ABSTRACT
In the three parts of this book I have examined national identity and nationalism in relation to philosophies and histories of language, to the tropes, figures, myths and symbols of national literatures, to the narratives of law, sovereignty, rational and moral community, Church and State. There is one other grand narrative which stands out as an essential part of the Nation/Word relationship of the period 1770-1850: the consciously or unconsciously adopted narrative of polarity in which 4 Word' became the means of establishing this-ness and other-ness through which national self-consciousness could evolve.
