Nationalism: Scottish + other "oppressed" ones

I tried to earlier.

Language and culture is something I find interesting in itself, there are possibilities within other languages and cultures to think beyond the limits of your own. It is easier to interrogate your own culture if you know others.

It is not a baseless argument, the BNP try to create an identity. The aim is not really clear, on a psychological level I would say it is because people tend to think in terms of binary oppositions. The creation of an external force consolidates the 'identity' and reinforces the self.

Firstly I am not part of a 'lot' while I would be interested to know more about scots and other cultures I have no connection to Scotland. I have Irish roots but unfortunately that part of my heritage is lost.

There is a difference between attacking the 'other' and reinforcing the self. "trashing a curry house" which no one suggested apart from you, is an aggressive nationalistic gesture, similar to the ones that many cultures, including the ones mentioned here, have suffered. Helping people to stay in touch with their culture is a positive attempt to spread knowledge.

Do not confuse an attempt to preserve an existing/vanishing culture with an attempt to form one through aggression.

All the aggressive nationalistic gestures you suggested would make you a prick. These are not gestures anyone has suggested.

Learning about another culture by choice is entirely different to imposing a culture or attacking another.

Forcing people to learn Scots would be rather pointless. But making the opportunity available is worthwhile. It is unlikely to lead to revolution in itself but it will not harm it in any way.

You're usually a fairly reasonable voice on the boards so I am assuming that some wires have got crossed somewhere.

Nationalism is no use. Culture, as itself and not as a construct, is always a valuable thing.

All of those that live here. It is so, so noticable that the debate around independence is increasingly focusing on deportation and detentions, and around international issues.

You take a very narrow and pessimistic view of English culture, personally I think its because English people tend to be ashamed of their association with the Empire, and have never really moved beyond that. The Scottish ruling classes were as deeply involved in the Empire (and the Highland clearances) as the English, but we found a culture seperate to that of the ruling classes, by forging one away from the North British identity handed down to us.

The 70s/80s saw a massive reinvention of scottish culture - pre-70s it was all kitch (tartan dog jackets) or very formal (full highland dress etc), from the 70s things changed - people started to redefine the culture...culminating in Irvine Welsh, Alasdair Grey, Deacon Blue, Belle and Seb. Ken McLeod etc.* and re-explore and challenge accepted historical narratives .

If you kick out all the foreigners to protect "english culture" there isnt going to be many of youse left. Instead of fighting with an "English culture" that wants to kick out foreigners, shut down curry houses and establish a network of "ye olde corner shoppes", would it not be more productive to look at what English culture actually is and support the good bits.

People need culture and they need an identity, a geographical one is an obvious one, where you live determines a lot about how you live, but we cant allow them to be highjacked in the way that scottish culture was in the C19th, we need them to reflect the reality.

* I am also aware that we got the Proclaimers...I never said it was all good.

Home-grown domination is, compared to imperialist domination, historically progressive. The same way that capitalism is historically progressive compared to fuedalism. Sure, it'd be nice if struggles for national independance could magically result in a classless society, but that's, unfortunately, not the way societies progress.

Not necessarily, but I think he's closer to the material conditions necessary for a communist revolution than if he were oppressed by "some foreigner" (a foreign imperial power, if we're going to use objective terminology).

Indeed they do.

Of course, the same could be said of bourgeois revolutions against fuedalism. Are they not progressive?

"Catching up with other states" is progressive. It brings the once-dominated society closer to the technological level necessary for a classless society.

Who said anything about a socialist utopia? I sure didn't. I said it's progressive, and progression is a matter of comparison.

capitalism and the state do not have some innate desire to wipe out cultures and languages, infact the modern state is desperately trying to create some form of social cohesion by supporting multiculturism, capital having colonialised everywhere is forced in on itself, multiplying identities and cultures, they become like everyother commodity, a pic n mix.

Your love of gaelic culture is no more profound or real than my interest in the goings on in Albert Square.

It has no more right to exist than Dirty Den.

You seem obsessed that oppostion to english is somehow against the interests of capital, this is absurd, look at how Spanish colonised south america, how spanish language is growing at a phenomenal rate in the US, how Chinese will soon become the second business language.

And that absurd comment about "opposing the work of fascism within us", what the fuck does that even mean? Most fascists aren't exactly tripping over themselves to embrace globalisation, infact they're more likely than most to attempt piss poor cultural revival movements.

But it's not evil in itself so why do we have to prove it's good? It's like proclaiming your solidarity with the oppressed masses in Vietnam, you couldn't do that as effectively in English as you could in Vietnamese, cause they don't understand English.

Gaelic is no better and no worse than any other culture, and it has a lot of poetry that is worth knowing in the original just for the sake of it. Sorley Maclean, the best 20th c Gaelic poet, was a Marxist, but he wrote an excellent poem about the Spanish civil war.

If no culture is good in itself, we may as well drop the bombs now. Real proletarians and peasants speak languages other than English, so why say their culture is crap just because they're different? All cultures have value, so learning about any one enriches yourself, I just chose the nearest one to me. And by doing so, you're saying that not all Gaels have been drunken wife-beaters or Tyrannical chiefs, you're saying that there is some good in every culture, even ones that have been marginalised by the forces of history. You can find the best of that culture and add it to your personality, your personal history. Down with the commisars! Saorsa cainte! (freedom of speech)

No, states repackage 'cultures' and identities within the context of their own existence. 'Multiculturalism' is a case in point. What we're defending is a people's history and consciousness (to give it a name) that doesn't and couldn't fit within the confines of a subservient, Anglicised, Globalised environment. We're not talking about languages or folk heritage etc. in isolation to how people relate to their own part of the world and objective circumstances. Though I'll be predicatably denounced for having such heretical opinions; this is a class position. Struggle with a cultural perspective isn't new, we ourselves have a long and often forgotten history of social sturggle rooted within the common people. Against this, you'd only be furthering the exact same alienated homogenisation that capitalism itself necessitates, like a typical prole you'd be part of capital.

Your views, as always, are like someone looking on from without...following the example you yourself used - of someone watching the TV.

That's an assumption based upon a lack of knowledge of linguistics. Half the world's languages will be extinct by the end of the century, the reason? These languages are being eroded by national languages in their respective states. National languages are the languages of education, officialdom and commerce, so people are educated out of their own language or choose to pick up another one for the sake of career enhancement. Most of the world's population are in any case bilingual, through the need to communicate with neighbouring populations. The reason most of Europe speaks Romance languages is because the native populations required Latin to get a post in the Roman army, or get ahead in the bureaucracy. The languages of those native populations are all now dead, except Basque and Welsh. Multiculturalism does not affect language retention, most asian children living in the UK will be monolingual English speakers within a few generations, because of the pressure of English to get a job, education, the law and so forth.

So your bigoted attitude towards other British cultures is because you don't want to give in to the debauchery of Capital?

Your pomposity and intellectual posturing are no more profound or real than that of Sharon Osborne.

I'll post a poem by Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair that might change your mind. I can't do this just now, but will do so when I get home.

I wouldn't support any imperial or business language.

I admit I'm out on a limb there, but seeing that it's English fascism, and their efforts in the Celtic fringes have been almost pre-fascist, that has destroyed those cultures, isn't it progressive to oppose that. And isn't fascism based upon internal colonisation first and the adoption of an identification with the master race, in this case, the English?

It is not a little hypocritical to condemn "imperial or business language" they have been colonised so that they can be imposed.

"English fascism" English has been homogenised to the detriment of culture and the language itself so that it can be imposed. There has to be internal repression before it can be exported.

Sorry, I don't follow your argument

alasdair mac mhaighstir alasdair

Acarsaid nan Con 's nan Gillean

Siud i ' chulaidh, 's cha b'i 'n ulaidh

Gu bhith cullainn garbh orra -

Cullainn a' bhuilg bhuidhe bhoicinn

Leagh am bod a' mhealg aiste!

Mile marbhphaisg air an trustair

Guitear nam ball feardha,

An t-ospadal an tric na bhasaich

Magan de bhrill meardha

Thusa a' tarraing ad' bheul prionnsa,

A phumpa nam bod mealamhin?

Acarsaid nan con 's nan gillean

S tric a sgiol iad t' earball

S tric a chigil iad do bhrillean

'Nad dhubh innis tharragharbh

Spreillean do chamais air rusgadh

Le sior luisreadh Ghallabhod

Chladh thu t' fhuil is t' fheoil is t' igh riu

Le d' dhiombas, a dhearg bhanabheist

An coltolis memento mori

Ceann gun fheoil gun eanraich

Ciad mile marbhphaisg don trustair

Gulfa nam breall ceannachruinn

S tric a bhasaich ann ad' nog-sa

Gnosa de bhod le steallairean!

English translation

The Anchorage of Dogs and Servants

Now there's the contraption, hardly the treasure

For having strenuous sex with them

The body with the yellow goatskin belly

The penis has melted the eggs from it!

A thousand curses on the slut

The gutter for all men's dicks

The hospital where often expired

Great giants of merry pricks

You to be breathing the word prince

You pump for honey-smooth penises

The anchorage of dogs and servants

They often entered your premises

They often tickled your clitoris

In the thick of your belly-wide pasture

The blubber lips of your harbour stripped

By Lowland pricks fervent shafting

You spawned your blood, flesh and fat to them

With your lust, you mad beast of womanhood

The coltolis memento mori must be

A head with no meat and no soup in it

A hundred thousand curses on the slut

The gulf for the roundheaded pricks

There often died in your nock

A pig's snout of a cock with its squirts!

Why did this remind me of Revol?

The model of English that was imposed onto Scotland and other oppressed nations was also imposed within England. A metropolitan English worked to destroy variation of culture and language within England.

England and by extension English has suffered from being used as a tool of persecution.

true, good point

John that's a lot of shite, and a really offensive straw man. You're not revol. There's no need for it.

Read what people have wrote for fuck sake! Absolutely nobody has claimed that Scottish culture is a homogeneous entity. You have asserted that this is a claim people have made. If you're going to talk through dogma then at least make a shot at trying to back it up (ie quote something that suggests that some poster on this thread has claimed that there is a homogeneous Scottish culture).

Also the 'you' that you are refering to does not include people like Bodach or Volin, as so far only me and STI have made any pro-independence comments but I see you've just decided to lump us all together coz we're all reactionaries who think that cultures shouldn't just be extirpated to meet the needs of capital and empire (which of course is akin to wanting to trash carry-outs ran by Scottish Asians, naturally).

it's quite simpe really there is no scots culture!

well not outside historical reenactment socities.

In a sense there isn't, no, you're quite right.

There is a body of literature and such like that mostly derives from the ruling class and the subsequent popular culture of the lowlands which is often mistakenly refered to as 'Scottish', and certainly most well people educated people in Scotland will share some references and have probably read the same books; just as you tend to get in any state/nation on the planet, but it would be a mistake to refer to it as 'Scottish'? There's nothing in common between John Barbour's The Brus (written in the latter half of the 14 century) and, say, the writing of James Kelman. People may have read both but it's more a question of historical understanding than an actual culture (which is always very mutable and depends on the conditions of the day).

Apart from me

It's quite simple really there is no revol intellect!

And anyway, I don't think you're qualified to make such assertions.

no really you need to get over it, there is no scots culture, it is but a reified husk.

It's true, this man has no penis

He blows goats (I have proof)

Revol's right. People in Scotland have no culture, and in fact no civilization. I think the focus of communists should be to kill these barbarians and replace them with worthwhile people who speak a real language.

Wicked-awesome reference. It didn't go unnoticed

"If you tremble with indignation at every injustice or if you like Ghostbusters, then you are a comrade of mine". I think it was Che who said that.

Bustin' makes me feel good

Depends on wherther you view culture as something that is lived or something that can be studied. As a lived culture, scots is inn the shitter AFAIK and I think as Bodaich (sorry memory sucks) said culture is often the production of the upper ( I would contest middle) classes and certainly removed from the proletariat.

All the same we might as well try to maintain as much diversity of language as possible. It will give us something to do after the revolution, when we work 2 hours a day and need to fill the hours.

Just no.

What do you mean by that?

There's a strong working-class culture in Scotland. It maybe doesn't get on the telly, but that doesn't mean it's not there.

But it does, still game being an example

My bad, I thought the culture had gone the way of the language and was largely lost. Glad to hear its still alive.