Premodern Nations, National Identities, National Sentiments and National Solidarity

While the subject of this volume, like the conference from which it emanates, is early modern nationalism in Europe, the task set to me by the editor is to broaden the frame and discuss premodern nationalism not merely over centuries but over millennia, and not only in Europe but throughout the world. Indeed, my book (with Alexander Yakobson),Nations: The Long History and Deep Roots of Political Ethnicity and Nationalism(Cambridge UP, 2013), challenges the modernist portrayal of nationalism as recent and superficial. The book argues that, reflecting the post-1945 climate of ideas and normative atmosphere, modernists have lost sight