AMERICAN PUBLIC UNIVERSITY SYSTEM Charles Town, West Virginia The Development of French Nationalism Submitted by Elizabeth Ping 4142216 HIST 543 C001 Spring 2011 Submitted to the Department of History September 4, 2011 The Development of French Nationalism France was one of the first countries to embrace nationalism as their main political force during the nineteenth century. Yet, even during and immediately after the French Revolution, the French peasantry still possessed a very individualistic mindset that placed a greater loyalty to local provinces over the larger nation. However, France underwent a transitional period from 1870 to the early twentieth century when the movement toward nationalism came as a result of increasing modernization and industrialization. The historian, Eguene Weber, attributed the development of nationalism in France that morphed the common French peasant into a civilized Frenchman to a variety of factors that included the increasing industrialization of France; the disruption of local traditions and languages; and the migrating and mingling of people across France; and the increasing political centralization during war time Eugene Weber, Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870-1914 (Stanford: CA, Stanford University Press, 1976), Weber argued in his book, Peasants into Frenchmen, that France’s peasants gradually became more acculturated to French society during the years after the French Revolution. He explained that before the 1880s, French peasants lacked a national identity. Weber went as far as to explain that, to contemporary Parisians, France’s peasants were savages with no common language and goals. Many French peasants did not even know how to speak or read the French language and believed heavily in superstitions. Ibid., 6. Likewise, those from the larger of France’s cities had little in common with the peasants and could not easily communicate with them. Weber explained that before the French Revolution, diversity was more accepted. After the French Revolution, however, France’s diversity became viewed as undesirable because it was seen as an imperfection of society. Ibid., 9. Through mass free and compulsorily education, France moved away from consisting of a nation of multiple languages toward a nation of French as a common language. By the end of the nineteenth century, travelers from the city to the countryside could just barely be understood by the peasantry. Weber., 77. Weber explained that the success of creating French as the national language differed according to class, sex, and location. Those further away from the cities, had less of a need to learn French since they did not come into contact as those who did not. The poor lagged behind the rich because they often chose to not send their children to school. Ibid., 319. Furthermore, women and the elderly adopted the French slower because they did not come into contact with the city dwellers who spoke French very often. However, there was a general need for a common language as industrialization began to take hold in France. The increase of industrialization, such as that seen in the cotton industry which extended its territory from the cities to the country, created an environment where it was easier to speak one language than multiple languages. Ibid., 78. Additionally, the expansion of industrialization into the countryside allowed for an increase in social interactions between the peasants who spoke patois and those who spoke French. Likewise, the peasants were more apt to migrate into the city once they received enough education and were more apt to view the urban environment as being superior to the small villages. Ibid., 286. An increase in market interactions spurred the eventual abandonment of local dialects in favor for French while creating a highway for exchanging customs and trade items. Ibid., 86. The Great War further necessitated the move toward a national language as men left their home towns to fight together for a common cause in war. Ibid., 79, 289. Eventually, patois became despised among the young and fell out of favor as the Great War began. Ibid., 86. Speaking French became an expression of pride, prestige, and respect that helped unite France both in lingual terms and cultural terms. Ibid., 87. Schools went further than in attempting to assimilate the peasants into the larger French society. Weber explained that the France’s school system attempted to destroy whatever savagery that the peasantry still possessed. They taught about keeping the hair and nails clean and about wearing appropriate clothing. Ibid., 330-334. Likewise, the schools taught the peasant children about morality and about French society. The peasants the how one must work in order to become wealthy and that idleness was viewed as unfavorable. School also became the place where the peasants learned about government and their part in making France a better place which included serving for France in the military. Change was the favored worldview and as school became the realm of inspiring patriotism through the use of songs, gymnastics, and writing. France condemned itself as a kingdom and viewed itself as a fatherland. Visual tools such as maps were changed to reflect their changing perception of what France was as a nation. In these ways, the peasants became socialized to the expectations of higher French society. Weber argued that military conflict brought an additional push forward toward nationalism and political solidarity. Hudson Meadwell, “The Long Nineteenth Century in Europe.” Review of International Studies 27, no. 5 (2001): 165-189. Nationalism strengthened as a result of growing military presence that was necessitated by the French Revolution and Franco-Prussian war. John Hutchinson and Anthony Smith (Ed)., Nationalism: Critical Concepts in Political Science, Volume 5 (New York: NY, Routledge, 2002), 1608. The Great War further strengthened nationalism and patriotism due to the need for the conscription of soldiers. The conscripting of soldiers into the military, created an environment that relied on the connectedness that the soldiers felt for their country since there was a lack of other motives for individual soldiers to fight for a specific cause. Ibid., 1682. Empires that contained many nations could not survive in the total war state that characterized modern warfare during the Great War. It has been argued that nations engaged in such states of warfare grow closer together in order to cope with the challenges of war that include everything from the horrors of war itself to the mass mobilization efforts that it takes to produce an effective war. Ibid., 1622. As such, ethnocentrocism or the love of one ethnicity over others is reinforced during war times. Ibid., 1623. The Great War was no exception for its use of propaganda to augment the war movement and created an atmosphere of greater cohesion among those of a particular country and alienation and belittlement of those who were not from a particular country. Warfare has the ability to increase a nation’s government by calling for centralization. Social Darwinist theories abounded and attempted to explain why one country was better than another. Marvin Perry, Western Civilization: A Brief History (Boston: MA, Wadsworth Cengage, 2011), 423. Ultimately, Weber believed that a relationship existed between the modernization and the move toward the peasantry having a national identity. In essence, the introduction of civilization and industrialization allowed for the uniting of the peasantry like unseen before. Ibid., 5. The obligatory French school system allowed for the indoctrination of youth for the goals of the nation to have one language, a strong army, and commitment to France. The migration of peasantry into the cities for work allowed for the spreading of ideas and goods that created a greater since of unity. Lastly, the nationalism grew as a result of wartime that increased government control, propaganda, and ethnocentrism among French citizens. Bibliography Hutchinson, John and Anthony Smith (Ed). Nationalism: Critical Concepts in Political Science, Volume 5. New York: Routledge, 2002. Hudson Meadwell, “The Long Nineteenth Century in Europe.” Review of International Studies 27, no. 5 (2001): 165-189, http://search.proquest.com/docview/204960046?accountid=8929. Perry, Marvin. Western Civilization: A Brief History. Boston: Wadsworth Cengage, 2011. Weber, Eugene. Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870- 1914. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1976), PAGE 6