Brubaker, Rogers. “Religion and Nationalism: Four Approaches.” Nations and Nationalism, vol. 18, no. 1, 2012, pp. 2-20.

The author examines the relationship between religion and nationalism; to achieve this, Brubaker employs literature generated through a recent intensification of scrutiny on the subject matter. Brubaker explores four unique perspectives on the correlation between religion and nationalism. One element of the article that struck me is the multifaceted association between religious movements and nationalistic ideals; previously, I had assumed that the two concepts shared a one-dimensional connection.

Brubaker (3) focuses on four standalone lenses through which the link between religion and nationalism can be interpreted. He deconstructs, builds, and critically assesses each of these approaches to analyzing how religion and nationalism are connected. The first involves considering religion and nationalism, together with race and ethnicity, as identical notions. The second entails pinpointing the angles through which religion can facilitate an understanding of nationalism, including its genesis, influence, or exclusive quality in specific instances (Brubaker 3). The third comprises viewing religion as a component of nationalism and to highlight ways of interrelation and interpenetration. Lastly, the fourth encompasses proposing a variant of patriotism that is peculiarly religious. For the first approach, Brubaker (4) discusses various texts, theories, and ideologies that have been put forward by different authors over the years as well as in recent times. A good example, Brubaker (4) states, is the perspective adopted by Carlton Hayes, who dedicated a whole chapter to examining nationalism as a religion. In the publication, Hayes reckons that nationalism awakens a deep and powerful emotion that is fundamentally religious. Also, nationalism is similar to religion as it revolves around the belief in some extrinsic power, customary practices, and admiration, based on the flag. Like religion, nationalism has its deities, one of which is the symbol or embodiment of the fatherland. In another example, Anthony Smith interprets nationalism as a new populist religion that is as compelling, ritually monotonous, and mutually captivating. Brubaker (4) suggests a more unifying perspective that considers religion, ethnicity, and nationalism as similar phenomena connected by their methods of conceptualizing political assertions, their social organization processes, and their identification mechanisms. Nationalism and ethnicity are essential sociocultural platforms by which people label themselves and identify others (Brubaker 4). Religion is analogous to both nationalism and ethnicity because it is a social clustering process that frames, communicates, and structures social relations. Politically, statements made based on religion or religious organizations can be clustered with those pronounced on the pulpit of race, nationalism, or ethnicity (Brubaker 5). Such claims cut across the spheres of political influence, representative identification, economic resources, or cultural development.

The reading has a strong connection to both the section topic and the course question as it provides an insightful account of the association between nationalism and religion that goes beyond typical approaches.  Brubaker does not merely rely on theories advanced in earlier texts; instead, he also expounds on them to create sound and progressive analyses of the connections that bind the two concepts. In the process, Brubaker expands current horizons pertaining, first, to religion and nationalism as independent aspects, and second, as interdependent and interlinked phenomena. This comprehensive approach is crucial in the development of the four relationships, a feat which would have been impossible without Brubaker’s holistic strategy. All in all, the reading presents new ways of understanding how nationalism and religion correlate that strengthen the scholarly foundations of the coursework as well as the disciplines of history and sociology.

Work Cited

Brubaker, Rogers. “Religion and Nationalism: Four Approaches.” Nations and Nationalism, vol. 18, no. 1, 2012, pp. 2-20.

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