Post Blog 11/28 Courtney Sparling

After Wednesday's class, I feel as though everything we have studied throughout the course of the semester has come full circle. Especially after reading and discussing Appadurai and watching the TED talk, I really feel that theory isn't just something just for scholars. As students, we can use it and see it taking form in our everyday lives. I think that it is most fascinating to read theorists' work that were written such a long time ago, before any modern technologies that we have today were even imagined, and see how it connects so eerily to what is actually happening. It is as if these theorists have predicted what couldn't have possibly been known, but somehow they do! I think that is my favorite part of theory that I have been introduced to this semester. For never having read theory and analyzed it so deeply before this class, I was pleasantly surprised with how much I could relate to it and how interesting it really was!

I really liked how in class, looking at Appadurai specifically, we paired up with a classmate and tried to define the 5 different streams of global culture flows in our own words. Ethnoscapes, financescapes, technoscapes, mediascapes, and ideoscapes, in my opinion, as I listened to my other classmates speak, is that they all overlap and create instability within each other's interactions around the world. These all are the heart of the disjuncture of the world that Appadurai speaks of in this reading. Our world dysfunctions.  

Melanie Roth - Post Blog 11/28

            Arjun Appardurai’s reading “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy” offers deep meaning, while exploring communication and ways to connect at a global level. Broadening the material by referencing other theorists, Appardurai introduces us to new ideas. This reading truly exemplifies the connections from one theorist to the other, and demonstrates correlation through this massive web of theory. 

Cuban emigration - 1980's

            Dissecting each of the “five dimensions of global cultural flows” (514) one by one, made it easier for my to organize my thoughts and to overall comprehend the material. One of the most important things that I have learned from this reading is that each of Appardurai’s “-scapes” is constantly changing. Out of the five, I personally find ideoscapes to be the most intriguing. The ever-growing global flow, and the spreading of ideologies throughout the world is what defines ideoscapes. The Mariel Boat Lift, an event that resulted in a mass emigration of Cubans to the United States, is an example of how ideoscapes work. In this specific case, the flood of Cubans to south Florida caused an overwhelming transformation of Miami. Because of the new population of Cuban immigrants, ideologies quickly were dispersed and changed, exemplifying Appardurai’s term ideoscape.  

I enjoyed concluding class with the video from TED talks where Hans Rosling provided us with visual imagery to share global statistics about population and life expectancies. The technology used to display this information provided viewers with a clear visual of how the world is continuously changing.

Image, the Imaginary, and Postmodernity's Mediascapes: The case of The Onion

BEIJING. The Chinese Communist Party may want to brush up on U.S. media.

The People's Daily, the party's official organ, ran a large feature on its website Tuesday on young North Korean leader Kim Jong Un being named The Onion's "Sexiest Man Alive."

The only glitch was that The People's Daily didn't seem to realize The Onion is a satirical publication...

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~ dc

Post Blog Appadurai

Today in Class we discussed our readings on Arjun Appadurai. There are phrases, quotes and ideas in this piece that resonate with me.  Two of the phrases were Disorganized capitalism and Path Dependency. I believe both of these conditions are caused by the structures that hold capitalism up. Something like path dependency, which is when we blindly follow the trend and even if, its not right path we still stay on it. Also Disorganized Capitalism is just as it sounds, capitalism but disorganized or not right. In class we heard an example about how Florida is the top grower of tomatoes in the US but how its one of the worst places to grow tomatoes. Also the scapes Apadurai had mentioned all about understood the structures of different landscapes. When dealing with media scape you must understand its power structures. You must be able to identify biasness so that you can look at the gaps in the text like Mache ray or Derrida. In this clip John Stewart points out Fox News’s bias, he sees the biasedness and is aware of his media landscape. Overall i learned a lot more in this semester than i thought i would. The first couple of days i was worried about learning theorist. But all turned out well and i learned a lot, hopefully i can bring up critical theory in other classes besides John Stewart Economics

Post Blog 11/28

Thankfully, after today’s class discussion I feel I now have a better grasp on Appardurai’s article. His essential argument is that the global cultural economy is growing at an exponential rate. There almost aren’t any countries or cultures that are purely there own. He states, “Cultural transitions between social groups in the past have generally be restricted, sometime by the fact of geography and ecology . . . ” (511). However, “it takes only the merest acquaintance with the facts of the modern world to note that it is now an interactive system in a sense that is strikingly new” (511). This interactive system of which he speaks with “new order and intensity” is congruent with the advancement of technologies. Technology is constantly growing and likewise its advancement effects industry and culture around it. This for example could be anything from advancements transportation of traded commodities to telecommunication satellites. Basically anything that contributes to the ‘shrinking’ of world. He creates 5 concepts for helping understand how this has happens in their respective categories. One example of this can be “technoscapes.” This refers to the technological contributes to the global flow of culture. For example lets say Michael Jackson, an American pop icon. Now I say and American icon, but in reality the majority of people of earth know who he was. Technological advancements in radio, television, Internet etc. has made it so nearly everyone in the world could identify a song if they heard it, and furthermore could even tell you when he dressed like. Appardurai’s has, for all intents and purposes, created a lexicon for which can be used to help understand the global economy and the cultural flow of the postmodern world. 

Post Class 11/28/12 - Arjun Appadurai-

Arjun Appadurai has rather a broader ideology of the global cultural economy. However, his ideas ties into one piece at the end. He discussed disjuncture and difference in the global cultural economy which contains rather recent on going issues in global economy. He talks about "elementary framework for exploring such disjunctures to look at the relationship among five dimensions of global cultural flows that can be termed"(514). Those five dimensions are 'ethnoscapes', 'mediascapes', 'technoscapes', 'finacescapes', and ' ideoscapes'. They all tie into one similar relationship which shaped by globalization  and easier excess of everything. In today's society, whole world is so closely related especially in economy. No country is completely independent when it's come down to economy and culture. We think this irregular culture and relationships had been going on for long time. Yet this international phenomenon had been going on only last ten years, when we critically look at what Appadurai is discussing in his text. 

Post class 11/28

Once again, the class discussions truly brought forth the deeper meaning, and agenda, of Appadurai's reading in its totality. One of the links we drew in class was the sustained cultural forces creating a stronger communication across cultures and the ways in which its becoming stronger.

"A new power was unleashed in the world, the power of mass literacy and its attendant large scale production of projects of ethnic affinity that were remarkably free of the need for face-to-face communication or even of indirect communication between persons and groups." (511-512)

Mark Poster brings forth the rhizome and how it spreads down and out, just as Appadurai explains this cultural connection. Thanks to the ability of communication growing there's an equal spread of culture with that communication.

In regards to mediascapes, one of the five dimensions laid out, I was in thought over a governments bias with another country or culture in relevance to media. If a country's government were to have a tiff with America, would they then hold out a lot of American media from their own population? They would seem to have the power and resources to do so. How would this then play into the Americanization of that country? Would this then have a reaction similar to Appadurai's discussion of distance from metropolitan areas and their fantasy images? If a culture is far removed from America, then their images of Americanization would become imagined.

post class 11/28

Arjun Appadurai discussed the imaginary in his article. A lot of what I found can relate back to what Baudrillard discussed in his discussion on reality and simulacra. When Appadurai discussed the “ethnoscapes” in his piece he was discussing the people including tourists, workers, immigrants, refugues, and more all together creating the culture and society we live in. For example the tourists that go to Disneyland are choosing to partake in a type of culture and that is what creates the change in our world. His discussion of “mediascapes”is interesting as well because we have so much technology now, but the distribution of it is so important. A lot of what we have in the media is regulated or controlled by the government, and what is seen in the media influences our view on our culture. Media and technology shape our world today.

He also discussed “disorganized capitalism.” Every time I travel from my home in south Florida back to school I pass through the middle of the state with tons of orange factories. Almost all of our oranges come from Florida and it makes me wonder why that is. Florida is conveniently located within the United States. The shipments of oranges are sent out all across the country from just one state. I am not sure why, because other states could most likely grow them too and have local produce. This is one way our country and disorganized and makes it much more difficult then it needs to be. This has to do a lot with what Appadurai says. He questions the culture we live in and then how this is affecting our economy, and on even a bigger scale, our globe. 

Pre Clas Blog: Arjun Appadurai

Appadurai's article explores the global cultural economy. Appadurai notes that there is this sense of nostalgia for some, nostalgia for a place of time that one has not been to. Growing up as a teen, there was a television channel, that would air Different Strokes at night. I watched every single episode and was fascinated with the American sitcom. Purely for the fact that I liked comedy, but also the fact that it was a famous American show. I wanted to know what it meant to be American and somehow this show acted as a gateway. Although it was among a list of many that I would watch, all american shows. The reason why this one was different is the fact that there was this constant feeling of Nostalgia. The series stars Gary Coleman and Todd Bridges as Arnold and Willis Jackson, two African American boys from Harlem who are taken in by a rich white Park Avenue businessman. There is a definitely mettanarrative around this whole show, and that is the notion of two black children taken in by someone who holds so much privilege in the country, during a time in which there where still pretty high racial tensions. Appadurai states " The past is now not a land to return to in a simple politics of memory. It has become a synchronic warehouse of cultural scenarios" (513), the show constantly drew upon the tensions that Mr Drummond faced, and at this time it was seen as kind of revolutionary for the country. I celebrated the family dynamic, although not really know what the underlying tones suggested. Living in an interracial household, this had never appeared as something that may be such a problem.

Pre Class- Appadurai

After reading Appadurai's essay, much of his argument about the global culture is very similar to different theorists we have studied all semester. He writes, "Yet today's world involves interactions of a new order and intensity" (Pg. 511). This notion of the new relates back to Lyotard and Baudrillard. Lyotard talks about a "period of slackening" and argues that "so-called realistic representations can no longer evoke reality except as nostalgia or mockery". Appadurai builds off of this concept, talking about Americanization, suggesting "that the issue is no longer one of nostalgia but of social imaginaire built largely around reruns" (Pg. 512). These configured worlds which Appadurai writes about, not only argues for Americanization but globalization as a phenomenon of reconfigured images. Baudrillards notion of simulacra also can be realted to this argument as well. The idea of simulating something to put a subject into experiencing the real is something cultures globally are exposed to.

The images of Harry Potter are a perfect example of the globalization that took place in order for the novel to circulate across the world.

Arjun Appadurai – Melanie Roth

Arjun Appadurai’s article Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy, presented theories that related back to previous theorists whom we have already studied. By doing this, I personally had an easier time understanding the reading, and what Appadurai’s was theorizing.

            One of the main topics discussed was the notion of technology connecting people at a global level. Appadurai states, “For with the advent of the steamship, the automobile, the airplane, the camera, the computer, and the telephone, we have entered into an altogether new condition of neighborliness, even with those most distant from ourselves” (512). This passage suggests that nations are connecting to one another through technological advances, allowing one to travel or communicate in a much simpler way. This allows us to be able to quickly share ideas, spread information, and connect on a personal level globally. This media, technology, and travel have resulted in “nationhood” which is what fuels consumerism.

            I found it interesting when Appadurai brought to light the notion of nostalgia, stating, “As far as the United States is concerned, one might suggest that the issue is no longer one of nostalgia but of a social imaginaire built largely around reruns” (512). These reruns are past scenarios from different eras, and it is theorized that nostalgia is a “central mode of image and reception” (512).

Appadurai states, “Americans themselves are hardly in the present anymore as they stumble into the megatechnologies of the twenty-first century garbed in the film-noir scenarios of sixties’ chills, fifties’ diners, forties’ clothing, thirties’ houses, twenties’ dances, and so on ad infinitum” (512). We continue to use past era phenomenon’s and styles to create past familiarities. I find it interesting that even if one is not from a specific era, it is easy to put yourself in such a scenario, through a construction of ideas taken from the past. “The past is now not a land to return to in a simple politics of memory .It has become a synchronic warehouse of cultural scenarios, a kind of temporal central casting, to which recourse can be taken as appropriate, depending on the movie to be made, the scene to be enacted, the hostages to be rescued” (Appadurai 216).

Appadurai - Courtney Sparling

"It takes only the merest acquaintance with the facts of the modern world to note that it is now an interactive system in a sense that is strikingly new."

I believe that the first quotation in this work not only sums up the theory that Appadurai continues on to explain in the reading, but also relates to all the other readings we have done throughout the year in this class. So many theorists and theories pertain to this new modern world that we now live in, relating it to the past, present, and future. One thing that is clear in all of the theories we have approached all year, is that the world we live in is based on interactions as the system we need and rely on. Today, this system is new and different from what has been used in the past. Technologies and the removal of global restrictions have transformed the world into "communities with 'no sense of place."

One quotation that really caught my attention:
"If your present is their future, and their future is your past, then your own past can be made to appear as simply normalized modality of your present."

We are not really in the present, ever. Appadurai gave examples of 50s diners, 20s dances, ect. We incorporate so much of the past in our present day. I also see that we incorporate the future in shows and gadgets that are constantly being released to the public in an attempt to outdo the previous. We also see the original Batman comic books, made into a film, and then more films that revamp the first, so to speak.

These examples are seen here as "American," but often times travel globally into numerous countries. We see Batman toys/puzzles in China, comics in India etc. Everyone around the world can become familiar with Batman.

Cixous & Butler

I didn’t do the correct assignment but I’ll still blog. This weekend the issue of gender equality came up in regular conversation with some friends of mine. One of my friends was really interested in the MRA the Men’s Rights Association. From what I gather from my friend it’s a bunch of men not realizing their privilege. He talked about how unfair it is to be a man sometimes, and I did not want to get into this discussion. Last year I took a women’s studies course so my knowledge of this issue is grounded historically and culturally meanwhile he literally had only read a couple blogs and felt as though he was an expert. I do like “As a woman, I could be obsessed by the scepter’s shadow, and told hey me: adore it, that thing you don’t wield” this quote is a woman’s perspective of the patriarchal society we live in, she is using the scepter’s shadow as a metaphor for man’s power as well as his genitals because that’s where his power supposedly is. “But at the same time, man has been given the grotesque and enviable fate of being reduced to a single idol with clay balls” I think this is a good juxtaposition of the ways men power is viewed.  Another thing pointed out in class that I liked was the difference between appreciation and appropriation in reference to Hip Hop and urban culture I believe there is a fine line between the two. I do believe in a suburban white culture you can find both of these. There is the appropriated side where people are wearing big clothes, sagging their pants and echoing things they see and hear in Hip Hop but don’t really understand it or why. There also the appreciation side of it where they know where it comes from and emulate the culture which can be through dressing the same way, but they actually understand the culture.

Appadurai Robby Riehle

I don’t know if it’s because the semesters coming to an end or what but I certainly didn’t not enjoy reading Appadurai’s article. I found it to be possibility the most difficult to follow and his process of thinking to be confusing. However, he does refer to a couple of other theorist that I do understand and that helped me a lot. As a matter of fact after reading to article I realized the only way I got though it was by referring back to other theorists concepts in my head. For example he talks a good deal about reproduction and mechanical art directly refers to refer Benjamin. Appadurai’s gives the example, “Dragnet is back nineties’ drag, and so is Adam-12, not to speak of Batman and Mission Impossible, all dressed up technologically but remarkably faithful to there original” (513). Benjamin says, “Everybody who witnesses the films accomplishments is somewhat of an expert… at any moment the reader is ready to turn into the writer”. Here essentially we can see that people who saw the originals became the reproducers and recreated the charters in a new age. Furthermore the technological aspect of reproduction makes it easy to construct them “faithful to the original.” However, Benjamin also says that “by making many reproductions it substitutes a plurality of copies for a unique existence.” Leaving its aura weakened. Appadurai’s also states “An important fact that the world we live in today is that many persons on the globe live in such imagined worlds and thus are able to contest and sometimes even subvert the imagined world of the official mind and of the entrepreneurial mentality that surrounds them”(514). This quote immediately reminded me of Baudrillard’s notion of simulacra. In which our simulated world encompass our actual ones. 

Pre Class Appadurai- Messer

"As far as the United States is concerned, one might suggest that the issue is no longer one of nostalgia but of a social imaginaire built largely around reruns." (Appadurai 512)

The quote describes American culture as one built upon the idea of nostalgia, yet there's a gap between the nostalgia and memories. Thanks to mechanical reproduction, previously analyzed by Walter Benjamin, there's a capability for "print capitalism" to reach out to other corners of the world, creating a power of mass literacy. Americanization can be closely bound to commodification, a term discussed by Jameson, creating blurred lines between reality and fiction.

Arjun talks about the distance from metropolitan areas and their correlating lack of reality to media images. I found this to be an interesting concept because it's an idea I found relatable to my personal knowledge. Think of the locations in America, away from all big cities or with smaller populations, and the way they perceive the modern world. On a much smaller scale, I've had friends who had never been to New York City and the way they would talk about it would be so far fetched from it's reality, in the sense that I have visit numerous times and know the city pretty well at this point. To go even further, there's the separation between countries, bringing back Hooks discussion of the Other and people's desire to come in contact with it.

http://thechive.com/2010/08/04/asians-in-american-t-shirts-made-me-lol-more-than-i-should-24-photos/

The shirt, pictured at top of page, is from China where they wear clothing with English as fashion statements and yet the wording tends to make no sense. I thought this exemplified, in a humorous light, the gap between two cultures.

Pre Class Appadurai

Arjun Appadurai

I found this essay by Arjun Appadurai to be a great way to end the semester, because there are so many connections that can be made, both in terms of theory and concepts in “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy,” in relation to many of the readings that we have done throughout the semester.  One of the key quotes that struck me by Appadurai was when he states, “…I call mediascapes and ideoscapes, which are closely related to landscapes of images.  Mediascapes refer both to the distribution of the electronic capabilities to produce and disseminate information…which are now available to a growing number of private and public interests throughout the world…” (515).  I found this quote to be important, because it directly connected to Walter Benjamin’s idea that at this moment in time, society is now able to produce and reproduce at a rapid pace, allowing for anyone and everyone to be a viewer.  What is ironic is that Arjun Appadurai ends his essay with a section titles “The Work of Reproduction in an Age of Mechanical Art, and states, “I have inverted the key terms of the title of Walter Benjamin’s famous essay (1969) to return to this rather high-flying discussion to a more manageable level” (520).  The connection that I made to Benjamin, was clearly one that Appadurai wanted the reader to make, given that he incorporated Benjamin’s essay into his own.  But, I think that says a lot, given how important the reproduction of media has become in our society.  Nowadays, like Baudrillard one famously states, there are copies of originals, and works without originals at all, and this is all possible through means of reproduction, just as Benjamin and Appadurai state.

My media example for this week is a picture of a billboard with the caption “Buy Something!” and relates to Appadurai’s idea that “…Many audiences around the world experience the media themselves as a complicated and interconnected repertoire of print, celluloid, electronic screens, and billboards” (515).  With this in mind, the “Buy Something!” billboard is an example of a direct message to audiences, and a direct correlation to the idea that viewers are bombarded with messages through different mediums.     Billboard