The beginning of 1960s marked the rise of the American Studies as a subject in the academia. The whole discourse of the American Studies was established based upon the metanarrative of the American creed and exceptionalism. Basically, it was the cultural revolution of the 1960s, which played a pivotal role in shaping the discourse of the American Studies as a subject. However, with the beginning of the 1970s, the Cultural Revolution also gave birth to the discourse of “Critical Nationalism”. Nonetheless, it goes without saying that it was the expansion of Critical Nationalism that gave birth to the post-national Studies.
Despite vibrant multiculturalism, America was criticized for its imperialist character. According to Amy Kaplan, American Society and culture in terms of indifference and conflicts, sustains the fiction of an America defined as discrete identity. Moreover, it was the turn from high to popular culture that broadened the scope of post-national studies. Basically, the pop-culture has changed everything nothing remained European instead new trends and rituals were invented and celebrated by the Americans.
Another problem with the American Studies was that with the passage of time the whole literature became patriotic with selected contents. Several addition and incorporations were made in the existing literature e.g. Women, immigration, ethnic communities, and multiculturalism perpetuated the notion of the national exceptionalism. According to Whiteman, every nation contains multitudes in the enclosed national space. Nonetheless, the fact cannot be denied that the First Generation of American Multiculturalists were remote because their intervention did not challenge the notion of “nation” itself.
However, for cultural critic Amy Kaplan, the cultural discourse must be analyzed from the perspective of internal categories of gender, race, identity and ethnicity up to the global dynamics of empire building. According to Kaplan; “Imperialism as a political and economic process abroad is inseparable from the social relations and cultural discourse of race, gender, ethnicity and class at home”.
On the contrary, it was the writing of C.L.R James, which gave birth to the post-national American Studies. Throughout his writing James attempted to study American nationalism and multiculturalism outside the geographical and disciplinary boundaries, which he termed as “Culture of the United States imperialism”. C.L.R James writings dragged a lot of criticism from various commentators, many deemed him as nostalgic or apologists to communism. Some called him aggrieved under capitalism, who tries to reimagine socialism.
He was also criticized for the construction of the narrative of Mariners, renegades and castaways. The same thing he mentioned in his letter to V.S Naipaul explaining “Beyond Boundary”. Basically, James tried to explain all the national cultures within the American Society and elucidated the narrative of their nationalizing narrative. For studying the multiculturalism discourse of the American Society, James suggests the post-national approach in order to debunk the myth of exceptionalism.
He has birth to the concept of trans-locality, which is the vibrant segment of the American civilization. Moreover, the fact cannot be denied that the intellectual projects of James has given birth to the discourse of the Middle class in the vibrant American Society. The situation moves around different ethnicities and race, engulfing the very condition of overall middle class. Although, his writings didn’t attract much attention during the cold war but with the end of cold war, James writings attracted vibrant appreciation form the academia especially from the standpoint of post-national discourse.
On the other hand, it is vivid fact that throughout the cold war, the imagined national communities were defined by the ideological consensus within the straight-forward binary opposition manner: between good and evil, and freedom and control etc. For critical scholars like James, from the standpoint of “Freedom” the American society was un-American because of the internal difference. Moreover, the hegemonic nationalism also came to the forefront during the cold war and created much troubles for the ideological societies. This phenomenon can be best understood from the standpoint of the Soviet Union, in which various ethnicities in the periphery demanded freedom from the hegemonic ideology (the ideological paradox).
One of the central themes of this ideological opposition was the “national character” that came into question—what Eric porter once said “the recent presidential elections in America was fought by the rights on “Gods, Gays and Guns” (Evangelicals, LGBTs, NRA). Perhaps, this is why today, the vibrant theme of global national discourse is class, race, identity, gender, and geography. And for this particular reason, C.L.R James highlighted the subaltern voices in the context of Saint Dominique, who proposed the creation of “Black Jacobins” for the racial revolution.
According to James, we cannot understand the metanarrative of American Exceptionalism without taking into account the American cultural and economic imperialism. Perhaps, this is why James divided American Society from the standpoint of post-national studies into three types: Marines, Renegades, and Castaways. Moreover, through the phenomenon of “Moby-Dick” he turned the national mythology inside-out by establishing the link between the American Foreign Policy and internal Colonization. Basically, James attempts to conceptualize the United States as the “Geo-Social Space” on the move across and between nations.