Globalization & Culture: Global Melange

by Jan Nederveen Pieterse

Is there cultural life after the 'clash of civilizations' and global McDonaldization? Internationally award-winning author Jan Nederveen Pieterse argues that what is taking place is the formation of a global mZlange, a culture of hybridization. From this perspective on globalization, conflict may be mitigated and identity preserved if transformed. The book offers a comprehensive treatment of hybridization through a series of 14 conceptual tables embellished by textual analysis laced with tantalizing examples from around the world. This historically deep and geographically wide approach to globalization is just what is needed on the brink of more war bred by cultural misunderstanding. The first book in the new 'Globalization' series edited by Manfred Steger and Terrell Carver, Globalization and Culture sets the tone for short, provocative treatments of hot topics in the expanding universe of globalization studies.

Genres: Nonfiction, Academic, Cultural, Sociology, Economics, Theory

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

Reviews

[Karla Kitalong · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a textbook used in the global cultures class at MTU. Seems too challenging for first-year students, and parts were boring to me, but I resurrected some ideas--boundary, boundary objects, fixity, hybridity, mimicry, translation, mestiza--from my early academic years, so it was time well spent.

[Sergej van Middendorp · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good introduction to the duality of globalization and culture, blending concepts associated with each to help us understand both phenomena as interrelated and from the outside as well as the inside.

[Ricardo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a lucid and engaging discussion of cultural hybridization in the context of globalization. Pieterse takes the long view, insisting that globalization has a deep history. It is not a phenomenon of just the last few decades. Likewise, the sort of cultural mélange that we think of as characteristic of globalization is nothing new. Hybridity happens, and its been happening, for a long time, as cultures have come into contact through a variety of ways, some peaceful and some not. In fact, hybridity is only meaningful in the context of some kind of normative purity, because when you get right down to it, all cultures are hybrid cultures. It's just that some hybridities are more salient, and draw our attention, while others go unnoticed, or are mistaken for pure forms. One of the real merits of the discussion is the attention Pieterse pays to power asymmetries. Hybridity rarely involves a symmetrical relationship between two forces. Usually one or the other exerts more pressure, enjoys greater authority, or has more momentum. The two forces, however, are not necessarily those of the modern west and the non-modern rest. In given instances, it can be the "nonwestern" component that exerts itself. In others, we can be dealing with hybridities made up entirely of nonwestern components. The book is polemical, taking stands against prominent naysayrs of hybridity as a useful concept, and against those who would see globalization as McDonaldification or the clash of civilizations, but it is all the better a read for that.

[Anna · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has an interesting concept; it's a shame it's such a snoozefest while also being a bit overly-romantic about the possibilities of a "hybrid" theory of globalization.

[Jakub]

Read while in Oaxaca. Very thought provoking. The title pretty much captures what its about.

[Serena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great introduction to hybridity theory.