Homogenization of Cultures

Posted by Tad McIlwraith on May 29th, 2005 filed in Biological Anthropology, Language Endangerment

From Discover.com and noted by Anne Galloway comes a discussion about the reasons for cultural diversity and the idea that in order to protect themselves, cultures behave like different biological species.

I find several ideas of note here. In particular, the interview includes more discussion about linguistic diversity, why fewer and fewer languages are surviving today, and the implications of linguistic loss cultural diversity. I blogged about similar discussions recently. In an MSNBC piece, it was posited that less cultural and linguistic diversity will lead quickly to a global monoculture with less human biological variation.

Notably, this thread was picked up by technology and legal blogger Rob Hyndman. Rob’s post ties the discussion to Tom Friedman’s much talked-about book The World is Flat where the idea that the world is increasingly interconnected — with all sorts of resultant effects — is explored in great detail.

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5 Responses to “Homogenization of Cultures”

  1. orange. Says:
    May 30th, 2005 at 3:28 pm

    I currently talked to a living example of hybridization in regards of language as representation of culture when I had my hair cut at Ayla`s as I do for some years now.
    I allways had thought she had immigrated from Turkey as child for the strong accent she speaks german with, but was surprised to learn she was born in Hannover.
    We have a high percentage of Turkish people living in Germany, many in Third Generation, which means they are hereborn and went to school in Germany, which moreover mostly means they have german nationality. But they nevertheless speak german with specific turkish appropriation, which means more than accent and pronounciation, which they have adopted from their non native speaking turkish parents.
    Imagine. Culture turns native speakers to non native speakers in their native language.

  2. Administrator Says:
    May 30th, 2005 at 6:16 pm

    Very cool example … thanks for sharing it!

  3. orange. Says:
    May 31st, 2005 at 6:12 am

    You are welcome. I ve written a contextualizing 20 minutes paper in fall last year connecting Ulf Hannerz Anthropological Networktheory with the Cultural Studies Approach and discussing it in regards of globalization and questions of homogenization v. heterogenization of culture(s): Konnektivität und Kulturanalyse (Connectivity and Cultural Analysis). Unfortunately I ve not yet managed to translate it–maybe you got someone german speaking around, until I ve done a translation.
    Anyway Hannerz` text I`m refering to is written in english and perhaps might interest you to have a look at yourself.

  4. orange. Says:
    May 31st, 2005 at 6:18 am

    = Ulf Hannerz, The global ecumene as a network of networks in: A. Kuper (ed.): Conceptualizing Society. New York, 1992

  5. Administrator Says:
    May 31st, 2005 at 6:54 am

    Thanks for the reference too … I’ll take a look.

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