GS101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Cultural Globalization, Blue-Collar Worker, Glocalization
Election - The Pendulum Swings
● Glocalization: opposing tendencies operating simultaneously
● Pendulum effect: push and pull of different groups
● Integration / disintegration of larger blocs
● Vote for trump, brexit etc, reflect protectionist tendencies, ie. defend homeland
● Attempt to reclaim sovereignty from larger blocs
● Fear loss of culture, fear, and insecurity from others
Disenchantment
● Globalization: winners and losers
● Growing wealth for some, but also growing inequality within countries
● Shift of manufacturing from Global North to Global South (affected MI, WI, OH, PA)
● Disenchantment of some voters (largely working class, non-university educated, white
young blue collar men) with status quo and lack of recognition of their predicament by
mainstream politicians
(Un-) Inspired Votes
● Trump managed to inspire those voters who had felt neglected and disrespected
● Clinton failed to inspire enough young voters, minority groups (esp. Black and Latino),
women voters to offset the push by Trump’s supporter
● Independent candidates did better than expected
LECTURE
Part III: Cultural Globalization and Resistance
Universal Culture, Local Identity?
Agenda:
Culture - 3 definitions, human nature and human cultures
Cultural globalization, 3 models - McDonaldization, Localization, Hybridization
3 Definitions of Culture
● Steger’s definition: culture refers to the symbolic construction, articulation and
dissemination of meaning
○ Steger focuses on:
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■ Development of global cultures and homogeneity
■ TNC’s and the dissemination of popular culture;
■ Globalization of languages (especially English) but also the eradication of
languages
○ “Cultural practices have escaped fixed localities such as town and nation, and
eventually acquiring new meanings in interaction with dominant global themes”
(Steger, 75)
● Orend’s definition: culture is a way of life; the way that people think, speak, behave and
spend their time
○ Focuses on political and religious ideologies (e.g. liberal vs conservative, secular
vs theocratic, etc)
● Zaidi: culture makes us fully human
○ We only become fully human through interactions with others
○ To be human is to partake in communal languages, in shared ideas, values,
practices
○ The meaning of things resides not in their objective, material reality, but in their
symbolic reality (e.g what happens when we shed a tear?)
Human Nature and Human Cultures → Philosophical Musings
Human Nature
● Basic biological needs are universal
○ Need for food, shelter, security
○ Universal life-cycle (birth, sex, death)
● Universal capacities
○ To think, evaluate, act, fantasize, and hope
● Universal emotions
○ Love, hate, anger, grief, sadness, vanity, shame, hope, excitement, nostalgia
Is human nature deterministic?
● Human nature is universal, but not deterministic
○ Human nature functions as tendencies, but does not predetermine outcomes
● Human nature swings both ways
○ War but also peace
○ Enmity but also friendship
○ Greed but also altruism
○ Shaping our environment to suit us, but also destroying our environment
● Recall the order that persists unseen
Human Nature and Cultures
● Need to take both biology and culture fully into account
● Neither one alone accounts for what we are
● The meanings that we attach to universal aspects of human life vary across cultures
○ What is the meaning of birth, of death, of suffering?
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Document Summary
Pendulum effect: push and pull of different groups. Vote for trump, brexit etc, reflect protectionist tendencies, ie. defend homeland. Attempt to reclaim sovereignty from larger blocs. Fear loss of culture, fear, and insecurity from others. Growing wealth for some, but also growing inequality within countries. Shift of manufacturing from global north to global south (affected mi, wi, oh, pa) Disenchantment of some voters (largely working class, non-university educated, white young blue collar men) with status quo and lack of recognition of their predicament by mainstream politicians (un-) inspired votes. Trump managed to inspire those voters who had felt neglected and disrespected. Clinton failed to inspire enough young voters, minority groups (esp. Black and latino), women voters to offset the push by trump"s supporter. Culture - 3 definitions, human nature and human cultures. Cultural globalization, 3 models - mcdonaldization, localization, hybridization. Steger"s definition: culture refers to the symbolic construction, articulation and dissemination of meaning. Tnc"s and the dissemination of popular culture;