Manifesto of Globalization and Cross Communicative Cultures:
By A. R. Dhawan
1. [PURPOSE THROUGH OBSERVATION]…..
2. [DISSENTION]
5. [THE GLAMOROUS WORLD]
4. [ARCHITECTURE]
6. [OPTIMISM]
7. [EMERGING NEW CULTURES WITH CONTINUOUS EVOLUTION OVER TIME]
1. [PURPOSE THROUGH OBSERVATION]…..
As time progresses, the worlds cultures and traditions evolve at an expeditious pace. Power struggles and peacemaking efforts coexist in a time where difficulties arise from the most simplistic controversies. Urban spaces are becoming more and more condensed, while spreading throughout less dense areas similar to viral strains. Nations are growing and collapsing at a minutes’ notice. Although much effort being made to connect the tissues of humanity and bring unity between people from all backgrounds, the endeavors seem to be insignificant on the global scale. There seems to be very little understanding and acceptance between nations. Not only is this communication disturbed at such an extroverted scale, there seems to be similar conditions in introverted identities. Communities and components forming such groups as nations don’t seem to communicate or make effort to understand the diverse cultures and theories forming the region they are engaged in. It is not practical to assume that everything and everyone will someday be in a state of tranquility, where we will be in an almost surreal utopia. However, it is inconsiderate to not make effort to resolve issues that have been stretched through several epochs. As children, many are told they can do anything they want and that they are the keys to the future, which sparks the innocent mind to crave destinies that stretch reality well beyond its limits. Then life goes on for the child and they soon witness great things as well as massive catastrophes. Their imagination becomes more and more rigid as their options become less amorphous. Many think about issues revolving around conflicts which involve resolution at a global scale. The unfortunate become victims to these issues. Others, watching from a distance, wonder how the situation came to be. The dilemma repeats itself from epoch to epoch while technology continues to advance and cultures continuously expand and divide. This has culminated to the present, where even though there is the means to communicate globally, however there is little understanding of whom or what to communicate. While they may be known by name, the clash between cultures is so great due to poor efforts of communication at a global scale that complex situations arise from the most simplistic issues. How can countries become part of a greater community when there is no compassion for understanding and such little tolerance for the diversity of cultures?
This paper is a statement and plea for change through the given observations. Though many of the issues described involve a collaborative effort from nations around the globe, it seems as though the intentions aren’t so clear. As in current traditions only politicians and businesses communicate at a global scale. The intention is that communication filters to all the remaining branches of society and we reach a new era of “globalization”. There is optimism that humanity accepts people for who they are, and understands that everyone should be free to practice any lifestyle they choose. However people should seek to understand that no culture, nation, or group is higher than the other and we are all part of one single planet. They should be encouraged to study the complexities of cultures and their influence on human existence, so there may be an optimistic progression towards a future of united prosperity.
2. [DISSENTION]
Disagreements between two cultures emerge in many cases due to a lack of tolerance and misunderstanding of history which brought the definition of culture to its questionable state. As the dialectic philosophy states, any form of an argument has a contradictory response. The result is a synthetic resolution through the process of a coherent debate. This principle can also be introduced to the clash in cultures. However, there needs to be coherence and a level of understanding between the opposing forces. If one force delivers an argument, the opposing should give the other a chance to explain their perspective view on the issues under controversy. The diverse perspectives between cultures are the result of generations of traditions, time, economic conditions, political stabilities, different environments and religious philosophies. Though there are similarities between many religions and cultures, there are probably more differences. However the core similarities which are hidden due to misunderstandings and socio-political consequences can prove sometimes to be the keys of uniting cultures.
The impact of the industrial, economic and social globalization has been dramatized in a globally connected world that has created a flow of information, technology and social behavior from one society to another. However, the flow of change and influence from the developed countries to developing countries is much more dramatic with an apparent destruction of local heritages in an unprecedented way. On the other hand, the flow of cultural heritages and values from the developing countries in the eastern part of the globe is commercialized and skewed in the developed countries (western part of the globe where there is more economic power), but it has failed to preserve the originality of the ancient cultural heritages. Even though there are now the tools to understand and learn from these ancient cultures, the tools are currently being abused to only extract fragments of the culture that seem “exotic” or aesthetically pleasing.
The “societal values” related to the way of living have been established by the long history of cultural heritage evolving from over thousands of years in the eastern part of the world are diminishing. They are losing their existence because of strong influences by more prosperous western cultures and economic impact from the developed counties. For example, relationships in the family have moved from a focused and stable environment to more independent and distributed form. Though such transitions can help the society to evolve with respect to higher personal accomplishments and distributed resources in society, it has negatively impacted the personal relationships and dependency within a family. In Japan the pressure of developing economy in a global market has lead to the situation where families are deprived of having time and relationships to provide the next generation offspring. The birth rate is drastically reduced with a vital question on the preservation of society and its cultural heritage in the future.
3. [THE GLAMOROUS WORLD]: Music, Art and Spiritual Heritages;
The Eastern world appears to be blindly following the western form of music, art and spiritualism. Though there are initiatives, interest and practice of eastern forms in the western world but they are fragments of what the original heritage followed. In some ways, this migration of exotic interpretations of culture are positive, however the initial purpose or idea which created those traditions is lost. It is a lost opportunity because with that knowledge much of the historical difficulties can be analyzed to minimize the possibilities that those problems may return in the future. Will this migration be enough to preserve these cultures in their original forms?
4. [HYBRIDIZATION]
Most emerging cultures are strains of preceding cultures which adapted to their contexts and roots with a different intention of where their place in society was. However the tolerance for some of these rebellious cultures is little to none.
5. [ARCHITECTURE]
Architectural landmarks and monuments have made a historic and time-resistant representation of culture and society. With some of the new models of industrialization in the architectural industry, those distinctions appear to be lost in the modern society. The small architectural firms skilled in the art of craft are losing to bigger corporate entities. On the scale of globalization, many firms are making an attempt to understand the context of where architectural designs are in dire need and have the necessary resources. Many firms aspire to understand the cultural values and historic precedence’s that occurred in the region for inspiration when designing in a region which may not be in their sector of the world.
6. [OPTIMISM]
The old artistic forms and procedures such as those in medicine have been re-evaluated with new technological tools and knowledge on the old heritages can be disseminated much faster and efficiently than ever before. The recording of new information towards preserving old heritages is much more feasible because of globalization in all sectors with communication archrivals. It could be argued that new renovations can be done to preserve old architectural heritages but a careful consideration should be made in designing new buildings and monuments to reflect the historical evaluation of society to create time-preserving landmarks. The great advances in technology can make understand diverse cultures and build a unity between them, however the best results lie on how this technology is used as these technologies can also open great disasters waiting to happen. Pandora’s future essentially lies on the user.
7. [EMERGING NEW CULTURES WITH CONTINUOUS EVOLUTION OVER TIME ]
As a product of globalization making the world much more competitive, connected and fast moving, new lifestyles and beliefs are evolving into new forms of integrated cultures. The shear pace of modern developments and competitiveness in economically stressed world has caused to lack of tolerance and confusion among members of the societies on the practice of traditional cultures to preserve and strengthen their heritages. While new trends and styles of living are integral parts of an evolving world, they may not have the time and resources to stabilize to evolve into new form of cultures as they can be bombarded with the new plateau of fast-pace changes. However, technology tools for effective knowledge discovery, dissemination and archival can be and have been used recently to understand the diversity of cultures and create and environment of translation and integration of traditional and cultural heritages into new forms without being compromised. In this process, all cultures form a certain relationship with each other and begin to coexist together with respect and tolerance. However, on order to attain such a goal, people of all races, religions, cultures need to have some flexibility while studying and traveling to other regions of the globe.
In summary, cultures have been evolved and stabilized within diverse societies over time as local assets. Through practice and integration of traditions, societies have preserved their cultures over the past thousands of years. Cultures have great assets to learn from other societies to enhance our understandings of human evaluation and possibly survival in the future. However, the technologically enabled globalization of fast changing modern societies has threatened the preservation of old cultural heritages, and traditional values and assets. While the diversity and lack of conjunction in the old world has restricted the proliferation of cultures in the past, the new technology-advanced era has provided an unrestricted flow of information and resources throughout the world to evolve traditional cultures into a state of confusion with an unstable sense of modernization. The globalization with an imbalance of economic powers has resulted in a dangerous situation of loss in local traditional heritages specifically in the eastern world because of blind following of trends and styles of developed countries in the western world, and a skewed form of eastern cultures in the commercialized western part of the globe. Though the globalization may be responsible for such degradation and loss to the society, modern technological advancements and tools can be very effectively used to study and re-discover the past cultures, traditions and heritages, then archived and disseminated in the modern world. While communication technologies can provide some great opportunities to acquire and archive vital information, advances in transportation allow us to visit other remote cultures and foreign spaces as nothing can surpass the knowledge gained through personal interactions with people, and visits to historical landmarks and monuments. With the most advanced technologies in communication, informational archiving, knowledge discovery and architecture, it is the moral obligation of society to integrate and preserve the old “gold” of the past cultural heritages with the new “tech-evolution” of the modern world effectively. It is a critically important method for the survival of human civilization in the future to develop and evolve with this synergy. The synergy of power through the high-tech environment with the richness of the past heritages and values would enable human kind to direct their life styles to evolve as a healthy and stable society with the least damage to the environment, earth and the universe.
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