Appadurai, Arjun, Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization, Minneapolis
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COMM 629 Global Culture Tuesdays 9-12 Professor Josh Kun [email protected] Office hours, ASC 321c, Thursdays 10-12 and by appointment
There is a myth surrounding us and it goes something like this. We live in a borderless world, where the divisions that once separated nations and cultures are being erased by the daily sweep of international finance. The myth tells us that we are all interconnected, all of us just a fin- ger-tipped click or a wireless download or a Blackberry mobile Twitter message away. The myth likes words such as “speed” and “instantaneity” and concepts such as “global citizenship.” The myth even has an image: a once round world that has now been flattened. Blame it on transna- tional money, migratory technology, and outsourced labor, or just call it globalization. Either way, the walls come tumbling down. This seminar explores the myth of a borderless world at a time when perhaps more than ever before, borders matter, where the future lies not in national capitals or in corporate boardrooms, but at the borders, those places of conflict and juxtaposition, of meet- ing and separation, where flow and interconnection bump up against checkpoints and fingerprint scans. For every transnational corporation, a car bomb. For every pirated DVD, an outsourced job. For every wireless chat, a deportation. Are the walls tumbling down? Or are they getting high- er, and getting rigged with electronic sensors?
What does it mean to study culture in the age of globalization? What does it mean, if anything, to speak of a global culture or of multiple global cultures? This seminar explores these broad and ur- gent questions across a wide range of areas, from cool hunting and global branding to the birth of cultural capitalism to popular music to cultural commons ideas to food activism and sustainability debates. We then focus on one geopolitical and geocultural figure within the current global map: the US-Mexico border.
Each week, a different group of students will lead discussion with a series of questions and com- mentaries about the weekly readings. Each student will also be responsible for a book review to be considered for publication in the International Journal of Communication. Finally, students pre- pare a proposal for a final research project which they will present in class during the final weeks.
Recommended Background Reading
J. MacGregor Wise, Cultural Globalization: A User’s Guide Jonathan Sacks, The Dignity of Difference: How To Avoid The Clash of Civilizations Jeremy Rifkin, The Age of Access Harm De Blij, The Power of Place Anthony D. King, Culture, Globalization and the World-System
SCHEDULE OF READINGS
WEEK ONE Introduction to Seminar
Discussion of -“Mapping The Global Future”- Report of the National Intelligence Council 2020 Project -”Vogue’s Fashion Photos Spark debate in India,” New York Times -Adam Zagajewski, “Praise This Mutilated World”
WEEK TWO Inroads, Key Debates
-Mike Featherstone, “Global Culture: An Introduction” -Benjamin Barber, “Jihad vs. McWorld” -Samuel Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations” -Immanuel Wallerstein, “Culture as the Ideological Battle Ground of the Modern World-System” -Arjun Appadurai, “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy” -Arjun Appadurai, “Grassroots Globalization and the Research Imagination” -Raka Shome and Radha S. Hegde, “Culture, Communication, and the Challenge of Globalization”
WEEK THREE Before the Global: Coloniality from Walter Mignolo, Local Histories/Global Designs: Coloniality, Subaltern Knowledges, and Border Thinking Jamaica Kincaid, A Small Place
WEEK FOUR Before the Global: Modernity
Paul Gilroy, The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness
WEEK FIVE Culture as Global Resource
George Yudice, The Expediency of Culture: Uses of Culture in the Global Era
WEEK SIX Culture as Global Industry
Scott Lash and Celia Lury, Global Culture Industry (excerpts) William Gibson, Pattern Recognition
WEEK SEVEN The Music Cultures of Globalization
George Lipsitz, Dangerous Crossroads: Popular Music, Postmodernism, and the Poetics of Place Steve Jones, “Music That Moves: Popular Music, Distribution and Network Technologies” Josh Kun, “Mexico City’s Indie Rock: Now Playing To The World”
WEEK EIGHT Culture as Global Commons
Larwence Lessig, Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy
Guest Speaker: Professor Francois Bar
WEEK NINE Culture as Consumer Citizenship
Inderpal Grewal, Transnational America: Feminisms, Diasporas, Neoliberalisms
WEEK TEN Culture as Diplomacy Penny Von Eschen, Satchmo Blows Up The World: Jazz Ambassadors Play The Cold War Joseph S. Nye, “Public Diplomacy and Soft Power” Bourzou Daragahi, “For Bush-Critiquing L.A. Band, A Surprise Invitation”
Guest Speaker: Amy Blackman, manager, Ozomatli
WEEK ELEVEN Culture, Food, and Global Sustainability
Paul Hawken, Blessed Unrest: How The Largest Social Movement in History is Restoring Grace, Justice, and Beauty To The World from Bill McKibben, Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future Michael Pollan, “An Open Letter to the Next Farmer in Chief” Bryant Terry, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95288271 Anna Lappe, http://www.takeabite.cc/
WEEK TWELVE The US-Mexico Border I
Guillermo Gomez-Peña, “What If Berlin Was Tijuana?” Tito Alegria, ed. “World View: Tijuana” Online Dossier (http://www.worldviewcities.org/tijuana/main.html) Lawrence Herzog, “Global Tijuana” Mike Davis, “The Urban Climacteric” Books/exhibition catalogs on reserve: This is Tijuana, Tijuana Sessions, Strange New World
Screening: Maquilapolis
WEEK THIRTEEN The US-Mexico Border II
Alicia Schmidt Camacho, Migrant Imaginaries: Latino Cultural Politics in the US-Mexico Bor- derlands Roger Rouse, “Mexican Migration and the Social Space of Postmodernism”
Screening: El Otro Lado
WEEK FOURTEEN
Research Project Presentations Group 1
WEEK FIFTEEN
Research Project Presentations Group 2