Sri Aurobindo’s Concept of the Nation
Keywords:
Nation, nationalism, state, community, modernityAbstract
This paper deals with Aurobindo’s conception of the nation and the methods he proposed to make it a reality. Aurobindo’s formulation of a nation here is discussed in the context of the ideas of nation and nationalism propounded by writers like Ernest Geller, Eric Hobsbawm, Benedict Anderson and Partha Chatterjee. It is evident that Aurobindo’s conception of a nation is similar to the Western idea of a nation, though while conceiving it he also depends heavily on indigenous terms and quasi-spiritual metaphors. Having been educated in the West, Aurobindo could have been influenced by ideas of nation and nationalism which were gaining popularity during his time.
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