Contaminated cultures
Can a culture be destroyed by outside influences? There has been a growing concern on the vanishing cultures around the world, especially in the third world countries. The Western civilization is spreading through mass media (Internet, TV, newspapers), consumer products (food, clothes, make-up...) and accelerating movement of people around the globe. This cultural globalization, or McDonaldization as it also has been called, is normally thought as something evil and destructive, a view shared especially by the intelligentsia.
On the surface it is true: even in the remotes village anywhere in Africa you can surely find a bottle of Coca Cola or Fanta sold in a tiny kiosk, whereas bottled water (being more expensive than coke and thus not accessible for ordinary people) is more of an oddity outside big cities. Sometimes the global products bring a whiff of familiarity in strange surroundings: I remember when our guests from South Africa last summer, when seeing the first McDonald's in Helsinki sighed - perhaps in slightly ironic fashion - "oh, it feels like home!". Instead of McDonald's, however, I took them to Hesburger, which sells "Finnish" hamburgers (yeah, right!) and to a basic Finnish outside grill kiosk, which they totally adored. Being abroad does make one miss recognizable tastes and resort even to these multi-national companies. Hell, I went to a Subway in Dar-es-Salaam, it being located conveniently near the YMCA hostel, when I was feeling hungry and wanting to get something I would surely know.
Getting back to the worries about the bastardized cultures, I've been recently reading texts from Kwame Anthony Appiah, a Ghanaian-English philosopher, currently in the esteemed Princeton University. It is fair to say that I have become enchanted by Appiah's writing, which is eloquent, provocative and fluid. He has been compared to Socrates (a 'post-modern' version of him!) or Oscar Wilde, and even told to be "the smartest person I've ever met" by a work colleague Henry Louis Gates Jr. Enough for the praise, Appiah's work speaks for him. The most renown piece is In My Father's House (1992), now phrased as a classic in African studies. After this break-through he has been writing particularly about race, identities and cosmopolitanist ethics. These themes are concisely gathered in an essay 'The Case for Contamination', published in NY Times on the 1st of January in 2006. In this essay Appiah approaches the question of cultures: what are they supposed to be like, and how can they be harmed by contacts with the wider world? Among other things he asks: "What can you tell about people's souls from the fact that they drink Coca-Cola?"
Kwame Anthony Appiah in his New York apartment, 2002. (AP Photo / Jerry McCrea)
People live in different cultural contexts and interpret the products of Western cultural imperialism in their own way. Appiah describes researches made on the response to American soap operas such as "The Bold and the Beautiful". For example a young Zulu man in South Africa had drawn lessons concerning relationships in the family while watching these series, and decided himself whether he approves or denies the values presented in them. Dutch viewers had concluded after watching "Dallas" that money and power don't protect you from tragedy. Thus, Appiah lashes at those who claim that cultural imperialism alters the consciousness of the poor recipients in the periphery, or in the rich world, for that matter. He asserts that according to this patronizing view, people are seen as tabula rasas, unable to reflect and form their own opinions based on both their own cultural background and those shown in the international media.
After some discussion about "malign" cosmopolitanism such as Islamic fundamentalism, Appiah continues with the cultural change and historical habits. He concludes that 'pure' cultures do not exist: thus there can not be any 'contaminated' cultures either, but "change is more of a gradual transformation from one mixture to a new mixture". Social trends change: two hundred years ago other customs (such as slavery) were accepted without any moral resistance, whereas other habits or ways of life (such as homosexuality or independent women) were scorned upon, or even punished.
Appiah argues against freezing 'cultures' into static entities, against putting people into neat boxes: 'this is what you are supposed to be like'. He notes that there has not been a culture which would not be a conglomeration of different influences and cultural traits. The borders of a 'culture' are not clear; people have several identities besides belonging to a particular community or culture. The danger of pure categories is obvious: stereotypes are too often used in an evil way, turning one fraction of people against another, 'us' against the 'others'. Already Adolf Hitler (and before him, surely quite a number of political thinkers) recognised the importance of homogenizing the enemy:
"As a whole, and at all times, the efficiency of the truly national leader consists primarily in preventing the division of attention of a people, and always concentrating it on a single enemy. -- As soon as the wavering masses find themselves confronted with too many enemies, objectivity at once steps in, and the question is raised whether actually all the others are wrong and their own nation or their own movement alone is right." (Hitler, Mein Kampf)
What Appiah proposes, instead of dividing people into cultures with unsurmountable differences, is cosmopolitanism. Tolerance and respect for difference, but at the same time freedom for each individual. Appiah believes that dialogue is possible, and that it might even yield into results, although not necessary an agreement. A phrase that students of Humanities should especially appreciate: "I am urging that we should learn about people in other places, take an interest in their civilizations, their arguments, their errors, their achievements, not because that will bring us to agreement but because it will help us get used to one another - something we have a powerful need to do in this globalized era."
Getting back to the worries about the bastardized cultures, I've been recently reading texts from Kwame Anthony Appiah, a Ghanaian-English philosopher, currently in the esteemed Princeton University. It is fair to say that I have become enchanted by Appiah's writing, which is eloquent, provocative and fluid. He has been compared to Socrates (a 'post-modern' version of him!) or Oscar Wilde, and even told to be "the smartest person I've ever met" by a work colleague Henry Louis Gates Jr. Enough for the praise, Appiah's work speaks for him. The most renown piece is In My Father's House (1992), now phrased as a classic in African studies. After this break-through he has been writing particularly about race, identities and cosmopolitanist ethics. These themes are concisely gathered in an essay 'The Case for Contamination', published in NY Times on the 1st of January in 2006. In this essay Appiah approaches the question of cultures: what are they supposed to be like, and how can they be harmed by contacts with the wider world? Among other things he asks: "What can you tell about people's souls from the fact that they drink Coca-Cola?"
Kwame Anthony Appiah in his New York apartment, 2002. (AP Photo / Jerry McCrea)People live in different cultural contexts and interpret the products of Western cultural imperialism in their own way. Appiah describes researches made on the response to American soap operas such as "The Bold and the Beautiful". For example a young Zulu man in South Africa had drawn lessons concerning relationships in the family while watching these series, and decided himself whether he approves or denies the values presented in them. Dutch viewers had concluded after watching "Dallas" that money and power don't protect you from tragedy. Thus, Appiah lashes at those who claim that cultural imperialism alters the consciousness of the poor recipients in the periphery, or in the rich world, for that matter. He asserts that according to this patronizing view, people are seen as tabula rasas, unable to reflect and form their own opinions based on both their own cultural background and those shown in the international media.
After some discussion about "malign" cosmopolitanism such as Islamic fundamentalism, Appiah continues with the cultural change and historical habits. He concludes that 'pure' cultures do not exist: thus there can not be any 'contaminated' cultures either, but "change is more of a gradual transformation from one mixture to a new mixture". Social trends change: two hundred years ago other customs (such as slavery) were accepted without any moral resistance, whereas other habits or ways of life (such as homosexuality or independent women) were scorned upon, or even punished.
Appiah argues against freezing 'cultures' into static entities, against putting people into neat boxes: 'this is what you are supposed to be like'. He notes that there has not been a culture which would not be a conglomeration of different influences and cultural traits. The borders of a 'culture' are not clear; people have several identities besides belonging to a particular community or culture. The danger of pure categories is obvious: stereotypes are too often used in an evil way, turning one fraction of people against another, 'us' against the 'others'. Already Adolf Hitler (and before him, surely quite a number of political thinkers) recognised the importance of homogenizing the enemy:
"As a whole, and at all times, the efficiency of the truly national leader consists primarily in preventing the division of attention of a people, and always concentrating it on a single enemy. -- As soon as the wavering masses find themselves confronted with too many enemies, objectivity at once steps in, and the question is raised whether actually all the others are wrong and their own nation or their own movement alone is right." (Hitler, Mein Kampf)
What Appiah proposes, instead of dividing people into cultures with unsurmountable differences, is cosmopolitanism. Tolerance and respect for difference, but at the same time freedom for each individual. Appiah believes that dialogue is possible, and that it might even yield into results, although not necessary an agreement. A phrase that students of Humanities should especially appreciate: "I am urging that we should learn about people in other places, take an interest in their civilizations, their arguments, their errors, their achievements, not because that will bring us to agreement but because it will help us get used to one another - something we have a powerful need to do in this globalized era."
Comments