55
European Identity as the Horizon of Belarusian Imagination
14
Bhabha H. Mestonahozhdenije kultury // Perekrjostki: zhurnal issledovanij vostochnoev-
ropejskogo pogranichija. 2005. # 4-5. S.162.
15
Ibid. S.162-163.
16
Ibid. S.173.
17
Bobkov. Mentioned sources. S.136.
18
Beck U. the Cosmopolitan Society and its Enemies // Theory, Culture & Society. 2002.
Vol. 19 (1-2). P.17.
19
From Latin intemus – internal. The process of mastering by an individual or a group of
people of social values, norms, views, aims, stereotypes which belong to those with whom
he or they interact. As a result, structures of social activity external towards the given indi-
vidual or group turn into their internal regulators of behavior. – Comment of the author.
20
Ibid. S.19.
21
Hannerz U. Cosmopolitans and Locals in World Culture // Featherstone, M., Lash, S., and
Robertson, R. (eds).
Global Modernities, London: Sage, 1995. P.239.
22
Appiah K. A. Cosmopolitan Patriots // Cheah P. and Robbins B. (eds). Cosmopolitics:
Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,
1998. P.94.
23
Ibid. P.91.
24
Beck U. The Cosmopolitan Society and its Enemies // Theory, Culture & Society. 2002.
Vol. 19 (1-2). P.27.
25
See for more details: Minenkov G. K novoj oppozitsii. 2006 (http://belintellectuals.com/
discussions/?id=120); Minenkov G. “Otmorozki”, ili o tom, kak rozhdaetsya grazhdans-
kaya identichnost’ //Topos. 2006. #13 (v pechati).
26
Appiah. Op. cit. P.106-107.
27
Appadurai A. Modernity at Large. Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press, 1996. P.166.
28
Beck U. Obshchestvo riska. Na puti k drugomu modernu. M.: OOO Eklips Media, 2000.
P.166.
29
See: Delanty G. Citizenship in a Global Age: Society, Culture, Politics. Open University
Press, 2000. P.6.
30
See: Ibid. P.138-140.
31
See: Ibid. P.145.
32
See for more details: Beck. Op. cit. P.37-41.
56
“When there were no buttons and people were healthy, ate only
lard and potatoes and lived one hundred twenty years”
Les’ Podervyansky, “Utopia”
“By the huge lie of his life Baudolino proved that there can be no
historical lie because history is not what took place but what is nar-
rated and by this it creates the basis and the precedent for society”
Elena Kostjukovich,
the comment to “Baudolino”
by Umberto Eco
“Getting its history wrong is part of being nation”
Ernest Renan’s well-known thesis
in Eric Hobsbaum’s
interpretation
The purpose of the article offered for your attention is the analy-
sis of modern national-state ideologies of Ukraine and Moldova. I
have chosen two texts as the object of research as they are signifi-
cant for each of the Borderland countries. These texts are Leonid
Kuchma’s “Ukraine is not Russia” and Vasile Stati’s “History of Mol-
dova” [1, 2]. Both of them are the essence of a peculiar message, sent
by authorities both to their own people and to the neighbors.
It seemed quite pertinent to use the method of two American
sociologists Matthew Levinger and Paula Lytle [3] in the analysis
of these two texts. In many respects sociologists used the idea of
Craig Calhoun, believing that nationalism is a discourse formation
presenting collective forms of rhetoric of various movements and
political practices [4, p.7]. The central place in Levinger-Lytle con-
cept is occupied by the thesis that all national movements develop
in conformity with some general examples. Signals of the beginning
Paul Tereshkovich
constructing the past:
historical resources
of Modern national-state
ideologies (ukraine and Moldova)
57
European Identity as the Horizon of Belarusian Imagination
of national mobilization may include addresses (messages) of the national elite to the
masses, representing the elite’s idea of conformity of the nation status in the present, past
and future with a certain ideal desirable model. These statements structure the experi-
ence of the nation and offer a program of actions, usually in the form of inversion of crisis
reasons. Different peoples and different times have a miraculously similar structure and
content of these actions.
“Virtually all rhetoric of national mobilization contains three juxtaposed elements:
1.
The glorious past. The original nation once existed as a pure, unified and harmo-
nious community.
2.
The degraded present. The shattering of this corporate unity through some
agency or traumatic series of events undermined the integrity of the national community.
A key dimension of this rhetoric is the identification of the nation’s decay sources.
3.
The Utopian future. Through collective action, the nation will reverse the condi-
tions that have caused its present degradation and recover its original harmonious
essence.
These three elements are framed within a series of binary oppositions, contrasting the
vision of an ideal past or future with the degraded present. The project of national rebirth
represents an inversion of the existing disordered condition and a reconstitution of the
ideal community” [3, p.178].
Matthew Levinger and Paula Lytle believe that such a model of narrative not only
stimulates political actions, but also defines the reasons for national decline and orders
specific actions necessary for its overcoming. The myth in the process of its construction
articulates the sense, placing seemingly not connected events into a coordinated sequence
or an ordered reality. The purpose of nationalistic rhetoric is to connect the space of the
imagined with the space of actions, and, thus, to make the audience join collective actions.
A triad like structure creates symbolical oppositions by means of a series of narratives
about losses and findings. They emphasize the gap between an ideal condition and real-
ity. The explosive energy of national mobilization is found specifically inside the mixture
of binary oppositions (the past against the present and the present against the future).
The nationalistic rhetoric not only structures requirements, but also defines the identity
of actors. The fact of belonging to a national community itself presupposes participation
of each specific individual in a collective struggle. Creation and/or preservation of group
identity is the decisive element of national mobilization.
The diagnosis and the recipe
Besides a series of binary oppositions the past, the present and the future are con-
nected by diagnostic and prognostic structures. The diagnosis of national degradation is
defined by means of identification of external and internal agents which destroyed the
community, and also of the actual list of the caused damage (loss of territory, linguistic or
racial
cleanliness, political division, moral decline).