The ambiguities of Patriotism

 There is a note in the OED appended to the etymology of “patriot” that sez: “Ancient Greek πατριώτης is used of barbarians, who had a common πατρίς (as opposed to Greeks who were called πολῖται, having a common πόλις); in this sense it derives from πάτριος. It is also used of members of a clan, in which case it derives from πατριά.”

Ah, poisonous binary! Patriot, which like patriarchy is derived from the father, or family, as opposed to polis, or community. In the liberal tradition, the social form of the clan, the family, must be subordinate to the state. Banditism and all the barbarian customs so adhering go back to the clan; the mafia goes back to the clan; and the state goes back to the city, the capital, the court.

Of course, this binary structure founds and is unfounded. The wealthy, for instance, go back to the family, or clan; the corporation goes back, often, to the clan, the family trust, the investors, inherited wealth. While the community, or state, tends fatally to the clan as well – the monarch, the political family.

In its connotative sweep, patriotism has inherited the uneasiness of the city dweller before the barbarian, the metropolitan before the “clown” (colonnus, dweller in the fields). As a city dweller myself, I have an ambiguous relationship to the Patria. I want to be “for” the Barbaric Yawp, but is the barbarian mouth open to issue the purest stream of poetry – or to eat me?