26 May Publication of the 4th NISE Essay: “Flemish Patriots and the Construction of the Nation: How the Flemish Nation Ceased to be ‘Small’. Antwerp, Peristyle, 2019.
Bruno de Wever, Frans-Jos Verdoodt and Antoon Vrints* are the authors of this essay, that applies the influential theory of Czech historian Miroslav Hroch related to the development of ‘small’ nations on the territory of dominant nation-states, to the case of Flanders.
How did the ‘small’ Flemish nation develop within the dominant Belgian nation-state? How did their roles switch, the Flemish nation gaining the upper hand over the Belgian nation?
To understand this, it is useful to look at the social context in which the founders of the Flemish nation or ‘patriots’ (‘patrioten’) operated, and the social programme that they laid out for the Flemish nation.
PDF available here.
A copy available for the price of 15€ (excl. postal charges).
Image of the front cover of NISE Essays 4.
*About the authors:
Bruno de Wever (°1960) is a Professor of History at Ghent University. He has published widely on fascism and Flemish nationalism in the twentieth century, including his published dissertation, Greep naar de macht: Vlaams-nationalisme en Nieuwe Orde. Het VNV 1933-1945 (1994) and Belgium in: R.J.B. Bosworth (ed.), the Oxford Handbook of Fascism (2008).
Frans-Jos Verdoodt (°1939) is an emeritus lecturer at University College Ghent and a guest lecturer at the University of Antwerp. His research focus includes the topic of ‘daensism’ and the figure of Hector Planquert. He is the author of De zaak Daens: een priester tussen Kerk en chistendemocratie (1993), his published dissertation. He was managing director and subsequently chairman of ADVN, until 2014.
Antoon Vrints (°1978) is a senior lecturer in History at Ghent University. He has published widely on the topic of social history during the First World War, including Bezette stad. Vlaams-nationalistische collaboratie in Antwerpen tijdens de Eerste Wereldoorlog (2002), (Martin Schoups & Antoon Vrints) De overlevenden. De Belgische oud-strijders tijdens het interbellum, Antwerpen, 2018, and The Theatre of the Street. Public violence in Antwerp during the first half of the twentieth century (2019).
