investigates the relationship between working-class identities, socialist politics, ethnicity and nationhood in modern Europe. This new contribution to nationalism studies challenges the dominant view of nationalism as the result of modernization as well as the assumption that nationalism is necessarily a reflection of entho-linguistic identity
