Theory of Plot and Conflict

16 means no matter how big the number of the members of certain community; they are still limited to particular characteristics showing that they belong to certain community nation 1991: 6-7. The last thing he identified about the term nation is sovereign. The word sovereign is to identify that when the members of a community nation have understood that they are limited and tied each other in their group, and then they realize the need for sovereignty. Sovereignty is the key of a nation to show its existence among many other nations in the world. Moreover, it guarantees its freedom from being intervened by other nations Anderson, 1991: 7. The three characteristics, of what-so-called a nation, proposed by Anderson imply that a nation is in the minds of its members. It builds comradely relationship among the members. Then it can be understood why certain people feeling that they belong to a certain nation sometimes make irrational acts or even killings because of their nation. ‗Ultimately it is this fraternity that makes it possible, over the past two centuries, for so many millions of people, not so much to kill, as willingly to die for such limited imaginings ,‘ Anderson, 1991: 7. The willingness or awareness of certain people for their nation is how to describe nationalism. Such a feeling or spirit, later, manifests many different actions. The actions are usually led by a leader, or to be easier people call him or her a nationalist. As mentioned previously, the names such as Soekarno, Mahatma Gandhi, and José Rizal are considered as nationalists. They brought with them nationalism for their nations. They manifested nationalism in different ways. 17 Snyder‘s The Meaning of Nationalism exemplifies another way of how people show their nationalism. He explained how nationalist movements were sometimes irrational and they triggered hatred toward the foreigners among their people. He took a case of Lolito Lebrón, a member of terrorist nationalist party from Puerto Rico, who brutally shot the chamber of the House of Representatives and caused five Congressmen from United Stated bleeding and wounded 1968: 3. Those examples of nationalism or nationalists‘ manifestation are to give understanding that a deep love to a country or a nation is perceived and carried out differently by some figures. It is no doubt that nationalism is the impetus for a nation or a country in developing itself or, at least, releases itself from hegemony. Not only is the spirit of nationalism needed but also a figure of leader. This leader or someone called nationalist stands in the front line of nationalism movement and also burns his or her people spirit. It is important to notice Anderson‘s point that the thing that stimulates a person‘s willingness to do whatever for his or her nation, or maybe country, is, like mentioned previously, the power of imagining the community. However, again, the deeper questions about how this consciousness is formed in people‘s mind and how it can influence other members in a community rise. To respond that, it seems important to notice at three factors playing roles in the movements. As proposed by Anderson in Imagined Community, the three factors are cultural roots. By noticing the cultural roots, people can understand the things that 18 drive nationalism. The first one is ‗a particular script-language‘ in religious community. This script somehow unites certain members in a community although they do not know each other. He exemplified the case when a Maguindanao and a Berber meet in Mecca. They might not recognize each other, not even have a talk. But they are connected due to the sacred texts written in classical Arabics. They are Muslims that understand the written language inherited in their sacred texts 1991: 12-19. What he means with this example is that the script with certain language can connect people in a nation so that they imagine who their brothers and sisters are. The second cultural root is that certain people can understand from which monarch they inherit. They then will show their loyalty to their ancestor. This means that nationalism can emerge fro m people‘s understanding that they are from certain dynasty that bear their brothers and sisters Anderson, 1991: 19-22. To explain the third cultural roots, the case of Maguindanao and Berber is borrowed. In the case of Maguindanao and Berber, people in ‗stable‘ circumstance can understand the communion with other members in their community. In other parts of the world, lots of people that are still in ‗under pressure‘ circumstance can also feel their communion. In this case, he explained about the importance of simultaneity of time in the analogy of the word meanwhile. He, first, took an example of Christian people who prepare in this present time for the end of life in the future by learning from the past. It is certainly difficult to understand the simultaneity of time in the case of Christian life to answer the understanding about nationalism as he also noticed ‗but it is a conception of such fundamental 19 importance that, without taking it fully into account, we will find it difficult to probe the obs cure genesis of nationalism.‘ However, the main learning from that case is that people from different time or era with their own conditions can feel nationalism because the previous generation had taught about this spirit to their children Anderson, 1991: 22-30.

b. Nationalism in a Novel

Anderson continued the explanation about simultaneity in the word meanwhile by exemplifying through literature. He explored how José Rizal‘s novel Noli Me Tangere clearly describe that simultaneity of events in different time can create nuance of nationalism 1991: 22-30. In Spectre of Comparisons, he also described how Noli Me Tangere can create the imagination The Philippines people. The author put several characters in different settings to create a story containing series of events that seem separated but actually are closely related to each other. By looking at the description of different events put in Noli Me Tangere , the readers‘ minds are brought to the imagination of what-so-called The Philipinos. Yet the geographical space of the novel is strictly confined to the immediate environs of the colonial capital, Manila. The Spain from which so many of the characters have at one time or another arrived is always off stage. This restriction made it clear to Rizal‘s first readers that ―The Philippines‖ was aa society in itself, even though those who lived in it had as yet no common name. That he was the first to imagine this social whole explains why he is remembered today as the First Filipino Anderson, 1998: 230. Thus, Anderson exemplified how nationalism is created by imagining series of events in a novel. Characters coming from ‗every stratum of late colonial