Globalization I3 Hybridity and Reflexive Postmodernism What have

Globalization I-3: Hybridity and Reflexive Postmodernism

What have we learned so far? Themes: History and narration Travels in Time and Space/Escape (Illusion of Realism) -- Somewhere in Time Authority (Self-Justification) in story-telling -- “Rip Van Winkle” the Sherlock Holmes “Charles Augustus Milverton” story Authority deferred to a loafer -- “The Man Who Would be King” History and Labyrinth (Spatialized History) -- "The Garden of the Forking Paths“ National Trauma/event or colonial history re-visioned and told “indirectly” (from the margins) –Atonement , The Piano《太平天國》 Historicity gained thru’ juxtaposition of the past and the present -- The Stunt Man, Obasan Nostalgia films (thru’ stereotypes and media simulation):

What have we learned so far? Critical Movements (Foucault) History as discursive constructions. (New Historicism/Cultural Materialism) Re-definition of text and context. textuality or con-texts. (Postcolonialism) : Orientalism, re-visioning the colonial past, cultural translation silence, mimicry and hybridity (Postmodernism): reality as fiction; exposing fictional boundaries, crossing the other boundaries. pastiche; flattened subjectivity or aesthetic/cognitive reflexivity

What have we learned so far? Global movements –increasing diversification or fragmentation Colonialism post-colonialisms (socially specific) Nation-States neo-colonialism and/or globalization Organized Capitalism disorganized capitalism; overall commodification Modernity Postmodernity and economic/media globalization High Modernism– collage, hybridization and global cultures.

Some Questions. . . n n n Is contemporary globalization a form of cultural imperialism or standardization? Is it ok to develop one’s style(s) with the signs from global culture? (Say, wearing bell-bottoms [喇叭褲 ] without being a hippie, dancing hip-hop without knowing Afro. American culture. ) What do you think about the following example? (You can change the TV program into one on Taiwan made by a Dutch or British company. )

There was this Englishman. . . who worked in the London office of a multinational corporation based in the United States. He drove home one evening in his Japanese car. His wife, who worked in a firm which imported German kitchen equipment, was already at home. Her small Italian car was often quicker through the traffic. After a meal which included New Zealand lamb, Californian carrots, Mexican honey, French cheese and Spanish wine, they settled down to watch a programme on their television set, which had been made in Finland. The programme was a retrospective celebration of the war to recapture the Falkland Islands. As they watched it, they felt warmly patriotic, and very proud to be British. Is he British or globalized? Is it ok to feel patriotic still? n (Williams, R. (1983). The Year 2000 (p. 117). New York: Phantheon. Originally published as Towards 2000, London: Chatto & Windus).

The questions are: • What do the international signs and products mean? • What does working for a foreign company mean? • Is the patriotism inspired by a documentary an illusive one, or residues of British imperialism?

Outline n n [Note--skip] The chapter on Cindy Sherman– image, vision and our identity Four Views on Globalization (next time: The world interconnected in our experience of risk and trauma) Hybridity in consumer culture – examples – glocalization and appropriation Hybridity as Mimicry Aesthetic Self-Reflexivity –examples n ( New Social Movements; not our focus) n For Next Week. . .

Four Views on Globalization: 1. Clash of Civilizations n (textbook chap 10: 44) n Samuel Huntington: the West vs. non. Western –fault lines/gaps in between “The fault lines include Islam’s borders in Europe (as in former Yugoslavia), Africa (animist or Christian cultures to the south and west), and Asia (India, China)” (45). recommends greater cooperation and unity in the West, between Europe and North America n n

Four Views on Globalization: 1. Clash of Civilizations (2) n Another perspective (in brief; source 1 2) n Benjamin R. Barber -- Jihad vs Mc. World: How Globalism and Tribalism Are Reshaping the World (note: Jihad— ”struggle” holy war or trivallism) Neither of the two supports democracy Mc. World threatens Jihad and leads to the latter’s violent reactions Barber supports local democracy. n n n

Four Views on Globalization: 2. Standardization and homogenization (chap 10: 51 -) 2. An extension of rationalization and standardization of labor production of the modern world + commodification (or Calculability, Control, Predictability, FAMILIARITY) 3. “Mc. Donald’s formula is successful because it is efficient (rapid service), calculable (fast and inexpensive), predictable (no surprises), and controls labor and customers. ” Mc. Donaldization of Society: (the process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as of the rest of the world. ) 1.

Four Views on Globalization: 2. Standardization and homogenization (chap 10: 51 -) 1. E. g. – (54) Mc. Jobs, Mc. Information, Mc. Citizens, Mc. University, Mc. Tourism, Mc. Culture, Mc. Prisons, Mc. Courts (Gottdiener 2000, Ritzer 2002, Stojkovic et al. 1999). Also, 7 -11, Starbucks, … 2. = Americanization 3. localization of Mac. Donalds 52 = glocalization In Russian, in Taiwan Do you agree?

homogenization –superficial or in-depth n n n Cultural assimilation of the signs and languages but not of the grammars Skin-deep assimilation (or hybridization): of hair color, commodities, foods, services, fasions “depth” or base: process of production and ideologies implied.

Four Views on Globalization: 2. Standardization & Cultural Imperialism 1. 2. n n n (Barker p. 115) a new form of Empire: Empire By Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri Empire= a singular system of global governance; not a system of discipline but that of command. "sovereignty has taken a new form, composed of a series of national and supranational organisms united under a single logic of rule. " (xii). “It is a decentered and deterritorializing apparatus of rule that progressively incorporates the entire global realm within its open, expanding frontiers. Empire manages hybrid identities, flexible hierarchies, and plural exchanges through modulating networks of command. The distinct national colors of the imperialist map of the world have merged and blended in the imperial global rainbow” (xii-xiii).

Globalization: 3. Hybridity or Interactions between the Global and the Local (55) (review) – considered negative in the 19 th century 2. Globalization -- Interaction between the global and the local: dialectic; disjunctive and multiple fronts; contrapuntal (對位) New Hybridity or Creolization = on both the levels of consumption (esp. of fashions, foods and music) and identity/cultural production (Barker p. 118 -119) 1. -- e. g in consumption, cultural styles in one city, and genetic mixing of plants?

Globalization: 3 -2. Hybridity or Interactions between the Global and the Local “Rhizomorphic (球莖式; decentered and expansive growth with nodes) and disjunctive global flows are characterizable less in terms of domination and more as a forms of cultural hybridity. “ (Barker 117) -- subverts nationalism, identity politics, -- reflects a postmodern sensibility of cut’n’mix, transgression, subversion. -- represents, in Foucault’s terms, a “resurrection of subjugated knowledges” 1. Examples of cultural hybridity which are constructive or active? hybridity as mimicry or self-reflexive hybridity (later) 1.

Globalization: 4. Aesthetic Reflexivity in Economies of Signs (Scott Lash and John Urry) 1. Rapid production and spreading of signs by computers, television sets, VCRs and hi-fis; 2. Two possible outcome: 1) blasé, anomie: bombarded and incapable of attaching meanings to them; 2) Aesthetic reflexivity: abilities to use the signs and create with them meanings of one’s self and society. e. g. “Money for Nothing” by Dire Strait

Globalization: 3. Aesthetic Reflexivity Aesthetic reflexivity defined: a. Signs = detachment (disembeddedness) from their original contexts aestheticization of material objects re-embedding. (re-creating their social meanings) b. “If cognitive reflexivity is a matter of 'monitoring' of self, and of social-structural roles and resources, then aesthetic reflexivity entails self-interpretation and the interpretation of social background practices. ”

Aesthetic Reflexivity—another view n n n Jameson: overall commodification lack of critical distance Lash and Urry: prevalence of signs reflexivity in choice of signs and reconstruction of meanings. It is always there in arts and literature, just in different forms. In postmodernism, the ‘signs’ of self-reflexivity = ‘author/writing, ’ ‘reader/reading, ’ frames in the texts, or any other ‘peripheral’ and artificial elements (camera, books, language, stage), etc. These signs “can be” overdone, or floating in the texts, or in mass media, without constructing any self-reflexive meaning or the ‘social. ’

Examples of Hybridization of Culture: 1. Glocalization on consumption level n n n Sea food pizza in Taiwan, no beef burger in India or pork burger in Muslim countries. rice burger, burger with Japanese flavors, etc. 燒餅 with salad; mango sandwich, etc. Your examples?

Examples of Hybridization of Culture: 2. Cultural Appropriation n n Mu Lan; Evita, Mummy Returns Enigma +台東阿美族豐榮部落長老郭英 男 ’Return of innocence’ -- 1994年風靡 全球，1996年奧運特別指定曲。

Examples of Hybridization of Culture: Mimicry and Masquerade n From Cindy Sherman (1, 2) to 森村泰 昌

Examples of Hybridization of Culture: 3. Cultural Critique n n The diaspora writers: e. g. 曾廣智Tseng Kwong Chi （1950— 1990; Hong Kong Canada Paris New York） （選自《東方遇見西方》 With the classic Mao Tse-Tung suit, dark eyeglasses and an identity tag stamped "Slutfor. Art". . he inserted himself in stereotypically touristic sites, from the Eiffel Tower to Kamakura, Japan, from the Statue of Liberty to Hollywood, CA, ricocheting between nature and culture to develop a massive series of self portraits entitled the Expeditionary Series or East Meets West. issues of cultural identity, tourism and tourist photography. Source: http: //www. stephencohengallery. com/artists/Tseng. html

Disneyland, California 1979 n Tseng Kwong Chi Gelatin Silver Print - 36 x 36 inches Printed 1997 Edition of 9

Statue of Liberty, New York; L'Arc de Triumph, Paris

Examples of Hybridization of Culture: 4. Cultural Revitalization n 霧鹿布農族傳統歌謠(and their polyphonic singing style 複音)與美國著 名大提琴家David Darling合作《 Mihumisa(n)g祝福你》專輯 --是全世界 音樂家少見的現場採集、編寫和錄音模 式 (source: 1, 2) n Darling’s experience of cultural communication: regretting not taking the cigarette offered by the chief.

Examples of Hybrid arts n n Paul Simon’s Graceland (with Ladysmith Black Mambazo and the innovative a cappella 清 唱 vocal harmonies of mbube music. —light rhythm, like footsteps) Paul Simon’s act against Apartheid.

Graceland (1988)

Examples of Cosmopolitan/Hybrid arts (2) Yo Yo Ma n "Soul of the Tango" n "Obrigado Brazil" n Chega de Saudade – “"Saudade" is a uniquely Portuguese word for "longing" that has no direct English equivalent; the music, however, says it all. ” (sample from Amazon) n n Lambarena-Bach to Africa Sankanda + Lasset Uns Den Nicht Zerteilen

Examples of Self-Reflexive Arts n n n The Canvas of Time: (Jacque Leduc) 時 光畫布 Desperanto (or "Let Sleeping Girls Lie" Patricia Rozema) 陳姍妮 監視

Examples of Self-Reflexivity as meaningless signs in popular culture n n n MTV channels – 妹 妹看MTV, MTV’s commercials Music video: “If”

For Next Week. . . n n read chap 11~12; Watch group report text: Ararat

Reference n Lash, Scott and John Urry. Economies of Signs and Space. London: Sage, 1994.