http://tajerna.com/index.php?option=com_wyn&wynview=profile&entryid=119308&w yn_lang=en&Itemid=107 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:epciixx77w4J:www.lebanonwire.com/0401/04012607DS.asp+Dikran+Sarrafian&cd=20&hl=en&ct=clnk Ranciere, Jacques. The Politics of Aesthetics: the Distribution of the Sensible. Trans. Gabriel Rockhill. http://www.lgic.org/en/history_4000.php http://www.barborana.com/newsdetails8c00.html?id=343
But Ok, a state, which identifies itself explicitly as the home of a cultural nation is a national state I will say. Many of the modern states are in this category or try to legitimize their existence in this way, although there might be disputes and contradictions as to the appropriateness of this. Because so many of the states are nation states, the words “nation”, “country”, and or “state” are often used synonymously, as you know. If the cultural nation is conceptualized as exclusively ethnic, and not as requiring a territory, a number of nations without land can also be found, I have to say. An outstanding example would be the so called “gypsy nation” the Roma people right? You have them right? In some countries they are like ghost nation, involuntarily appear and disappear according to political needs, right? We have seen that in the Scheck republic. So you see a cultural nation can exist without having an independent state, and not all independent states are cultural nations. Many independent states are simply administrative unions of different cultural nations or peoples. AC: OK now you brought the issue of Roma people or the gypsy nation, let me directly ask you this from an Italian to a Lebanese, do you feel the same with oth-
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er examples of cultural nations without states like the Jews before they have the state of Israel? KR: well, we are in Beirut now, so let me give an accurate answer precise and concise, I don’t know about the manufacturing of the state of Israel, this is a unique nation state project which is sill in the making, period. AC: Ok, ok, got the point. But you know on the other hand, we have states like Belgium which consist of several cultural nations, most prominently Flemish and Walloons. The question of whether the state of Canada harbors one cultural nation or two (I mean the British Canadian and Québécois) has been object of political debate as well. I can also say that the nations of the English, Scottish and Welsh are also nations without states as you know they exists as a larger sovereign state known as the United Kingdom. KR: I can see we are not the only unsettled geography and history in this world but we still react on the issue in different manners. If a state is about a geopolitical and a nation is a cultural and / or ethnic entity then, we assume that Lebanon is a cultural nation with ambivalent history and geography but still in the making. Which makes Lebanon the cultural nation without a national culture, a much stronger State or does it.