Religion and Nationalism in Europe and Asia.

This international conference was organized by the Max Planck-Institute fr Geschichte in Gttingen and the Research Centre Religion and Society of the University of Amsterdam, 27-29 November 1995. The Conference on Nationalism in Europe and Asia which convened in Amsterdam focused on the comparative approach to the relationship between religion and nationalism in Europe and Asia. The conference was funded primarily by the Max-Planck-Institut, but also received financial support from the IIAS. Peter van Rooden (University of Amsterdam) was both organizer and participant. By Dick Douwes A small number of participants offered a paper which had a marked comparative purport, but most contributions (totalling over twenty) constituted case studies which provided material for comparison in the discussions. This meant that the position of the discussants was vital. They -- Peter van der Veer, Hartmut Lehman, Talal Asad, Benedict Anderson, and Alf Ldtke -- ably succeeded in distilling those elements from the papers which will help to construct the methodology needed in the daring attempt to compare developments in highly diverse regions in Europe and Asia, and even beyond (United States). Inevitably, the discussions showed that the methods applied in political sciences have failed to grasp all the details of such highly diverse narratives, as yet. However, the conference was of a high quality and most stimulating. Although it may seem contrary to the whole purpose of the conference to make specific mention of contributions which dealt with Asia here, as these are of most interest to the readership of this newsletter. They included: Susan Bayly (Christ' College Cambridge), Race in Britain and India; Partha Chatterjee (Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta), Religion and Nationalism: the second partition of Bengal; Jeffrey Cox (University of Iowa), The Salvation Army and the Imperial Power in early- Twentieth Century Punjab; Bernhard Dahm (Universitt Passau), Religious Revival as a Bridge to Nationalism in Southeast Asia; Harry Harootunian (New York University), "Answering the Heroic Spirits of the Dead": Yasukuni Shrine and the reunion of state and religion in Japan; Barbara Metcalf (University of California), The Creation of Muslim Identity before the Statehood of Pakistan; Gyanendra Pandey (University of Delhi), Violence 'out there': memories of partition; Michael Roberts (University of Adelaide/IIAS), For Humanity. For the Sinhalese. Dharmapala as Crusading Bosat; Rita Smith Kipp (Kenyon College), Missionary Effects: rethinking divide and rule in Indonesia; Peter van der Veer (University of Amsterdam), The Moral State: religion, nation and empire in Victorian Britain and India; Erik J. Zrcher, Muslim Nationalism - the missing link in the genesis of modern Turkey. \

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