Department of Anthropology Rhodes University Cover Sheet1

Name: Michael Cohen Student Number: 12c3772 Course (Anthro 1, 2 , 3, Hons): Anthro 1 Term/Module: 1 Lecturer(s): Chris de Wet Tutors Name: Joy Owen Assignment/Essay Title: Globalization, culture and identity. Date: 2012/03/22

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There is only one Dollar and one Coca Cola and there may be lots of imitation Nikes but there will never be only one language, or one people, or one God. The world around us today seems smaller than ever before. New technology has allowed people to transfer information or talk with people from another country by the press of a button. With the use of modern transport humans are now able to travel from one place to another with ease and speed that was never imagined before; this gives people the opportunity from all over the world to interact. This interaction involves an increased flow of goods, ideas, beliefs and habits all of which represent culture between people over geographic borders. This can be described as globalization. Globalization makes it difficult to differentiate between different cultures and nationalities. Globalization is not something new and has been occurring for centuries with the establishment of trade routes and around the world linking Africa, Asia and Europe as well as the colonization of many areas (Global Ethic Now 2012). But due to heavy advances in technology it is more relevant. Culture is changing more rapidly as technology such as the internet exposes us to aspects of culture we may have never come into contact with before. But before the development of this technology one of the driving forces behind globalization was colonization where we see one culture forcing their ways onto another. However colonization does not mean cultural assimilation. All cultural changes that occur because of globalization are separated by their contexts. Ulf Hannerz has defined four that commonly occur: Market, State, Form of Life and Movement known as frameworks of the cultural process. (Lechner and Boli 2004) These frameworks best describe to me how cultures are changed through globalization and my belief that there will never be a homogenous culture. But rather a world where many aspects of culture are shared but differentiation between cultures is possible. The market is the exchange of culturally significant commodities. Each commodity should have some cultural meaning that could be intellectual aesthetic, emotional or intellectual. However the market frame work may involve some producers who flood the market with commodities of one culture pushing towards a smaller cultural differentiation. Thus this market framework is never stable due to flooding. (Lechner and Boli 2004)

Britain is a perfect example as when tea a culturally Chinese drink - first entered the market the British were oversaturated in it with a demand that the saturation satisfied and over time tea became the favourite drink of the British. (United Kingdom Tea Council 2012) The state is a reference to governing bodies of a nation. Hannerz says that the goal of said state is too assert that the state is a nation and that there will be homogenization at some level as the state attempts to engineer the culture of the nation. However he slightly contradicts himself when saying that the state also aims to create some sort of differentiation between cultures in order to classify people. So the effect of state is to promote the feeling of a nation whilst maintaining differentiation between cultures. (Lechner and Boli 2004) Form of life is Hannerz third frame work of the cultural process (Lechner and Boli 2004: 334). He uses form of life to describe repetitive daily activities amongst certain people. He describes that not all people would have the same form of life and that when forms of life mix there is observation between different forms of life and parts of a dominant form will eventually be mimicked by other ways of life making cultural differentiation harder to observe. (Lechner and Boli 2004) Hannerz final framework is movement. Movement is the process by which movements are started that can bring together a diverse group of cultures in the movement towards one goal such as the womens movement, the environmental movement and the peace movement. (Lechner and Boli 2004) One movement that has changed modern culture in western countries for ever was the launch of the environmental movement started by organizations such as Green peace in the 70s (Green Peace 2007). Now there is a culture of using and manufacturing eco-friendly products. The result of this is awareness amongst many cultures about the importance of preserving the environment. I use Appadurais example of the decolonization of Indian cricket represents a position where in the cultural process two of the above frame works state and forms of life have occurred in succession to cement cricket in the culture of India. Appadurai highlights cricket in modern India as a Hard Cultural Form (Appadurai 1996: 90). A hard cultural form is a form that is linked to the transmission of correct social conduct

that is difficult to remove or change. He continues by explaining that a soft cultural form is one which can be changed or removed with ease (Appadurai 1996: 90). Through globalization a hard cultural form was introduced into India by the British showing that culture is not stagnant but is constantly being changed and shared across borders without the assimilation; this being the role of the state framework. The British attempted to create a more British culture in India whilst maintaining a cultural difference between Indians and the white colonials. The transition of cricket between the cultures is also due to the form of life framework illustrated by Appadurais description of the embrace of cricket by Indian princes as their royal culture to promote themselves among the British and thus filtering it down through into Indias national culture (Appadurai 1996). It seems as if there is a condition among humans to impress and mimic those in elite positions of power. He then continues to explain the development of cricket in India where he emphasises the role of the media, especially radio and print, in the popularisation of cricket (Appadurai 1996). Appadurai explains crickets integration into Indian culture as the decolonization of cricket where it no longer becomes a part of only British culture shared with India but a hard form of Indian culture itself without completely replacing Indian culture with that of the British. Cricket modernized Indian culture. The above shows the force that the media has in spreading forms of life among people. In the age of extremely fast communications the media has the ability to spread information throughout the world at speed. The role of the state framework in creating a national cultural identity is also highlighted in Gosseyes essay Leisure Politics: The Construction of Social Infrastructure and Flemish Cultural Identity in Belgium, 1950s to 1970s in reference to how the Belgium government attempted to socialize the Flemish into a cultural identity by building communal areas for them to socialise (Journal of Urban History 2012). It can be said that the state framework provides the structure and means for the form of life framework to exist. Hannerz framework of market is manifested in the Larkins study of Indian Films in Northern Nigeria and the role of the films in the Huasa culture. Globalization is not restricted to being caused by past colonization or just the global acceptance of western culture. Modern

transport has made distances become less significant allowing us to trade commodities over large distances in a short amount of time. Brian Larkin carried out research into the popularity of Indian films in Northern Nigeria among the Huasa people and found that Indian films where in fact found to be displayed in cinemas more, stocked in video stores and have a bigger general influence towards Nigerian culture than local or Hollywood films so extremely to the point that Hollywood films are only shown once every week. Showing that there is circulation of media within and between non-western countries rather than an influx from the west into non-western countries as my misinterpretation was. (Inda and Rosaldo 2002: 351) It is fair to say that similarities can be drawn between the integration of cricket into Indian culture and the integration of Indian films in Northern Nigeria is fairly similar as they have both produced a similar result of incorporating one aspect of a foreign culture into another creating a scenario where the respective cultures havent been replaced or homogenized but added to and modernized. They are also linked in the way that both Nigeria and India exist in a post-colonial state where Nigerians absorb film from India as the youth in Northern Nigeria relate to the characters of the films in their struggle between western influences and their cultural heritage (Lechner and Boli 2004). Here we have a cultural similarity based around the increasing problem of westernization and its influence towards cultures. Huang and Deng highlight the importance of Tea drinking as part of Taiwanese culture at a social level; they highlight how the use of traditional tea trays, sets and brewing methods is a way of countering against a western culture that has taken over in Taiwan especially from a technological aspect. (Huang and Deng 2008). What we can observe in the case studies above is that there is a blending of cultural practices that allows culture to become interrelated as well as a resistance the forces of globalization. Globalization has the ability to influence and change the cultural identity of individuals who are a part of a certain culture. Your cultural identity is defined by your cultural heritage. I believe that there is a drive for people to preserve their cultural heritage.

It is important to observe that the world is now made of many cultures and culture is not confined to certain regions (e.g. Jews to Israel). There are many cultures that share many parts globally and on a smaller scale. However in each culture there are strong beliefs that cannot simply be forgotten or replaced. Culture may be shared and interrelated but there are strong norms that define them all, whether it is a God or the way in which tea is consumed. Thus globalization may bring cultures together but it will never result in one complete, homogenous, global culture.

References: Appadurai, A. 1996.Modernity at Large: cultural dimensions of globalization. Minneapolis, Minn.: University of Minnesota Press. Inda, J.X. And Rosaldo, R. (eds. 2002) The Anthropology of globalization: a reader. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell Publishers. Lechner, F. and Boli, J. (eds. 2004) The Globalization Reader. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell Publishers. Global Ethic Now, 2012. Globalisation a historical process over the centuries. http://www.global-ethic-now.de/gen-eng/0d_weltethos-und-wirtschaft/0d-01-globalewirtschaft/0d-01-103-prozess.php (Date consulted 15/03/2012). United Kingdom Tea Council, 2012. History of tea. http://www.tea.co.uk/history-of-tea (Date consulted 16/03/2012) Green Peace, 2007. Amchitka: the founding voyage. http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/about/history/amchitka-hunter/ (Date consulted 16/03/2012). Huang, K., & Deng, Y. 2008 Aug 30. Social Interaction Design in Cultural Context: A Case Study of a Traditional Social Activity. International Journal of Design [Online] 2:2. Available: http://www.ijdesign.org/ojs/index.php/IJDesign/article/view/341/168 Gosseye, j. 2012 Leisure Politics: The Construction of Social Infrastructure and Flemish Cultural Identity in Belgium, 1950s to 1970s. Journal of Urban History 38(2) 27129.

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