Begins with a two-page essay by Arnold Toynbee asking "What is a Nation?" Nationalism, the opposite of ecumenicalism in its secular and religious forms, is described as a "western ideological infection" outlasting "the west's material domination". I don't know what that even means. Toynbee does acknowledge that "Today, nationalism is about 90 per cent of the religion of about 90 per cent of the human race". [8a]

But how did the concept of nationhood arise? All is paradoxical. For example, the framework of English nationhood was cobbled up by the kings of Wessex after the Romans withdrew from Britain. Normans invaded. Shortly thereafter, "English people" emerged as a nation in a late medieval period.

Few "nations" are linguistically homogenous. German-speaking Alsatians think of themselves as French. Among the Swiss, four languages, including Romansch, enjoy official status.

This book documents the nations of Europe, geographically, and with photographs and essays. The fact of nationalism, potent and disruptive, is ventilated on these pages. Lots of demographic and political information in the attributed essays.

In this series of 20 volumes, from which the "tribe" of Jews is omitted, the volume for Europe, is blighted by ideological bias. The book perpetuates the myth that life was better in Moscow under communism than under the Romanov reforms.[21] ( )

An outdated edition of European cultures ... but this way the book becomes useful for history, and not just cultural studies, capturing customs and attitudes as they were in 1973, which simply fascinates me. I love the pictures, and the intimate descriptions and stories of people as they were and probably no longer are or ever will be. After 35 years of globalization, I know nothing will ever be the same--quaint, cute, and endearing (I say this partly with tongue-in-cheek)--but Peoples of the Earth recognizes that, identifying changes that have already taken place even apart from America's influence. At the same time, it inspires faith in the lasting power of identity and tradition, because no matter how many ideas are borrowed from the dominating (world) culture, human creativity and originality imposes its own twists and styles, making it, again, all its own. ( )