Anthony D. Smith and the role of art, architecture and music in the growth of modern nations: a comparative study of national parliaments and classical music in Britain and Denmark

Brincker, B. and Leoussi, A. S. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6323-4814 (2018) Anthony D. Smith and the role of art, architecture and music in the growth of modern nations: a comparative study of national parliaments and classical music in Britain and Denmark. Nations and Nationalism, 24 (2). pp. 312-326. ISSN 1469-8129 doi: 10.1111/nana.12409

Abstract/Summary

This essay takes its inspiration from Anthony D. Smith’s work and offers a brief com-parative analysis of national parliaments and composers in Britain andDenmark. It examines how ideas of the nation became ‘real’ in those key pub-lic institutions of the two countries, their national parliaments and through theworks of the composers, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Carl Nielsen. Our aim is also to advance cross-national study of national art, architecture and music(Brincker and Brincker, 2004; Brincker, 2014; Leoussi 2004, 2009) and thereby address the critique raised by, among others, Rogers Brubaker, that studies of nations and nationalism have a tendency of generating non-cumulative knowl-edge that does not move beyond the insights that one acquires from single case studies (Brubaker 2004). In response to Brubaker and building on Smith, we show,first, the role of the arts in official and popular definitions of national identity in Britain and Denmark; and second, the existence of formal patterns in European national art, architecture and music as the idea of the nation spread across Europe.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/80531
Identification Number/DOI	10.1111/nana.12409
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Arts, Humanities and Social Science > School of Literature and Languages > Languages and Cultures > French
Publisher	Wiley-Blackwell
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