Nationalism was invented in colonial Creole societies, not Europe.

Evidence

One of the most interesting aspects of Benedict Anderson’s very well-known analysis of nationalism, Imagined Communities (1983), is the contention that nationalism is actually invented in the Creole societies of the empire and recirculates back to European society; perhaps the earliest and most politically potent example of transculturation. … But what purchase on freedom does an African nation have? Certainly we have, as yet, found no alternative to the state, but can a nation exist without a centripetal, exclusionary, and monolithic mythology of identity? It would appear not. Nations merely take over the role of empire and reinstate the centrality of imperial power in the already created colonial elites. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 3404

Categorization

• XREF: Directly engages Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities thesis about Creole nationalism circulating back to Europe.