scholarly journals The Loss of Diversity in the Anthropocene Biological and Cultural Dimensions

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Hylland Eriksen
Keyword(s):  
Biological Diversity ◽  
Cultural Dimensions ◽  
National Identities ◽  
The Political ◽  
Cultural Groups ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Political Autonomy ◽  
The World ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Economic Globalisation

Theories of nationalism emphasise its standardising effects. Ernest Gellner compared the pre-nationalist world to a painting by Kokoschka (a colour extravaganza) and the world of nationalism as one by Modigliani (calm, monochrome surfaces), while Benedict Anderson showed how the standardisation of language through the medium of printing was a condition for shared national identities. In this article, homogenisation remains a concern, but the empirical framework differs from that of late 20th century theory. Taking its cue from Charles Mann’s 1493, a study of the world after Columbus where the term Homogenocene was proposed, the article shows how homogenisation is a key element in modernity, and analyses some implications of its recent acceleration. The effects of economic globalisation are detrimental to both biological and cultural diversity, since the Anthropocene era does not only refer to a reduction of biological diversity but also the incorporation of cultural groups into market economies, the loss of languages and of traditional livelihoods. The article then briefly surveys some responses to the upscaling of economies, the flattening of ecosystems and the growing power of corporations. The loss of flexibility is countered in a number of ways, from attempts to restore damaged ecosystems to groups defending their cultural and political autonomy. The analysis argues for a broad definition of politics (seen as the political), thereby questioning the ability of the state to solve the dilemma, which is a dual one relating simultaneously to cultural and biological loss. The conclusion is that upscaling (e.g., to the global system) is usually part of the problem rather than the solution, and that sideways scaling may address the shortcomings of downscaling (e.g., to the community level).

Journalistic objectivity and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Harris Parker
Keyword(s):  
National Identities ◽  
Close Inspection ◽  
Fourth Section ◽  
The Daily Show ◽  
Daily Show ◽  
The Third ◽  
Holistic Understanding ◽  
The Press ◽  
The World ◽  
Definition Of

The press is a constitutive part of our society. It helps create national identities and formulates society's understanding of itself and its place in the world. Moreover, a free press is indispensable for ensuring the vibrancy of a democracy. For these reasons, a close inspection of news, and an evaluation of its performance, is crucial. We must look to the development of the mass press at the turn of the twentieth century to locate the beginnings of journalistic objectivity and the type of news we are familiar with today. The first section of this paper offers a review of accounts of this transformational period, placing opposing theories within the larger framework of the frictions between cultural studies and political economy, and underscores the need for a holistic understanding of the period. The second section chronicles the press's articulation of its new professional tenets, offers a definition of journalistic objectivity, and reveals its intrinsic limitations. The third section details how the modern press's ideal democratic mandate has been compromised, with the influence of the press being used instead to ensconce powerful interests. And the fourth section outlines the calls for a redefinition of journalism in light of the failures covered in the preceding section. Finally, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is offered as an alternative journalistic form that transcends the dangerous dogma of traditional news outlets, allowing it to fulfill the democratic responsibility of the press by encouraging a critical and astute citizenry.

Who Changes the World

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Leeb
Keyword(s):  
The Political ◽  
Political Subject ◽  
The World ◽  
Mind And Body ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Definition Of

“Who Changes the World: The Political Subject-in-Outline” introduces the idea of the political subject-in-outline to creatively engage with the tension between the exclusionary character of the political subject and its necessity for agency. It explains why giving up on the subject altogether or theorizing it as a constantly shifting entity is implicated in the project of capitalism, and acknowledges the necessity of defining a political subject to critique and transform capitalism. Yet its outline reminds people that any definition of the political subject must remain permanently open for contestation to avoid its exclusionary character. This chapter also explains that the subject-in-outline aims to establish a mediated relation between the universal and particular, as well as mind and body. Furthermore, it shows that the idea of a political subject-in-outline can help people avoid alienation, instrumental relations, and the coldness of love in capitalism.

scholarly journals Beijing Subway and the Political and Economic Development of China

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 23
Author(s):  
Yixiao Guo
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
The Political ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Xinhua News Agency ◽  
The World ◽  
Subway System ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Beijing Subway

This research paper analyses the main purposes the Beijing subway system, which served from 1969 to now as a tool of political defense as well as a transportation system. The notion to construct the system arose in 1953, but the first section of today’s Line 1 did not open until September 1969.  Today, the Beijing subway system is the world’s busiest in terms of annual ridership and the world’s second longest subway system, ranking only behind Shanghai’s. (Xinhua News Agency, 2017, http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2017-12/30/c_1122188643.htm.) The political and economic development and trends in China in the second half of 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century, such as the Cultural Revolution and the 2008 Olympics, affected the subway system’s development greatly. This paper examines Chinese documents with the aim of providing a general understanding of the development and purpose of the Beijing system, through political, economic and technical analysis, among others, of its history. There exists almost no document, ¬¬either in English or Chinese, that analyzes the development of Beijing’s subway system. However, this topic should be considered important, as it provides an alternative way of viewing the development of China and its governing principles throughout its late-20th century and current-day history.

Socjalizacja i edukacja polityczna, jako ważne determinanty kultury politycznej

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (16) ◽  
pp. 31-51
Author(s):  
Grzegorz Piwnicki
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Political System ◽  
The Political ◽  
Literal Sense ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Definition Of

It is recognized that politics is a part of social life, that is why it is also a part of culture. In this the political culture became in the second half of the twentieth century the subject of analyzes of the political scientists in the world and in Poland. In connection with this, political culture was perceived as a component of culture in the literal sense through the prism of all material and non-material creations of the social life. It has become an incentive to expand the definition of the political culture with such components as the political institutions and the system of socialization and political education. The aim of this was to strengthen the democratic political system by shifting from individual to general social elements.

The Decline of the Social

2003 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 463-474
Author(s):  
Alain Touraine
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
State Intervention ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Social Representation ◽  
Economic Life ◽  
Industrial Society ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Definition Of

It is impossible to define sociology other than by reference to ill-defined entities like society or the social. Nevertheless, it seems necessary nowadays to ask the question explicitly, whether these referents have relevant meaningful contents. The idea of society has been profoundly reformist or reforming. Wherever the political system has become open and more complex, and state intervention in economic life has expanded, the field of sociology itself has expanded to the point where we can speak of the triumph of a sociological vision of the world. Industrial society was a complete historical construction, defined by a morality, a philosophy of history and various forms of solidarity. The idea of society was never more closely associated with those of production and social justice. Now, we no longer live our collective life in purely “social” terms nor expect social answers to our problems. The decomposition of the idea of society, set off by the fragmentation of the world in which that idea developed, got worse. The current predominance of the theme of globalization has been accelerating the decline of the “social” representation of public life. The time has come to reconstruct sociology, no longer on the basis of what we thought was a definition of the social and of society, but on the basis of the explosion of those ensembles which had been thought to be solid, and of the attempts to reconstruct the space in which subjects can reconstitute a fabric of consensus, compromise and conflict.

scholarly journals A Hobbling Marriage: On the Relationship Between the Collections and the Societal Mission of the Museum of National Antiquities in Stockholm

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 151-164
Author(s):  
Mikael Jakobsson ◽  
Anna Källén
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
Development Model ◽  
Cultural Groups ◽  
Linear Arrangement ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Problematic Relationship ◽  
Archaeological Collections ◽  
The World ◽  
The Relationship

In the late 19th century, the new Museum of National Antiquities in Stockholm was a cutting-edge institution for the presentation of ideas of a universal human development from primitive to modern —ideas that were at the heart of the European colonial project. We argue that the archaeological collections with their unaltered 19th-century structures still represent a narrative that reproduces a colonial understanding of the world, a linear arrangement of essential cultural groups according to a teleological development model. Contrary to this, the contemporary mission of the Museum, inspired by the late 20th-century postcolonial thinking, is directed towards questioning this particular narrative. This problematic relationship is thus present deep within the structure of the Museum of National Antiquities as an institution, and it points to the need for long-term strategic changes to make the collections useful for vital museum activity in accordance with the Museum's mission.

scholarly journals 1995 Special Issue

1994 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 587-594
Author(s):  
Abdel Wahab Elmesseri
Keyword(s):  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
The Political ◽  
Human Suffering ◽  
Full Understanding ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Private Lives ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
Definition Of

The definition of secularism as the separation of church and statehas gained currency and has become more or less universallyaccepted, probably because of its tameness. It confines the secularizingprocesses to the political and economic realms. Although it couldbe extended to cover what is commonly called the realm of "publiclife," it never goes beyond that. The term suggests that processes ofsecularization are explicit and quite identifiable, and that an individual'sprivate life (i.e., dreams and nightmares, tastes and aestheticsensibilities) can be hermetically sealed off and thus remain free ofthe ravages of secularism.One glance at life in the modern West demonstrates the fallacy ofthis assumption. The state, far from staying out of the realm of publiclife, has penetrated deeper and deeper and into to the farthest comersof our private lives. The corporations and pleasure industries haveinfiltrated our dreams, have shaped our images of ourselves, and havecontrolled the very direction of our libidos.Like most, or probably all, world outlooks, secularism revolvesaround three elements: God, humanity, and nature (nature is hereafterreferred to as "nature-matter" in order to emphasize the philosophicaldimension of the concept and to dispel the romantic aura that hassurrounded it and weakened its analytical and explanatory power).The attitude of God-is He transcendent or immanent; is He abovenature and humanity and history or immanent in (namely reducibleto) them-is what defines the status of a human being in the universeand hisher relationship to nature-matter.Secularism declares that it is immaterial whether or not God exists,for He has very little to do with the formulation of our epistemological,ethical, aesthetic, and signifying systems. If God exists, Hetakes two extreme forms: a) He could be too transcendent and removedfrom humanity and nature, indifferent to human suffering, orb) He could be seen as completely immanent in both humanity andnature (or in either) and as having no existence separate from them.This view, which is the more common of the two, is known as immanence.Immanence implies that a) the world as given has within it allthat is necessary for its full understanding and utilization, and b) thatthe human mind is so equipped that it could acquire all of the knowledgenecessary for a full understanding of, and dominance over,nature. If nature is autonomous and self-sufficient, then so is thehuman mind. This duality (or dualism) produced two orientationswithin the same secular outlook: ...

The Metaphysics of Worldlessness

2020 ◽  
pp. 22-79
Author(s):  
Roland Végső
Keyword(s):  
Being And Time ◽  
The Political ◽  
The World ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Way

The first chapter provides an overview of Martin Heidegger’s works by tracing the way he defines the world and worldlessness at various stages of his career. The first half of the chapter examines the role the concept of worldlessness plays in Being and Time and the existential analytic of Dasein. The second half of the chapter examines Heidegger’s later works and his critique of modernity. The chapter argues that Heidegger starts with the assumption that the stone is worldless but ends up concluding that Being is worldless. Thus, the objective of Chapter 1 is to trace the trajectory of this shift from the lifeless object to Being itself as the site of worldlessness. The chapter concludes by examining the political stakes of the Heideggerian definition of worldlessness.

ASEAN 10: The Political and Cultural Dimensions of Southeast Asian Unity

1999 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael R. J. Vatikiotis
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Regional Identity ◽  
Southeast Asian ◽  
External Factors ◽  
Cultural Dimensions ◽  
The Political ◽  
The World ◽  
Asian Identity ◽  
Internal And External Factors ◽  
Ways Of Being

AbstractIn this essay, it is argued that the roots of regional cohesion in Southeast Asia have always been rather shallow, and driven primarily by pragmatic security concerns. The primary function of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been to strengthen and preserve the sovereignty of individual states, and not dissolve boundaries or fashion a supra-national identity. ASEAN's very success has nevertheless fostered more idealistic notions of regional identity, expressed as a form of collective nationalism. As ASEAN expands, this imagined Southeast Asian identity must compete with internal and external factors forcing the region apart as fast as it is coming together. And thus, while the world as a whole increasingly accepts the new habits of global civilization, another contradictory process is taking place: ancient traditions are reviving, different religions and cultures are awakening to new ways of being, seeking new room to exist and struggling with growing fervour to realize what is unique to them and makes them different from others (Vaclav Havel, 1995).

scholarly journals Journalistic objectivity and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Harris Parker
Keyword(s):  
National Identities ◽  
Close Inspection ◽  
Fourth Section ◽  
The Daily Show ◽  
Daily Show ◽  
The Third ◽  
Holistic Understanding ◽  
The Press ◽  
The World ◽  
Definition Of

The press is a constitutive part of our society. It helps create national identities and formulates society's understanding of itself and its place in the world. Moreover, a free press is indispensable for ensuring the vibrancy of a democracy. For these reasons, a close inspection of news, and an evaluation of its performance, is crucial. We must look to the development of the mass press at the turn of the twentieth century to locate the beginnings of journalistic objectivity and the type of news we are familiar with today. The first section of this paper offers a review of accounts of this transformational period, placing opposing theories within the larger framework of the frictions between cultural studies and political economy, and underscores the need for a holistic understanding of the period. The second section chronicles the press's articulation of its new professional tenets, offers a definition of journalistic objectivity, and reveals its intrinsic limitations. The third section details how the modern press's ideal democratic mandate has been compromised, with the influence of the press being used instead to ensconce powerful interests. And the fourth section outlines the calls for a redefinition of journalism in light of the failures covered in the preceding section. Finally, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is offered as an alternative journalistic form that transcends the dangerous dogma of traditional news outlets, allowing it to fulfill the democratic responsibility of the press by encouraging a critical and astute citizenry.

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