Global culture

Task 1. Now, you have three minutes to talk together about the aspects of global culture. Things to think about:

• How do you feel about a global culture?

• In what ways do you think it affects culture in your country?

• Does it widen or cross the generation gap?

Task 2. You will hear three extracts from a lecture on globalisation. For questions 1-6, choose the answer (A, B, or C) which fits best according to what you hear. Read through the questions carefully before you listen. After listening, discuss your answers with your partner.

Extract 1.

1. How does the speaker feel about the woman's experience?

A He is appalled at the loss of tradition.

B He dismisses it as of little importance.

C He accepts it without surprise.

2. What point is the speaker making when he talks about sceptics and radicals?

A To emphasise that globalisation is still a new idea.

B To show how seriously the concept of globalisation is taken.

C To warn us of the disagreements globalisation causes.

Extract 2.

3. According to the speaker, how has globalisation affected the family?

A Women's fight for equality has threatened family life.

B Women have achieved less than they should have done.

C Women are attempting to rewrite history.

4. What does the speaker say about nation states?

A They are trying to revive their cultural identity.

B They are not as powerful economically as they once were.

C They are being weakened from within.

Extract 3.

5. What evidence does the speaker have for the negative effect of globalisation?

A Rich countries are tampering with statistics.

B Many goods produced in the Third World are unsafe.

C Underdeveloped countries are a dumping ground for certain goods.

6. The speaker says that one effect of globalisation is that

A only Western culture is beginning to dominate the world.

B the West is at greater risk of pollution.

C former colonies are beginning to play a greater international role.

& LEARN & THINK

Yi-Fu Tuan (1930 - ) was born in China and later moved to the United States. Now a geography professor in Madison, Wisconsin, he has studied the cultural differences between America and his native country. He states that he writes "from a single perspective – namely that of experience." In this article published in Harper's, he compares the way people in two cultures view their environments.

Chinese space, american space

Cultures as diverse as America's and China's have many points of difference. In at­tempting to provide insight into their differences in a brief essay, Yi-Fu Tuan focuses on the concept of space and location. Americans, he asserts, are less rooted to place and are future oriented. The Chinese, savoring tradition, are deeply tied to specific locations.

Americans have a sense of space, not of place. Go to an American home in exurbia, and almost the first thing you do is drift toward the picture window. How curious that the first compliment you pay your host inside his house is to say how lovely it is outside his house! He is pleased that you should admire his vistas. The distant horizon is not merely a line separating earth from sky, it is a symbol of the future. The American is not rooted in his place, however lovely: his eyes are drawn by the expanding space to a point on the horizon, which is his future.

By contrast, consider the traditional Chinese home. Blank walls enclose it. Step behind the spirit wall and you are in a courtyard with perhaps a miniature garden around a corner. Once inside his private compound you are wrapped in an ambiance of calm beauty, an ordered world of buildings, pavement, rock, and decorative vegetation. But you have no distant view: nowhere does space open out before you. Raw nature in such a home is experienced only as weather, and the only open space is the sky above. The Chinese is rooted in his place. When he has to leave, it is not for the promised land on the terrestrial horizon, but for another world altogether along the vertical, religious axis of his imagination.

The Chinese tie to place is deeply felt. Wanderlust is an alien sentiment. The Taoist classic Tao Te Ching captures the ideal of rootedness in place with these words: "Though there may be another country in the neighborhood so close that they are within sight of each other and the crowing of cocks and barking of dogs in one place can be heard in the other, yet there is no traffic between them; and through­out their lives the two peoples have nothing to do with each other." In theory if not in practice, farmers have ranked high in Chinese society. The reason is not only that they are engaged in a "root" industry of producing food but that, unlike pecuniary merchants, they are tied to the land and do not abandon their country when it is in danger.

Nostalgia is a recurrent theme in Chinese poetry. An American reader of translated Chinese poems may well be taken aback – even put off – by the frequency, as well as the sentimentality, of the lament for home. To understand the strength of this sentiment, we need to know that the Chinese desire for stability and rootedness in place is prompted by the constant threat of war, exile, and the natural disasters of flood and drought. Forcible removal makes the Chinese keenly aware of their loss. By contrast, Americans move, for the most part, voluntarily. Their nostalgia for home town is really longing for a child­hood to which they cannot return: in the meantime the future beckons and the future is "out there," in open space. When we criticize Ameri­can rootlessness, we tend to forget that it is a result of ideals we admire, namely, social mobility and optimism about the future. When we admire Chinese rootedness, we forget that the word "place" means both a location in space and position in society: to be tied to place is also to be bound to one's station in life, with little hope of betterment. Space symbolizes hope; place – achievement and stability.

Understanding Meaning

1. How does the author see a difference between "space" and "place"?

2. What do the traditional designs of American and Chinese homes reveal about cultural differences?

3. Why do the Chinese honor farmers?

4. What historical forces have shaped the Chinese desire for "rootedness"? How is American history different?

5. What negative aspects does Yi-Fu Tuan see in the Chinese sense of place?

Evaluating Strategy

1. The writer really only devotes a single paragraph to describing American concepts of space. Why? Is the essay out of balance? Discuss whether or not a comparison paper should devote half its space to each topic.

2. Is the author objective? Is it possible for a writer to discuss cultures with­out inserting a measure of bias?

Appreciating Language

1. What words does Yi-Fu Tuan use in describing the two cultures? Do they seem to differ in connotation?

2. Does the word rootlessness suggest something negative to most people? How does Yi-Fu Tuan define it?

3. Look up the word wanderlust. How does a German term fit in an essay comparing American and Chinese culture?

Writing Suggestions

1. If you have lived in or visited another country or region within the United States, write a brief essay outlining how it differs from your home. Just as Yi-Fu Tuan used the concept of space to focus a short article, you may wish to limit your comparison to discussing eating habits, dress, atti­tudes to work, music, or dating practices.

2. Collaborative Writing: Ask a group of students about their attitudes toward rootlessness and place. Determine how often students have moved in their lives. How many have spent their entire lives in a single house or apartment? Write a few paragraphs outlining the attitudes expressed by the group.

U THINK & SPEAK OUT

William Ouchi (1943- ) was born in Hawaii and educated at Williams College, Stanford, and the University of Chicago. A specialist in organizational behavior, he has written several books widely studied by executives and government ad­ministrators. In 1981 he published Theory Z: How American Business Can Meet the Japanese Challenge. Appearing at a time when many American cor­porations felt threatened by Japanese imports, the book became a best-seller. Theory Z was developed in response to two contrasting views espoused by Doug­las McGregor. According to Theory X, people hate work and need to be directed and motivated. Theory Y assumed people gain satisfaction from work and require the freedom to direct themselves. Ouchi's Theory Z, based on Japanese manage­ment practices, stresses the importance of involving workers in the process.