Rehabilitating nationalisms: conviviality and national consciousness in postcolonial Tanzania

This paper explores the link between nationalism, development and national consciousness. In Tanzania, post-independence nation-building resulted in the establishment of a national consciousness sufficiently versatile to balance and contain most of the competing ideas about what it means to be part of the Tanzanian nation. By giving insight into how this has variably been related to a discourse on development and the responsibilities of the Tanzanian citizen, the paper argues for a convivial reading of national consciousness that recognises that nationalism remains a process of collective bargaining, with official versions constantly challenged, re-formulated and re-emerging in new forms.