Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 382 Nationality ([-])

Monday, March 1644, 3.In the early autumn, the east bank prairie was full of clear sky and clear scenery. Duncan, who was almost 2 years old, walked on the west bank of the Cue River with a dozen or so interns.

They set off from Merlin Port, and went to the Cue River area to inspect the terrain and build a residential area for Far East immigrants.At present, there are only dozens of scattered Samogitian families grazing in the Cue River area. They live scattered in this area with rich water and grass, and keep a large number of east bank bighorn goats that have been bred to the fourth generation. .In addition to the goats, each family also has two horses fostered by the government. According to the agreement between the two parties, every time a pony is bred, they can use this as evidence to receive a rather generous reward from the government.

At the same time, since these people grazing in a relatively wide area, they are also natural sentinels of the government. Once they find pirates or enemies landing from the sea, they can quickly report to Merlin Port, which is only seven or eight kilometers away, and request The militia was dispatched there to defend them.

With the gradual arrival of immigrants from the East, people on the East Coast are also building a lot of infrastructure to accommodate their arrival.As the deputy director of the General Administration of Construction of the Ministry of Communications who has only been in office for one year, Duncan personally went to the Cue River area east of Merlin Port to select a site for resettlement housing for immigrants.According to the plan of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, [-] sets of resettlement houses will be built in the first phase of the Cue River. Like the port of Merlin, after the continuous population in the future, the second and third phases of resettlement will continue to be expanded here. houses, and built castles, farmland, canals, barracks and other facilities to fully develop this area as the eastern barrier of the traffic throat Merlin Port.

The more than 20 students behind Duncan are all students of the vocational school under the General Administration of Communications and Construction, and they are studying architectural design.These students are only in their early twenties this year, and they come from all nationalities. They entered the East Coast school to study when they were teenagers.They all come from ordinary backgrounds, basically from civilian families, but they all have one thing in common: they are relatively smart, otherwise they would not have been selected to study in vocational schools.

After receiving years of education from the East Coast people, these teenagers are very satisfied with their current status and life.In Europe, if there is no accident, they will be farmers all their lives, and those who are unlucky will even be soldiers or sailors to make ends meet.But on the East Coast, they have access to coveted learning opportunities that equip them with the skills they need to earn a decent living.Moreover, although the entire east coast society has various disadvantages, it is much better than Europe as a whole.There is a vigorous and upward atmosphere in the whole society. Everyone performs their duties and lives and works in peace and contentment. There are no domineering nobles, no extorting tax officials, and no smelly streets.Everyone will not look down on you because of your low background. As long as you have the ability, you can stand out, and no one will set you up any obvious obstacles.

Just like what the teachers said, this country is a common cause for everyone. If the national interests are damaged, everyone's personal interests will also be damaged.Think about those vicious Dutch, British, and Spaniards. They are corrupt, greedy, and extravagant. They are always coveting the rich east coast. They always want to destroy and annex the east coast, so that everyone can become their serfs again.This made everyone gradually realize that they are different from those in Europe. Those people do not know self-esteem and self-love, and do not understand the East Coast qualities of "loyalty, dedication, bravery, and self-confidence". His arrogance is disgusting.

Their political system is rotten, and it is difficult for civilians without noble blood or poor people to have the opportunity to enter the ruling class.It is different on the east coast. Everyone has personally participated in the construction of this country, and has become a respected technician and engineer. There is nothing more satisfying than doing a career.The so-called my kinsmen in Europe, they and I only have some blood similarities, but we are not the same kind of people after all, they are them, and I am a "citizen" of the East Coast Republic of China.

These students are the products of typical political nationalist education.They are knowledgeable, cultured, and full of idealistic enthusiasm. Their life experience in the old continent in their youth made them almost have a martyrdom-like obsession with breaking the old order and creating a new world. The factor is the new political system on the east coast.

In fact, there have been many understandings of nationalism in history.That is to say, in the early pre-agricultural society, human beings gradually formed various settlement groups due to factors such as geography and living environment. These are the early forms of nations.However, this kind of nationalism is at best a kind of primitive nationalism, and nationalism will be fully developed after the rapid development of industrial civilization.In the agricultural feudal society before the development of industrial civilization, human beings had a relatively weak sense of national identity, and even vague national awareness, which is very typical in Western Europe.

However, after the bourgeois revolution in Britain, the national consciousness of most British people began to awaken, and a unified English nation began to gradually take shape.As a neighbor of the British, France, the Hundred Years' War gave them national enlightenment, and the king swept away the separatist princes and the country was thriving, which made the French people's sense of pride increased day by day, and their national consciousness began to gradually take shape. Tempered by fire, the French nation, which is self-respecting, self-loving and civic-conscious, began to stand tall among the nations of the world.

From the awakening of the national consciousness of the British and French, it can be seen that they all formed independent nations after undergoing major social changes, political system innovations, and cultural enlightenment, and everything they experienced also endowed them with their own uniqueness. national character.This, in fact, is a typical political nationalism.

Now the students of Duncan, they agree with the various systems of the people on the east coast, they agree that this country is their common cause, and they agree that this country can bring them a sense of pride and glory. In a sense, this is also A awakening of national consciousness.After years of rapid development of the country and the continuous indoctrination of East Coastism, they have become convinced that the system of their country is the most advanced system in the world. , self-confidence", the brand-new East Coast nation will eventually stand among the nations of the world.

With the new culture brought by five hundred cross-travelers, it is difficult to assimilate tens of thousands of 17th-century aborigines to form a new nation, and it is even almost impossible.Later generations believed that assimilation can be successful with several factors: first, a similar cultural background, second, a common language, third, literacy, and fourth, the assimilated individual has no idiosyncrasies.These four conditions may not be a big problem for Europeans who generally have a Protestant background in North America, but they are a big problem for people on the East Coast.

Whether they are Europeans or Orientals, their cultural backgrounds are very different from those of the time-traversing people. Among them, the Orientals may be better, but the Europeans are very different in terms of language, customs, and religious backgrounds. I want to transform them into conformity It is extremely difficult for people from the East Coast to pass through the standards, and even adults are basically impossible to be transformed.Therefore, the main work of the Traversing Congregation is to create a society with a common cultural background, and try to erase the national characteristics of people from different regions through coercive means, so that everyone can converge as much as possible.In this way, a relatively good environment can be provided for the new generation born on the east coast, so as to gradually complete assimilation and integration.

It is not impossible for you not to do this compulsory work, but it may take hundreds of years to integrate naturally.Because human inertia is strong, for some people, even if everyone around them speaks another language, he will still stubbornly speak his own language and communicate in a small circle.Even if your culture is more advanced than his, and he admires you, it does not mean that he will take the initiative to learn your so-called strong culture. If this kind of thing is not enforced, the effect will be very poor, and it will often take a long time to get along with the surroundings. People connect.

And this is absolutely impossible for the east coast people surrounded by powerful enemies, because what they lack is time.Unless you're sheltered by some powerful kingdom like the British North American colonies, you've got plenty of time to slowly integrate.But assuming that the North American colonies became independent from Britain in the 17th century, if you continue to integrate slowly in such a scattered state, then your country will fall apart under the instigation of foreign enemies in a few years. This is by no means alarmist.

The students of these construction vocational schools came to the East Bank when they were seven or eight years old. Their own cultural backgrounds are very weak. In addition, they have been with the time-traveling people for a long time, and their cultural backgrounds are already highly similar to the time-traveling people.Coupled with a common language and relatively rich knowledge, they can be regarded as real East Coast people!

As for the so-called "East Coast" people who "can speak and speak Chinese proficiently", "can write common characters", and "support the government" according to domestic statistics, most of them are actually false. The country on the east coast may agree, because this country can give them dignity and protect their interests, but this does not mean that they are proud of this country from the bottom of their hearts.On the contrary, due to religious inequality, high-pressure control, and cultural chauvinism, they also have a considerable degree of dissatisfaction with the government, and consciously or unconsciously resist assimilation, but their dissatisfaction has not yet accumulated to the point where it needs to explode. In addition, they were also full of internal conflicts, so they were temporarily suppressed.

(End of this chapter)