-
Unit 3
Word
Pretest:
For
each
italicized
word
or
phrase,
choose
the
best
meaning
below.
1.
The collection
is characterized by a
mé
lange
of bold
graphics, statements and exotic
Indian
motifs that are both classic and contemporary.
A.
style B. feature C. mixture D.
separation
2.
The weather is one
variable
to be considered.
A.
something that is subject to change B.
something of great importance C. key point D.
necessity
3.
You'll
be
biased
to
put
extra
weight
on
the
cases
that
support
your
theory
and
diminish the cases that
refute
it.
A.
prove B.
disapprove C. violate D. maintain
4.
Last week the
government unveiled a media sector review intended
to
spawn
a bit
more competition.
A. abolish B. destroy C. go beyond D.
engender
5.
Their latest computer
outstrips
all its rivals.
A.
surpasses B.
defeats C. follows D. modifies
6.
All the
children are
lumped together
in one class, regardless of their ability.
A.
taken care of B. watched over C. put
together D. brought up
7.
As a
journalist, she refuses to
gloss
over
their faults or silence their
critics.
A.
set
up B. take over C. cover up D. get over
8.
We
can foresee a new
paradigm
in the global market in the 21st century.
A.
pattern B.
problem C. scenario D. prospect
9.
This kind of
sedentary
lifestyle costs
you in more ways than you might think.
A.
tending to
follow fashion B. tending to do much exercise C.
tending to sit D. tending
to move about
10.
Lack of time
precludes
any further
discussion.
A.
speeds up B. slows down C. includes D.
excludes
Global Mé
lange
Globalization and culture is not an
innocent theme. The intervening variable in
most accounts is modernity. Three
vectors
—
globalization,
modernity, culture
—
come
together in a package with
modernization as the deciding variable. Modernity
is also a
polite, sociological way of
saying capitalism. The sociologists Axford and
Tomlinson,
among
others,
struggle
with
this
question
and
in
the
end
tiptoe
over
to
the
side
of
modernity shaping cultural dynamics.
It's difficult to argue with the combined power of
modernity and capitalism, with
technology and economics on their side, and
therefore,
it seems, global wins out
from local culture. Yet one wonders whether these
accounts
are actually about culture or
about power.
My reading of
trends past and current runs quite differently.
First, the conventional
account that
and capitalism has been refuted by
radically different accounts. An integrated world
economy
—
it may be
termed an Afro-Eurasian
economy
—
predates the rise of
the West
by several centuries. At the
core of this world economy were China and India,
with
Europe
at
the
outer
rim.
In
the
core
regions,
sprawling
outward
to
West
Asia,
the
Ottoman
Empire, and Persia, rates of population growth,
urbanization, industrial and
agricultural productivity,
infrastructures, and institutions of commerce, all
outstripped
those that existed in
Europe at the time, and continued to do so until
the early nineteenth
century.
Accordingly,
the
groundwork
for
modernity
and
capitalism
lies
in
these
regions,
not in Europe. Anthony King argues, with ample
irony, that in colonial cities
postmodern identities preceded the
development of modernity in Europe. We can add
that modern conditions prevailed in the
urban centers of India and China before they
emerged
in
Europe.
This
makes
dead
wood
of
the
usual
occidental
stories
of
Marx
(Asian
mode of production), Weber (Protestant ethic), and
Wallerstein (modern world
system). As a
late-comer Europe was an importer of cultural and
other goods, which
shows in the
mé
lange character of early European
culture.
Second, both
unpacked. Modern sociology is gradually
giving way to sociology of modernity and
next to anthropology of modernity. In
the process, modernity yields to modernities and
by the same token, anthropological
angles on modernization come into their own in
interpreting local changes.
unexpected
outcomes.
Development
as
modernization=westernization
is
a
passed
station. Now countries with a decade
and more of growth rates higher than in the West
have been spawning new modernities.
What is the character and outlook of these new,
mé
lange modernities?
Globalization, increased communication, and
mobility generally
create
opportunities
for
new
combinations
between
and
practices,
for
instance
novel
forms
of
cooperation
between
local
and
international
NGOs
and
organizations.
Likewise
capitalism
yields
unexpected
faces
when viewed through an
ethnographic lens. It's not just that capitalism
shapes culture
but capitalism is
embedded in culture: capitalism is a cultural
rendezvous. Capitalisms
plural, for
various reasons, then, is a more productive angle
than capitalism singular. It
is against
this backdrop that hybridity has gradually become
an increasingly prominent
narrative
and
a
new
convention
in
interpreting
local
changes,
past
and
present.
As
Walter
Anderson
notes,
of
all
kinds
have
detached
themselves
from
their
original roots and float freely, like
dandelion seeds, around the world
of
hybridities goes on and on:
German
Indians
I
would
make
additional
points:
bricolage
doesn't
just
apply
to
symbols
but
also
to
structures
and institutions;
and while mixing has accelerated in
recent times it is as old as the hills,
so the roots themselves are mixed. Cultural
mé
lange
and cosmopolitanism,
then, is not merely a precious elite experience
but a collective
condition and
experience. Global mé
lange does not
merely follow but also precedes
nations. We live lives of everyday
cosmopolitanism already. The Latino writer Richard
Rodriguez takes this a little forward:
variety that it makes a mockery of
'celebrating diversity.' ... Diversity is going to
be a
fundamental part of our lives.
That's what it's going to mean to be
modern.
What does hybridity
mean in settings of polarization and conflict?
Niru Ratnam
asks,
observes,
mean, on the other hand, that one
should gloss over the increasingly complex
meanings
of what it means to be British
or ignore the growing number of mixed marriages in
England and the complex biographies
that this gives rise to?
Polarization means the suppression of
the middle ground, but does suppression
mean that the middle ground does not
exist? What of hybridity amid the world's most
chronic conflict zone, the borderlands
of Israel and Palestine? Does recognizing this
conflict
dragging
on
and
on
mean
ignoring
multiple
identities
on
either
side,
the
complex identity of Arab
Israelis, and the backdrop of the Levant on both
sides of the
border?
The
nationstate
bonds
that
have
exerted
such
great
influence
grew
out
of
sedentary
experiences,
agriculture,
urbanism,
and
then
industry
as
anchors
of
the
national economy. The nation-state
inherited older territorial imperatives, and
interest
translated
them
into
geopolitical
and
geostrategic
niches
and
projects.
Together they make up a real estate
vision of history. Deleuze and Guattari
distinguish
between sedentarism and
nomadism as paradigms of perception. The moment we
shift
lenses
from
sedentary
to
mobile
categories
the
whole
environment
and
the
horizon
change:
hunting,
nomadic
pastoralism,
fishing,
trade,
transnational
enterprise,
and
hyperspace all have
deterritorialization built in. Why should identity
be centered on
sedentary
rather
than
mobile
categories
if
mobility
defines
the
species
as
much
as
settlement does? Why
should analysis privilege real estate rather than
mobility? Over
time, in view of
changing technologies, we may expect mobility to
become as salient as
or more salient
than sedentarism. Crossborder activities are on
the rise; border conflicts
will remain,
but will they be the overall, defining dynamic?
Futures also belong to the longue
duré
e, so evolutionary perspectives on
world
history
and
politics
are
relevant.
But
futures
are
mortgaged.
Thus
the
Mexican
philosopher José
Vasconcelos
anticipates
a future
planetary human blend, a Cosmic
Race,
but
in
doing
so
reproduces
the
old
preoccupation
with
Another
misperception that I have sought to
avoid or dispel in this account is that
rarefied,
separate
domain,
somewhere
on
the
soft
side
of
the
hard
realities
of
economics
and
politics.
Culture
is
not
just
an
afternoon
spent
in
the
Louvre
or
an
evening
in
the
Scala
of
Milan
or
the
Hard
Rock
Café
,
but
is
also
an
afternoon
patrolling Hebron. Culture is general
human software
—
and none of
the world's hard
enterprises
functions
without
software.
Desires
and
goals,
and
methods
and
expectations in achieving goals, are
all of a cultural nature. Power itself is a
cultural