National Identity and Conceptualization of Nationalism Among Rohingya

Abstract

The discourse on nationalism is a highly contested terrain for Rohingyas, especially to those denied of their Burmese citizenship. The denial of citizenship not only expels them from “state-nation-territory” as argued by Agamben (Homo Sacer. Stanford University Press, Stanford, 1998) but prevents access to basic set of rights that instils a sense of belonging in them. The overt emphasis on primordial nationalist tendency of the Burmese state warrants an introspection on how the Rohingya refugees’ conceptualize nationhood and belonging. How do they conceptualize nation? The chapter intends to introspect the theoretical assertions to emphasize on the state-centric discourse of nationalism and focus on the abstraction of nationalism among the very individuals that comprise the nation state. Such an analysis necessitates a deeper understanding on the formation of national identity and the constitution of “self” with respect to nation. The Rohingyas are conveniently an outcast from the nation state that relegates them to physical, territorial and symbolic margins of Burmese nation by deliberately othering them as the “enemy of the state”. A bottom-up approach on the conceptualization of nationalism among Rohingya refugees will enable us to understand how the symbols, practices and ideas of shared history, ethnicity and culture that shapes, re-shapes and propagates the notion of nationalism is constantly negotiated in their everyday struggle for survival as a stateless refugee.