Theories and Practices of Nationalism - HW04

How does the understanding of the universal school education system as a contributor to the emergence and spread of nationalism differ and overlap between the theories of Benedict Anderson and Ernest Gellner? Answer in 350 words

Ans: Immediately, Anderson views universal education systems as a tool used to promote nationalist interests. Gellner, on the other hand views them as a consequence of Industrial Society and not inherently for nationalist interests.

Anderson’s view is of:

1. Print capitalism creating the conditions for a vernacular market, that is territorially bound by mutual intelligibility.
2. Mutual intelligibility enabling an imagined community, that is self-spread via the education
3. Education being fully roped into the cause, by creating age-gradation expectations and a “common journey” in education

But Gellner imagines education as the consequence of the need for an Industrial society that needs generic, highly universal educational training to allow for quick re-appropriation to whatever highly specialised industrial skill is required of the worker.

Both share some similarity - in either case, the existence of standard education universal to all in the nation creates a form of “homogeneity” that allows for the imagination of a Nation. Both, more or less, agree on the general idea of “Universal High Culture”, although Anderson does not explicitly call it such.