This is a historical truth that is slowly taking form in my mind: today's nations are a myth.
The State, in the interest of developing central power, created the idea of the unified-in-purpose, one-language, nation that needed to be protected and advanced by a unified central government. In the nineteenth-century United States, the myth took a different turn by emphasizing English as the primary language and referring to itself as a “melting pot.”
But a myth it is, as we've seen as newer countries in eastern Europe and the Balkans splinter into sub-countries and increasingly regions of more established countries clamor to establish their own countries that reflect their local mores, customs, and languages (did the Basques ever stop fighting for independence?).
In this regard, Gerard Casey makes this interesting observation: “As late as the mid-nineteen century, fewer than half of the people living in the French republic spoke French.”
