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.