nada Švob-Đokić-theoretical syncretism in understanding cultures

8/13/2019 Nada vob-oki-Theoretical Syncretism in Understanding Cultures

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Theoretical Syncretism in

Understanding Cultures

Nada vob-okiInstitute for International Relations

Zagreb


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Cultural studies, cultural economies,

culture today

Terry Eagleton

AFTER THEORY(2003)

Literary Theory (1983; 1996)

The Idea of Culture(2000)

Chris Anderson

THE LONG TAIL

How Endless Choice is Creating Unlimited Demand (2006)

Sarah A. Radcliffe, Ed.

CULTURE AND DEVELOPMENT IN A GLOBALIZING WORLD.

Geographies, actors and paradigms (2006)


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Terry Eagleton: After Theory

Cultural theory (a critical self-reflection on

humanities and arts), essentially linked to colonial

and post-colonial studies, follows modernism and

post-modernism and raises up until the 1980s andthe end of 20th century

The great days of theories of modernity and post-

modernity have passed. However, there is no

possibility to go back to thepre-theoryinnocence.

What is in front of us?


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Note: Modernity, post-modernity;

modernism and post-modernism Modernity; modernism: mindset that emerged during the

Enlightment. Science explains almost everything, and modernsociety (industrial and capitalist society) is the consequence ofthe growth of rationality and reason. Growth, freedom,democracy, industrial and scientific development (roughly mid -

end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century)

Post-modernity; post-modernism: no objective scientific truth;relativisation of values (Lyotard: Incredulity towards our culturalmeta-narratives); major meta-narrative is individual difference

theory; complex diversity, pluralism(Jameson: post-modernityrelated to the late capitalism, post-colonialism, alternative viewsof progress (e.g. socialism), post-structuralism, discoursetheories, etc.


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The policy of forgetfulness; impossibility toconceptualize the present; no expectations from thefuture.

The policy of creativity.

National cultures have dissolved into a number ofchaotic sub-cultures

Sub-cultures correspond to global cultures. New

sensitivity. Technology, virtuality and globality.

What is culture today?


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Today, there is de-specialization, fullopenness of cultural spaces, intenseintercultural communication, and full merging

of creativity and production. All borders fadeaway. Theoretical views are general; culturesare specific, and the correspondence doesnot exist.

Rationality and conceptualization of cultureare not possible any longer; absolute truthabout culture does not exist


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Culture as: civility, community, imaginative

creation, spiritual values, moral values, forum

to raise the key existential issues; passions,

experiences, mystery and knowledge;diversity; tradition and modernity; hedonism,

adaptability; universal truth; identity, plurality

of meanings Cultural reconstruction as a possibility


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Chris Anderson: Long Tail World

The Long Tail


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We are consumed by hitsmaking them, choosingthem, talking about them, and following their riseand fall.

We define our age by our celebrities and mass

market productsthey are the connective tissue ofour common experience. Now, the markets fragment into countless niches Choices are much diversified A market of multitudes has appeared: mass market

has been turned into a mass of niches. There is no replacement: everything exists at the

same time.


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Creativity: Its hard to tell when the professionalsleave off and the amateurs take over

Customers: massexclusivity, masscustomization; peer-to-peer distribution (P2P) and

low cost marketing; millions of regular people arethe new taste makers

Merging of media; merging of time periods; thetyranny of locality fades away

The exposure culturereflects the philosophy of the

Web, in which getting noticed is everything. Shift from passive consumers to active producers:

from consumerism to participative producerism


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The emerging digital entertainment economy

We have been trained to see the world through ahit-colored lens

Who killed the hit album? Piracy. Technology.

Micro-hits: a singular star is joined by a swarm ofmicro-hits.

However, costly productions still need hits (Hollywood

films). this has leaked outside of the Hollywoodboardrooms and into our national culture.


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Probabilistic knowledge

Wikipedia

our mental software has evolved fasterthan our hardware (neural wiring)

the intelligence is simply emergent.


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Three forces of the Long Tail Culture

1. Democratizing production

2. Democratizing distribution

3. Smart choices (information easily

accessible). In the world of infinite choice,contextnot contentis king.


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Culture fragments into a million of tiny microcultures (creation ofmicro stars and micro hits)

Infinite choice (the Long Tail is about abundance); filtering ofinformation enables the choice and increases the importance ofcontext. However, too much choice creates the problem: it is

hard to choose New taste: Millions of regular people are the new tastemakers

New types of production (co-productions)

New types of distribution (unlimited offer)

New types of consumption (personal individualized choice)


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Fractal structure: the Long Tail is made of

many mini-tails (genres and sub-genres)

The Long Tail of Time: todays hit is

tomorrows niche (or vice versa?) From or culture to and culture

The rise of parallel cultures (millions of micro

cultures discernible through shared interests):urban tribes; urban dances, etc.


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Raymond Williams: There are no masses; there areonly ways of seeing people as masses (Culture andSociety)

Ego-casting: individual and extremely narrow pursuit

of ones personal taste (In thrall of our own littletechnologically constructed worlds, we are,ironically, finding it increasingly difficult to appreciategenuine individuality, Christine Rosen)

Variety of pop cultures.

Affinity based and massively parallel culture: Wewill still share our culture with others, but not witheveryone.


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The question tomorrow will not be

whether more choice is better, but

rather what do we really want?

Comment: We are back to the identity issues.


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S. A. Radcliffe:CULTURE AND DEVELOPMENT IN A

GLOBALIZING WORLD

What is culture?

Debates across disciplines

New paradigms, recent concepts

even one reason for taking culture seriouslycovers a number of different political,

analytical, or ideological perspectives.


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GLOBALIZING WORLD

Anthropological perspectives:

- cultural differences (colonial and post-colonial studies)

- structured cultural differences (ethnicity, nationality, trans-

nationality)- WesternOrientalOverseas perspectives Sociological perspectives:

- social relationships, social cohesion

- class, racial formations, gender formations, age formations

- security, democratic openness, accountability

- communities, societies; regions, states; rural settings, urbansettings


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GLOBALIZING WORLD

Economic perspectives:

- varieties of capitalism across the world, across

historical time

- social capital (human resources, education,knowledge)

- cultural capital (cultural values, cultural heritage)

- cultural entrepreneurship within wider socioeconomic

transformations

- 2 dimensions of culture and economics : cultural

embeddedness of economies; cultural economy


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GLOBALIZING WORLD

In summary, culture comprises the material products, patterns ofsocial relations, and structures of feelings produced by multipleactors, who are differentially positioned in power relations,political economies and social reproduction. Viewing culture inthis way recognizes the contested nature of cultural meanings,

artifacts and social relations that are coproduced by diverseactors in their ongoing daily and generational interactions. Thespatial and social limits of culture are thus dynamic, reflecting theways in which social interactions are rarely bounded, while thefeelings in which meanings and social relations are produced gobeyond the local or indeed national arena.Sarah. A. Radcliffe: Culture in development thinking:geographies, actors and paradigms, in Culture andDevelopment in a Globalizing World, Routledge, 2006.


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Understanding cultures

Culture:

- basically (re)defined through identities

- cross-disciplinary

- shaped by consumption (preceded by

production and distribution)

- reflects individual choices

- probabilistic value systems

nada Švob-Đokić-theoretical syncretism in understanding cultures

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