France (Inventing the Nation)

This study of France examines the nation-building process of continual re-creation and re-invention over more than two hundred years. It explores the complex task of creating unity while reconciling diversity, be it regional, religious or cultural, in a nation profoundly divided since the Revolution. Divided into three sections covering the invention of French history, experience and identity, it seeks to integrate more conventional political history with an examination of nation-building from the margins and through manifold images and representations of the nation.