Non-industrializing Westernization

Yes, I can argue that non-Western culture is very strong in the Andes, and is arguably becoming an even stronger influence now that indigenous peoples and rural mestizo peasantry are becoming more politicized. Evo Morales' inauguration was accompanied by an elaborate ceremony in which Aymara elders proclaimed him their spiritual leader. That's not very typical of Western leaders. He was also criticized by Western media for wearing an alpaca wool sweater instead of standard Western formal attire when meeting with other foreign leaders.

And George Bush chopped wood, in a Stetson, on his ranch. So? He wasn't exactly doing it to corner the ranchhand vote. He was after office workers and soccer moms who dominate Texas' population, because they idealize their lost past. The nearest equivalent to an actual cowboy today'd probably be Mexican-born migrant workers. Although he certainly didn't lose the factory farmer vote, either. Not that a Republican was ever going to lose that vote in his home state.
 
I've studied in the Andes (in Ecuador) and I've experienced the living Andean culture there myself. There is a tremendous wealth of sources relating to the thriving indigenous cultures in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, and throughout the rest of Latin America, for that matter. Indigenous peoples in the Andes go to great lengths to preserve their identities and it's actually one of the defining issues of the region's recent history.

That's just the tip of the iceberg, too - Even the mestizo cultures across Latin America carry varying degrees of indigenous influence in their diets, musical traditions, art, vocabulary, and spiritual beliefs, particularly in rural areas.

I'm dedicating my entire future toward studying surviving indigenous culture in the Western Hemisphere. It's my passion and it's something I know a great deal about. Trying to argue with me that these cultures are dead is an argument based on pure ignorance - It's like trying to convince me that there's no tree in my front yard when I'm looking right at it.
 
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I've studied in the Andes (in Ecuador) and I've experienced the living Andean culture there myself.

I accept your assertion of expertise. It implies you know a great deal more about the subject than I. I hope I can ask you to check my prior statements again, as it seems from my perspective that you misread my position.

There is a tremendous wealth of sources relating to the thriving indigenous cultures in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, and throughout the rest of Latin America, for that matter.

There are indeed many such sources. There are, unfortunately, also a great deal of sources discussing the decline and extinction of native languages and cultures throughout the Americas. Now admittedly this particular area - highland Peru through Paraguay - is the worst region with which to demonstrate my argument, and probably the best (excepting the Yucatan or Nunavut) for your own.

Indigenous peoples in the Andes go to great lengths to preserve their identities and it's actually one of the defining issues of the region's recent history.

Absolutely it is, and this is likely one of the few areas where I approach the same level of familiarity with the subject matter as you. However, where you take the strong political move to preserve heritage as an indicator of cultural survival, I interpret it differently.

Historically, early nationalism in Europe (and Japan and Turkey) developed as much in spite of as because of the machinations of any government or propertied class. It largely developed from grassroots movements, then graduated to the political level. The primary driver of these efforts was not the strength of the cultural object in question (whether dance, craft, folklore, or whathaveyou). Instead it was a reaction to the perception that the practices faced imminent extinction.

At root it was a consequence of the breakdown of the traditional unit through all of human history - the village. As the number of large communities grew and smaller ones withered, traditional local practices tended to fade. Political efforts to preserve old customs did in point of fact manage to preserve real cultural practices. I won't deny it. But in practice they actually preserved only a tiny fraction of the original cultural wealth of each country.

The cause was fairly simple. If you want to preserve peasant folk songs like the ones you grew up with, you're going to need a large group of people to cooperate. You certainly have a large group of peasants, but each is from one of thousands of villages, each of which had its own songs. The very act of attempting to organize the preservation of these songs will see the movement focus on at best a few hundred, of which, in practice, perhaps a few dozen will survive in popular as opposed to occasional use. Of course those few dozen would tend to be those that overlapped many communities or (importantly) were catchy enough that they leave the preservation movement and simply enter into the new "national" culture. This is all in the early years of the process, and long decades would threaten even those few dozen. A great deal would survive only or mostly in written form, to be brought out on festivals and through lack of practice sung unimpressively.

Allow me to offer an example. A five years ago I was living in Italy. There the process of nation-building threw up a dance called La Tarantella, originally from roughly around modern Naples. What fascinated me was that I could have conversations with Italians from vastly different ages and backgrounds, and they would have the same attitude toward the dance. They weren't terribly interested in performing it, but had a certain pride that it was still commonly known enough to be practiced on demand because it was the Italian peasants' dance. These very same people would admit without a second thought that it was actually the Calabrian (IIRC) version that anyone ever did, and that the dance was the Calabrian version of one South Italian folk dance. In practice, a large number of well-intentioned people, whose aim was to preserve their traditional culture, actually extirpated the vast majority of traditional folk dances in their efforts to rescue the one they'd decided was the "authentic version." Impressively, while records document this as a common and normal process, the myth of preserving national values has been remarkably successful in forgetting such casualties.

My interpretation then, would be that this is a hot-button issue precisely because traditional cultures are under threat. You do not need to go to great lengths to preserve your culture when it is not in decline. I do not claim that nothing will be left when the process is over, but that the politicization of Indian-ism will tend to itself rub out village-level practices in favor of shared values that the entire region can agree on. In point of fact, vastly disparate peoples with dialects approaching mutual incomprehensibility and (again, IIRC) outright separate languages are all attempting to take a unitary stand in defense of Indian-ness. The end result will inevitably be a definition of the term that will fall far short of the diversity of cultures it claims to represent. Much of what survives will be what can be "packaged" - culturally or economically - for global consumption.

That's just the tip of the iceberg, too - Even the mestizo cultures across Latin America carry varying degrees of indigenous influence in their diets, musical traditions, art, vocabulary, and spiritual beliefs, particularly in rural areas.

I'm dedicating my entire future toward studying surviving indigenous culture in the Western Hemisphere. It's my passion and it's something I know a great deal about. Trying to argue with me that these cultures are dead is an argument based on pure ignorance - It's like trying to convince me that there's no tree in my front yard when I'm looking right at it.

Having said all that, there remains a caveat.

You.

It isn't 1880 anymore. Modern Western (or, if you prefer, Global) culture puts a tremendous value on preservation of languages and dialects above and beyond (or rather below and within) the national level. To back it are recorders who not only have a relatively scientific motivation (and so are less likely to homogenize in describing), but also have access to tools that make recording and preserving information much more feasible. The Soviets made a truly impressive demonstration of the results that follow a state promoting and protecting minorities as opposed to assimilating them.

The West also offers a strong and growing market for goods produced "locally" and/or "authentically." It also promotes tendencies to seek out roots in a way that has been infrequent in human history, and has resulted in some cases in the recreation of cultures on the brink.

So, hopefully, we don't lose too much more of the interesting bits.

It is at this point that I'll point out that I certainly did not say that the native cultures of Bolivia were dead. I did exaggerate for effect in referring to them as a backwards fringe, but I hope that my comments here will make clear the sense in which I meant that. One, I admit, not entirely clear in my original post.
 
Most posters, including the opening post, are falling for the same issue that stumps modern Feminism. I was very surprised when my mother described herself as a Feminist, because the word conjures extremes in public discourse. When she described it, though, all I could say was, "That's not Feminism. That's just.... true." Most of the core values of the movement have been internalized into the culture.

That’s basically what you and several other posters are doing by trying to separate “Western” elements from “traditional” non-Western elements in other cultures. How many “traditional” Chinese customs that you see being supplanted are merely former new ideas or foreign influences that were internalized into the culture at some earlier time? What makes the adoption of a Western influence that much different? Arguing that “traditional” Chinese culture is dying is an alarmist, essentialist argument that assumes there was a point that Chinese culture didn’t undergo change and wasn’t subject to foreign influence.

At the very least, you want us to believe that non-Western cultures were developing upon a linear slate that has been or is now being erased and replaced by a new, Western slate.

China embraced Communism, which is not some sort of development out of traditional Chinese culture.

What is this “traditional Chinese culture” you speak of, though? When China embraced Buddhist influences, was that a development out of traditional Chinese culture? Statements like the one above seem to think of cultures as developing from their own unique, uncontaminated petri dishes, separate from other cultures. That’s not how culture works at all – The Chinese can adopt new Western ideas and remain just as culturally Chinese as they were before, because interacting with and taking influences from other cultures has always been part of the culture. To imagine a “traditional Chinese culture” free from foreign influences would probably result in something completely unrecognizable to reality.

What we consider traditional Chinese cuisine also include many ingredients of foreign origin.

Sure. Szechuan cuisine uses a lot of chili pepper, an ingredient that was exclusive to the Western Hemisphere until several centuries ago. Does that make all Szechuan dishes that use chili pepper inauthentic? If so, tell me the time stamp a food needs to have in order to be considered “traditional”. Whatever a Szechuan farmer was eating in 1492 would probably have been pretty alien to a hunter-gatherer who lived in the same vicinity before the adoption of agriculture.

Bolivia is actually majority Indian pureblood to this day. I don't think you can argue that non-Western culture is present as more than a backwards fringe even there.

What is Western and what is non-Western, though? Let’s take the popularity of bowler hats among Bolivian Aymara women, for example. Here we have an example of how an indigenous, non-Western culture has been changed due to the introduction of a Western idea.

Let’s look closer, now: Is the use of the bowler hat in Bolivia the same as the use of the bowler hat in the Western World? The difference that should be most obvious is the fact that the bowler hat is no longer common fashion in the Western World. You’re not going to find that many people walking around in London wearing a bowler hat today, and those who are probably realize that it’s not a mainstream fashion item. The second difference is that, whereas the bowler hat is popular among modern Aymara women, in Victorian Britain it was primarily worn by men – That’s a big difference. An even closer look will probably reveal that the Aymara bowler hats are stylistically different from the “traditional” British bowler hats in terms of shapes, colors, sizes, and materials used, with some more divergent than others.

That’s what cultures do. They take an element from another culture, assess it, and assimilate it into their own cultural contexts. The fashions of the Lolita subculture in Japan might be similarly based on Western ideas, particularly the period clothing of Victorian England, but to the eyes of someone from England, even someone from the Victorian era, there’s probably a sense of foreignness when looking at a Lolita dress.

So, no, non-Western cultures aren’t being replaced by Western culture. Western influences are simply being added to the same slates that existed before, slates that were always changing and will always continue to change. If you’ll look close enough, you’ll usually find that these Western influences had to be twisted and tweaked to fit into the existing culture as needed.

There may be many Pizza Huts in China, but to these observers there’s a noticeable divergence in taste and atmosphere from the American Pizza Hut they're familiar with, just as American pizza tastes different from the original Italian pizzas. (And while I've never been to China, I've experienced Pizza Hut in other countries - Different recipe formulas for the sauce, cheese, and crust, different ratios of crust-to-sauce-to-cheese, popular toppings that aren't used in the United States, and different portion sizes, for example...)
 
I accept your assertion of expertise. It implies you know a great deal more about the subject than I. I hope I can ask you to check my prior statements again, as it seems from my perspective that you misread my position.



There are indeed many such sources. There are, unfortunately, also a great deal of sources discussing the decline and extinction of native languages and cultures throughout the Americas. Now admittedly this particular area - highland Peru through Paraguay - is the worst region with which to demonstrate my argument, and probably the best (excepting the Yucatan or Nunavut) for your own.



Absolutely it is, and this is likely one of the few areas where I approach the same level of familiarity with the subject matter as you. However, where you take the strong political move to preserve heritage as an indicator of cultural survival, I interpret it differently.

Historically, early nationalism in Europe (and Japan and Turkey) developed as much in spite of as because of the machinations of any government or propertied class. It largely developed from grassroots movements, then graduated to the political level. The primary driver of these efforts was not the strength of the cultural object in question (whether dance, craft, folklore, or whathaveyou). Instead it was a reaction to the perception that the practices faced imminent extinction.

At root it was a consequence of the breakdown of the traditional unit through all of human history - the village. As the number of large communities grew and smaller ones withered, traditional local practices tended to fade. Political efforts to preserve old customs did in point of fact manage to preserve real cultural practices. I won't deny it. But in practice they actually preserved only a tiny fraction of the original cultural wealth of each country.

The cause was fairly simple. If you want to preserve peasant folk songs like the ones you grew up with, you're going to need a large group of people to cooperate. You certainly have a large group of peasants, but each is from one of thousands of villages, each of which had its own songs. The very act of attempting to organize the preservation of these songs will see the movement focus on at best a few hundred, of which, in practice, perhaps a few dozen will survive in popular as opposed to occasional use. Of course those few dozen would tend to be those that overlapped many communities or (importantly) were catchy enough that they leave the preservation movement and simply enter into the new "national" culture. This is all in the early years of the process, and long decades would threaten even those few dozen. A great deal would survive only or mostly in written form, to be brought out on festivals and through lack of practice sung unimpressively.

Allow me to offer an example. A five years ago I was living in Italy. There the process of nation-building threw up a dance called La Tarantella, originally from roughly around modern Naples. What fascinated me was that I could have conversations with Italians from vastly different ages and backgrounds, and they would have the same attitude toward the dance. They weren't terribly interested in performing it, but had a certain pride that it was still commonly known enough to be practiced on demand because it was the Italian peasants' dance. These very same people would admit without a second thought that it was actually the Calabrian (IIRC) version that anyone ever did, and that the dance was the Calabrian version of one South Italian folk dance. In practice, a large number of well-intentioned people, whose aim was to preserve their traditional culture, actually extirpated the vast majority of traditional folk dances in their efforts to rescue the one they'd decided was the "authentic version." Impressively, while records document this as a common and normal process, the myth of preserving national values has been remarkably successful in forgetting such casualties.

My interpretation then, would be that this is a hot-button issue precisely because traditional cultures are under threat. You do not need to go to great lengths to preserve your culture when it is not in decline. I do not claim that nothing will be left when the process is over, but that the politicization of Indian-ism will tend to itself rub out village-level practices in favor of shared values that the entire region can agree on. In point of fact, vastly disparate peoples with dialects approaching mutual incomprehensibility and (again, IIRC) outright separate languages are all attempting to take a unitary stand in defense of Indian-ness. The end result will inevitably be a definition of the term that will fall far short of the diversity of cultures it claims to represent. Much of what survives will be what can be "packaged" - culturally or economically - for global consumption.



Having said all that, there remains a caveat.

You.

It isn't 1880 anymore. Modern Western (or, if you prefer, Global) culture puts a tremendous value on preservation of languages and dialects above and beyond (or rather below and within) the national level. To back it are recorders who not only have a relatively scientific motivation (and so are less likely to homogenize in describing), but also have access to tools that make recording and preserving information much more feasible. The Soviets made a truly impressive demonstration of the results that follow a state promoting and protecting minorities as opposed to assimilating them.

The West also offers a strong and growing market for goods produced "locally" and/or "authentically." It also promotes tendencies to seek out roots in a way that has been infrequent in human history, and has resulted in some cases in the recreation of cultures on the brink.

So, hopefully, we don't lose too much more of the interesting bits.

It is at this point that I'll point out that I certainly did not say that the native cultures of Bolivia were dead. I did exaggerate for effect in referring to them as a backwards fringe, but I hope that my comments here will make clear the sense in which I meant that. One, I admit, not entirely clear in my original post.

Okay, I understand where you're coming from a lot better now, and I should probably make a better effort to distinguish between your opinions and thewingedgoat's.

The way I see it, the Western World has certainly been the spur to globalization (the West created the modern international system, after all), but we're getting to a point where the role of Western culture in the process of globalization is being eclipsed by its own creation. Westernization introduced nationalism and other forms of identity politics to areas of the world that didn't have them before, at least not in the familiar form. In recent years, it has also brought rights, political empowerment, and other opportunities to disenfranchised groups. That's where I see the role of Western culture diminishing - Before, the system was forged by Westerners and people from non-Western cultures couldn't have a say even if they wanted to.

Now, Chinese and Indian students are going to Western universities and adding their own unique perspectives to the "universal" academic scholarship - perhaps decreasing its former Western biases that resulted from its exclusive nature. Indigenous Andean peasants who were once silenced by the European-descended elite are organizing themselves and asserting their numeric advantage within Western-style democracies - They're electing leaders that stand for their causes on both national and international levels. A recent revision to the Ecuadorian constitution granted rights to the natural world, which is a phenomenon at least partially grounded in the cultural influence of the indigenous people... There's a growing trend of indigenous movements attaching themselves to environmental conservation movements, relating the importance of nature to their traditional cultures. I see these indigenous perspectives as valuable to global environmental awareness, especially since modern Western culture is so detached from nature.

As far the part about preserving culture, I agree, it's pretty much indisputable that the cultures of the New World have lost many traditions over the course of the last 500 years. Today, like you said, it's becoming easier to preserve traditions with the help of Western academia and technological development. On the other hand, other traditions continue to be threatened by external pressures.

The way I see it, though, a big part of culture is also about change. If one was to read Lewis' and Clark's descriptions of the Plains Indian cultures and then visit a modern reservation, one would be quick to think that the "traditional culture" is dead. Even though that tribe may live a very different lifestyle today, however, it's still a distinctive culture in its own right. The Lakota may not be archers chasing bison anymore, but then again, look at me. Before my grandparents' generation, my ancestors were all farmers, while I struggle trying to grow a tomato plant in my backyard.

The indigenous people of Ecuador speak Kichwa today, but before the Incas conquered them they spoke their own languages, which have been lost to history. The ancestors of the Iroquois went from hunting-and-gathering to horticulture before living on reservations. Cultures change, and what is traditional to one generation might have been novel to a previous one.
 
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Skokie

Banned
There's a growing trend of indigenous movements attaching themselves to environmental conservation movements, relating the importance of nature to their traditional cultures. I see these indigenous perspectives as valuable to global environmental awareness, especially since modern Western culture is so detached from nature.

Maybe I'm a cynical bastard, but I don't take the so-called indigenist movements very seriously as examples of authentic indigenous culture. I see them as examples of Western romanticism (specifically the trope of the Noble Savage) more than anything.

Many of the Pre-Columbian civilizations were pretty bad environmentalists, which contributed in certain cases to their decline (I'm thinking specifically of the slash and burn agriculture civilizations of Central America).
 
That’s basically what you and several other posters are doing by trying to separate “Western” elements from “traditional” non-Western elements in other cultures. How many “traditional” Chinese customs that you see being supplanted are merely former new ideas or foreign influences that were internalized into the culture at some earlier time? What makes the adoption of a Western influence that much different? Arguing that “traditional” Chinese culture is dying is an alarmist, essentialist argument that assumes there was a point that Chinese culture didn’t undergo change and wasn’t subject to foreign influence.

At the very least, you want us to believe that non-Western cultures were developing upon a linear slate that has been or is now being erased and replaced by a new, Western slate.

I see you've saw my statements when you wrote your later post, so I'll refrain from adressing the bits that are due to misunderstanding my arguments. No use prolonging argument on points where we essentially agree.

I will though, emphasize that I am not arguing that “traditional” Chinese culture is dying, but that it is Westernized. I'll define that below, as we all seem to ascribe different meanings to the word.

What is this “traditional Chinese culture” you speak of, though? When China embraced Buddhist influences, was that a development out of traditional Chinese culture? Statements like the one above seem to think of cultures as developing from their own unique, uncontaminated petri dishes, separate from other cultures. That’s not how culture works at all – The Chinese can adopt new Western ideas and remain just as culturally Chinese as they were before, because interacting with and taking influences from other cultures has always been part of the culture. To imagine a “traditional Chinese culture” free from foreign influences would probably result in something completely unrecognizable to reality.

Sure. Szechuan cuisine uses a lot of chili pepper, an ingredient that was exclusive to the Western Hemisphere until several centuries ago. Does that make all Szechuan dishes that use chili pepper inauthentic? If so, tell me the time stamp a food needs to have in order to be considered “traditional”. Whatever a Szechuan farmer was eating in 1492 would probably have been pretty alien to a hunter-gatherer who lived in the same vicinity before the adoption of agriculture.

This is in response to something that wasn't said by me. Just want to emphasize that in passing.

What is Western and what is non-Western, though? Let’s take the popularity of bowler hats among Bolivian Aymara women, for example. Here we have an example of how an indigenous, non-Western culture has been changed due to the introduction of a Western idea.

Let’s look closer, now: Is the use of the bowler hat in Bolivia the same as the use of the bowler hat in the Western World? The difference that should be most obvious is the fact that the bowler hat is no longer common fashion in the Western World. You’re not going to find that many people walking around in London wearing a bowler hat today, and those who are probably realize that it’s not a mainstream fashion item. The second difference is that, whereas the bowler hat is popular among modern Aymara women, in Victorian Britain it was primarily worn by men – That’s a big difference. An even closer look will probably reveal that the Aymara bowler hats are stylistically different from the “traditional” British bowler hats in terms of shapes, colors, sizes, and materials used, with some more divergent than others.

That’s what cultures do. They take an element from another culture, assess it, and assimilate it into their own cultural contexts. The fashions of the Lolita subculture in Japan might be similarly based on Western ideas, particularly the period clothing of Victorian England, but to the eyes of someone from England, even someone from the Victorian era, there’s probably a sense of foreignness when looking at a Lolita dress.

So, no, non-Western cultures aren’t being replaced by Western culture. Western influences are simply being added to the same slates that existed before, slates that were always changing and will always continue to change. If you’ll look close enough, you’ll usually find that these Western influences had to be twisted and tweaked to fit into the existing culture as needed.

Ah, actually I agree with that much. But I'm not arguing that non-Western cultures are being replaced by non-Western cultures. My position is that world cultures are being Westernized.

As you say, cultures quite naturally undergo change, and often this change finds its source in outside ideas. This is a very normal trend, and as globalization gradually comes to dominate economies the world over it is also an accelerating trend. The massive market for anime and manga in the United States, or the existence of homegrown Buddhism there, or the universality of restaurants serving food of Chinese or Italian origin show that well enough.

What I would argue is that there exists a strong trend wherein the disproportionate number of new ideas entering world cultures are originating from a single broadly-defined source. In countries like China most cultural shifts remain internal ones, but the number of "imports" has skyrocketed, and these imports are dominated by The West [TM]. In that sense I would say that nearly all world cultures are undergoing a process of Westernization. I would further add that most cultures that have taken a plurality of their "source material" in this way for decades, could reasonably termed "Westernized."

That's not to say that traditional Chinese culture is much more extinct than it'd be if the Chinese had replaced it themselves, and in a vaccuum. It's still Chinese culture. It's just that Chinese culture is Westernized. Or partially Westernized, if you prefer.

There may be many Pizza Huts in China, but to these observers there’s a noticeable divergence in taste and atmosphere from the American Pizza Hut they're familiar with, just as American pizza tastes different from the original Italian pizzas. (And while I've never been to China, I've experienced Pizza Hut in other countries - Different recipe formulas for the sauce, cheese, and crust, different ratios of crust-to-sauce-to-cheese, popular toppings that aren't used in the United States, and different portion sizes, for example...)

Actually, I agree 100% with those people. However, if you look in those restaurants you will find - along with incredible decor, uniforms, occasional odd costumes, and different menus - things that were most definitely alien to Chinese culture: Pizza, words like "yummy" and "funny" in fancy script on the wall, forks, spoons, knives, Italian-style pasta, even eating with hands - something not just foreign in origin but traditionally taboo.
 
Okay, I understand where you're coming from a lot better now, and I should probably make a better effort to distinguish between your opinions and thewingedgoat's.

The way I see it, the Western World has certainly been the spur to globalization (the West created the modern international system, after all), but we're getting to a point where the role of Western culture in the process of globalization is being eclipsed by its own creation. Westernization introduced nationalism and other forms of identity politics to areas of the world that didn't have them before, at least not in the familiar form. In recent years, it has also brought rights, political empowerment, and other opportunities to disenfranchised groups. That's where I see the role of Western culture diminishing - Before, the system was forged by Westerners and people from non-Western cultures couldn't have a say even if they wanted to.

Now, Chinese and Indian students are going to Western universities and adding their own unique perspectives to the "universal" academic scholarship - perhaps decreasing its former Western biases that resulted from its exclusive nature. Indigenous Andean peasants who were once silenced by the European-descended elite are organizing themselves and asserting their numeric advantage within Western-style democracies - They're electing leaders that stand for their causes on both national and international levels. A recent revision to the Ecuadorian constitution granted rights to the natural world, which is a phenomenon at least partially grounded in the cultural influence of the indigenous people... There's a growing trend of indigenous movements attaching themselves to environmental conservation movements, relating the importance of nature to their traditional cultures. I see these indigenous perspectives as valuable to global environmental awareness, especially since modern Western culture is so detached from nature.

As far the part about preserving culture, I agree, it's pretty much indisputable that the cultures of the New World have lost many traditions over the course of the last 500 years. Today, like you said, it's becoming easier to preserve traditions with the help of Western academia and technological development. On the other hand, other traditions continue to be threatened by external pressures.

The way I see it, though, a big part of culture is also about change. If one was to read Lewis' and Clark's descriptions of the Plains Indian cultures and then visit a modern reservation, one would be quick to think that the "traditional culture" is dead. Even though that tribe may live a very different lifestyle today, however, it's still a distinctive culture in its own right. The Lakota may not be archers chasing bison anymore, but then again, look at me. Before my grandparents' generation, my ancestors were all farmers, while I struggle trying to grow a tomato plant in my backyard.

The indigenous people of Ecuador speak Kichwa today, but before the Incas conquered them they spoke their own languages, which have been lost to history. The ancestors of the Iroquois went from hunting-and-gathering to horticulture before living on reservations. Cultures change, and what is traditional to one generation might have been novel to a previous one.

Heh. Looks like we're pretty much on the same page. Defining terms really ought to be mandatory in a person's first post. We could have avoided all of this.

As far as my position diverges, it is that the new world being built will continue to give disproportionate import to [1] Western cultures and [2] the most heavily Westernized cultures. These will be the source of much of the future cultural changes in the next few generations.
 
Maybe I'm a cynical bastard, but I don't take the so-called indigenist movements very seriously as examples of authentic indigenous culture. I see them as examples of Western romanticism (specifically the trope of the Noble Savage) more than anything.

Many of the Pre-Columbian civilizations were pretty bad environmentalists, which contributed in certain cases to their decline (I'm thinking specifically of the slash and burn agriculture civilizations of Central America).

Historically speaking I agree. Many tribal cultures did indeed live in balance with nature, in that they'd killed off every species that could not coexist successfully with them.

As far as the modern day, though, it bothers me less. Politically it is an extremely useful myth that produces something that is, overall, a good. It also helps right some past wrongs in a better way than just shoving money at a group. I'm not going to complain.
 
This is in response to something that wasn't said by me. Just want to emphasize that in passing.

...

Ah, actually I agree with that much. But I'm not arguing that non-Western cultures are being replaced by non-Western cultures. My position is that world cultures are being Westernized.

I must apologize for lumping you in with tailwingedgoat, but I suppose my arguments are really directed at his point of view. I threw you in because you seemed to agree with him. It's really statements like this that I'm arguing against:

Traditional Chinese culture is largely gone. Not even the clothing and hairstyles survive. It's been replaced by Western concepts like socialism and state capitalism.

It's that point of view, that there is (or was) a kind of "pure" Chinese culture that is being destroyed by Westernization, that I disagree with, and it looks like you agree with me for the most part.

Actually, I agree 100% with those people. However, if you look in those restaurants you will find - along with incredible decor, uniforms, occasional odd costumes, and different menus - things that were most definitely alien to Chinese culture: Pizza, words like "yummy" and "funny" in fancy script on the wall, forks, spoons, knives, Italian-style pasta, even eating with hands - something not just foreign in origin but traditionally taboo.

Since you're in China right now, perhaps you could confirm or correct my suspicions. I feel that for Chinese consumers, many times there is an understanding that Pizza Hut and other Western franchises are attempts at foreign food. For them, a trip to Pizza Hut would be an occasional break from the norm they're used to, but few would actually prefer to consume such Western foods all of the time. What do you think?

I mean, even here in the United States it's not difficult to find restaurants that allow us to break typical food taboos. At an Ethiopian restaurant, we can eat the same communal dishes and bread as our companions and sometimes, we can even order raw beef (kitfo). Japanese sushi bars give Westerners an opportunity to use chopsticks and eat raw fish. Still, many people go to such establishments with a perception that this are "exotic" spaces where we can momentarily give up our own cultural norms. Is that a valid comparison?
 
Since you're in China right now, perhaps you could confirm or correct my suspicions. I feel that for Chinese consumers, many times there is an understanding that Pizza Hut and other Western franchises are attempts at foreign food. For them, a trip to Pizza Hut would be an occasional break from the norm they're used to, but few would actually prefer to consume such Western foods all of the time. What do you think?

I mean, even here in the United States it's not difficult to find restaurants that allow us to break typical food taboos. At an Ethiopian restaurant, we can eat the same communal dishes and bread as our companions and sometimes, we can even order raw beef (kitfo). Japanese sushi bars give Westerners an opportunity to use chopsticks and eat raw fish. Still, many people go to such establishments with a perception that this are "exotic" spaces where we can momentarily give up our own cultural norms. Is that a valid comparison?

I agree with the gist here. Here in Korea, to give an example, pasta restaurants. They largely exist primarily as a dating space, expensive and somewhat-exotic places to date a girl to impress her. The food is over-priced and the flavours are heavily skewed to the Korean palate (even to the extent that pickled radish appears on the side to satisfy the Korean desire for side dishes). Beer is consumed heartily, a Western import, but it is always consumed with side dishes, frequently mixed with Korean local spirits or whiskey and one-shotted. Cereal is in the stores, but its seen as a kids snack rather than a legitimate breakfast. People drink Coke and eat dunkin donuts, but they also drink corn-flavored water and eat cakes made of rice powder.

I would agree that the products of Western culture have become common in non-Western cultures, but the vast majority of the time it is recontextualized within the existing culture. The random uses of "yummy" and "funny" on the walls, for instance, is not a very good example of Westernization. You wouldn't see that on a Western pizza restaurants walls because it would look ridiculous. Therefore, while the words themselves are Western in origin, their usage is non-Western. Koreans use "Hwaiting!" to mean "You can do it!" It comes from the English "Fighting!", but we don't use that expression like they do. It's a cultural reappropriation, much as "Ole!" comes from "Allah!".

The point is, that Westernization is for the most part surface-deep. Just as pre-Columbian religions have survived by disguising their gods as Catholic saints but largely maintaining their older traditions. Take a Chinese student and an American student, both wearing jeans, both listening to Lady Gaga and watching Hollywood movies. Then check their values, their world views, their lifestyle and habits. That's where the real cultural differences will emerge.
 
I must apologize for lumping you in with tailwingedgoat, but I suppose my arguments are really directed at his point of view. I threw you in because you seemed to agree with him.

No worries. We're on the internet, it happens.

It's that point of view, that there is (or was) a kind of "pure" Chinese culture that is being destroyed by Westernization, that I disagree with, and it looks like you agree with me for the most part.

Ayup. Reading Chinese history right now. I've noticed that the Chinese (and I don't mean the Communists) have been retconning it rather shamelessly to fit with the norms of the day. The result is an intriguing layered interpretation of their history, where the actions of people remain, but the reasons for their actions are tortuously altered to match what later historians understood or agreed with.

The place has altered dramatically for millenia. It was a society that resembled pre-literate mesopotamia and practiced human sacrifice. Then it was one vaguely feudal microstate, worshipping the ancestors of the ruling family and given token tribute by the related semi-sedentary peoples around them. Then a period of warring states non unlike the pre-Persian fertile crescent sporting ideas that'd've fit easily into the Classical Greek milieu (if the Greeks weren't intolerant bastards). Then a very no-nonsense Roman-ish sort of state. Add two dozen other iterations, each viewing itself as the end of the series or the natural heir to it, but not one truly repeating....

Since you're in China right now, perhaps you could confirm or correct my suspicions. I feel that for Chinese consumers, many times there is an understanding that Pizza Hut and other Western franchises are attempts at foreign food. For them, a trip to Pizza Hut would be an occasional break from the norm they're used to, but few would actually prefer to consume such Western foods all of the time. What do you think?

I mean, even here in the United States it's not difficult to find restaurants that allow us to break typical food taboos. At an Ethiopian restaurant, we can eat the same communal dishes and bread as our companions and sometimes, we can even order raw beef (kitfo). Japanese sushi bars give Westerners an opportunity to use chopsticks and eat raw fish. Still, many people go to such establishments with a perception that this are "exotic" spaces where we can momentarily give up our own cultural norms. Is that a valid comparison?

It's largely true. They're prestige vendors. There isn't really an equivalent yet to the Chinese restaurant in every town of 3,000 people we have in the states. That said, I've noticed an apparent trend for "Western" chains to undercut each other - as there's a huge potential market for cheaper foods that still fall into the right category for indicating status. McDonald's and KFC especially seem to be gaining traction in that regard.

At a guess I'd say eating "hamburgers" (what they call any sandwhich), chicken wings, and french fries will be internalized in the next couple decades. Sort of an exception-that-proves-the-rule thing that few will see as odd - "that's just how you eat it." Think tortillas/tacos in the US. Meanwhile pizza and pasta suppliers, as well as "bar and grill" restaurants or other more risqué fare will continue to be special occasion dining. Some people just won't go for it and few would be interested two nights in the same month. Except, again, to demonstrate status.

Actually, the single biggest difference between the US and Europe one one hand and China on the other is that the latter isn't cosmopolitan. Aside from the foreign chains, it's almost as if they're Britain in 1930 or the US in 1950 - they eat standard diner fare, with higher-end establishments mostly offering more and improved versions of the same.

He says with the vast authority of 4 months in a country.
 
It's largely true. They're prestige vendors. There isn't really an equivalent yet to the Chinese restaurant in every town of 3,000 people we have in the states. That said, I've noticed an apparent trend for "Western" chains to undercut each other - as there's a huge potential market for cheaper foods that still fall into the right category for indicating status. McDonald's and KFC especially seem to be gaining traction in that regard.

At a guess I'd say eating "hamburgers" (what they call any sandwhich), chicken wings, and french fries will be internalized in the next couple decades. Sort of an exception-that-proves-the-rule thing that few will see as odd - "that's just how you eat it." Think tortillas/tacos in the US. Meanwhile pizza and pasta suppliers, as well as "bar and grill" restaurants or other more risqué fare will continue to be special occasion dining. Some people just won't go for it and few would be interested two nights in the same month. Except, again, to demonstrate status.

Actually, the single biggest difference between the US and Europe one one hand and China on the other is that the latter isn't cosmopolitan. Aside from the foreign chains, it's almost as if they're Britain in 1930 or the US in 1950 - they eat standard diner fare, with higher-end establishments mostly offering more and improved versions of the same.

He says with the vast authority of 4 months in a country.

If you want to extrapolate into the future you might look at Singapore where a blend of Asian and Western cultural influences have become internalised into the local culture. Just to take the food example, Western food is no longer "exotic" and it's become internalised in the culture to the point where even tiny stalls in markets offer a version of it
 
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