Chinese Culture: Year of China Events

A unique aspect of Chinese culture is the stacking of rocks. Originally a Buddhist practice, primarily found in Korea before recently being transferred to China, stacking rocks of various sizes and shapes was a special form of worship and asking for good fortune. Many Chinese who practice this ritual do so for the latter reason, seeking to please supernatural forces and receive good fortune for their displays. It is primarily a gesture of asking or wishing for good fortune to be bestowed on the family . Each stone in the stack represents a particular wish or a family member. Certain shapes are noted as having specific meaning. For example, the stack I made that was three rocks stacked on top of one another represents a form of Buddha; this is a particularly common form. In addition, rocks are seen as having a direct connection to nature. In contrast to the human spirit, which is seen as weakening in a material world, rocks are seen as providing a lasting connection to the natural world.Stacks of racks, varying in size from two to as many as ten plus in height, can be found outside homes; many are even painted white as a symbol of purity.

 In many ways they are seen as artwork, and this has led to the practice becoming increasingly used for tourism. This is a double-edged sword, however, as it both preserves and spreads the practice while simultaneously risking the practices meaning.

Tibetan prayer flags represent another unique aspect of Chinese culture. These prayer flags are inscribed with auspicious symbols, invocations, prayers, and mantras. They are placed outside of people's homes and places of worship where the wind can carry their prayers and bring happiness, long life, and prosperity to those who designed them. They are designed on five colors, each representing a particular element: yellow - earth, green - water, red - fire, white - air, and blue - space. Acting on a spiritual level, the emanating vibrations from the flags protect from harm and bring harmony to everything touched by the wind. Symbols on flags range from Buddhist sayings, mythological creatures like dragons, powerful animals like tigers, and even deity drawings.

Economy & Politics: Modern Manipulators

Perhaps the two most important social structures in society, especially more developed and industrialized societies such as our own, economics and political systems, represent important avenues through which culture is expressed and affected. The Miller book on Cultural Anthropology discusses the basic concepts of these structures as well as provides various examples of their relation to contemporary cultural issues. In addition, the short video, titled "Stuff", offers a simple and insightful look into these structures and the numerous issues they cause, primarily for the people being manipulated and alienated by them.


Economic anthropology represents a subfield of cultural anthropology that focuses on economic systems cross-culturally. The term economic system focuses on three ares: livelihood, consumption, and exchange. There are five modes of livelihood mentioned in the book, however, the first three (foraging, horticulture and pastoralism) are mainly practiced in developing countries and by indigenous cultures; therefore, there importance to the global importance of economic systems is less significant than the other two. Agriculture is the fourth mode of livelihood, and it is practiced primarily in developing nations as well as in the more rural and poorer regions of countries such as China.

In the globalized capitalist economic superstructure, industrial capital agriculture has taken over. In this system machinery  does what human hands once did, and government subsidies guarantee a sustainable system of fewer farms produces massive amounts of food for consumption (and waste). An issue that cultural anthropologists have become aware of due to this system is the pressure placed on subsistence and family farming communities to compete with industrially advanced and subsidized farms.

The final mode of livelihood, industrialism and informatics, is best represented by industrial capitalism where most "goods are produced not to meet basic needs but to satisfy consumer demands for non essential goods". (Miller, 57) The video "Stuff" discusses this mode as a major issue due to the fact that this leads to increases in demand for resources, production of waste, and consequently damage to the environment. In addition, the video points out the alienation that people are faced with because the demand for non essential goods, caused by the capitalist system, leads to a never ending cycle of continuous buying of depreciating goods (in terms of worth financially and in sustaining happiness). In this mode, manufacturing jobs decline, and employment raises in the service occupations and information processing fields. Subsequently, unemployment becomes and increasing issue for societies following this mode, such as our own.

The dominant form of consumption in the modern world is consumerism, increased by globalization and industrialism. Inequality is the main issue caused by this mode, portrayed in the fact that the "share of total income that goes to the top 1 percent of families is nearly the same size as the total income share of the bottom 40 percent". (Miller, 60) The wealthy are then able to secure futures for their children through education and financial security.

The political and legal systems section of the book discusses various political organizations, leadership methods, social control variations, and changes in contemporary politics systems.

The book refers to politics as the organized use of public power, rather than the more private micro-politics of family and domestic groups. Power, authority, and influence are variations of how a person can achieve desired outcomes. (Miller, 160) All three terms exist in relation to other people; power represents a more hierarchical relationship, while authority and influence offer the greatest scope for cooperative decision making. The book continues to discuss social control, the process by which people maintain orderly life in groups. (Miller, 166) Norms and laws are the most commonly expressed forms of social control. A norm is an accepted standard on how people should behave and is usually unwritten and learned unconsciously. On the other hand, a law is a binding rule created through custom or official enactment that defines correct behavior and the punishment for misbehavior. (Miller, 167)

Two important terms located in this section are critical legal anthropology and the concept of social justice. The former is a cross-cultural study of legal systems that "examines the role of law and judicial processes in maintaining the dominance of powerful groups through the discriminatory practices rather than protecting members of less powerful groups". (Miller, 169) This represents an important sub field of cultural anthropology that in many ways encompasses the concept of social justice in societies. Socia justice is a "concept of fairness based on social equality that seeks to ensure entitlements and opportunities for disadvantaged members of society". (Miller, 170) In many ways the current Democratic Party in the United States has built its foundations on the concept of social justice in the American society. ObamaCare, welfare programs and entitlements, and tax raises on the wealthy represent just some of the ways that the Democratic Party has sought to progress social justice.

In many ways the video, "The Story of Stuff: Materialist Economy", encompasses the context of these two chapters on economy and politics. The video discusses the accepted linear path for discussing the movement that "stuff" goes through from production to waste. This path is misleading, however, because it fails to display the most important piece of the puzzle, people.

The video points out, for the most part, the negatives of the linear model. The first step, the taking of natural resources from third world countries and deprived regions of our own, harms the indigenous groups of those countries. Production of the goods in factories, whether at home or outsourced, harms the factory workers with the toxins produced from the natural resources. These toxins further harm the environment, another issue that humans must face due to a warming climate and environmental damage for animals (which represent a natural resource themselves). The greatest complaint the video addresses is the "golden arrow" found between the market for the produced goods and the consumers. At this stage, the government, aimed more at pleasing the corporations (who now hold a majority share of power in the global economy) than the consumers (people) they're sworn to protect, and the corporations push for constant consumption of the goods produced because our economy is based entirely on consumerism and consumption. They do so by purposefully producing goods with a shorter productivity life-span as well as through marketing for the constant consumption of newer goods. This leads to a cycle, one driven by alienation of the consumer, that is never ending.

The video addresses this cycle as the primary issue within the linear the model of production and consumption in our economy today. Environmental awareness, governmental strength and protection, and awareness on the part of the consumer are all important steps in correcting this model. If these goals are achieved, or even addressed and progressively sought after, then the once linear model will progress towards a cyclical one where fewer goods and resources are wasted and people feel less alienated and pushed to consume unwanted and needed goods.

In conclusion, the chapters on economic and political systems in the Miller book address the necessary terms and foundations of these systems in order to gain a better understanding of the global culture in reference to these points. The video, "Stuff", offers powerful insight into the way these systems coexist in our modern society. While pointing out the countless flaws in the linear model of production and consumption that the global economy faces today, the video also addresses several progressive means for adapting this cycle for the betterment of society.

Cultural Expressions: Communication, Religion & Art

Chapter 9 discusses and analyzes the various forms of communication that people use as well as the important connections between language and culture that exist in the modern world. The process of receiving and sending messages, a simple definition of communication, always involves some for of language, defined as a sustematic set of symbols and signs with learned and shared meanings (Miller, 182) The meaning behind various languages is at the center of the questions that anthropologists ask when studying communication and culture.

Communication can be verbal or nonverbal. Nonverbal language and embodied communication includes sign language, silence as well as body language. These are the most interesting forms to learn about as they are less recognized and openly understood.

Some gestures in sign lagnuage are universally meaningful, such as the peace sign (even it has several different meanings in different cultures) or a wave, but most are culturally specific and often completely arbitrary. Greetings, an important part of communication in every culture, often involve gestures, and they are typically among the first communicative routines that children and tourists learn. Silence is another form of communication, and it is interesting to note that silence is often related to social status. Silence is an important form to be studied through ethnography as well due to the ethnocentric judgements of outside cultures on various indigenous cultures. For example, white outsiders view the silence of Native Americans, due to their cultural norms, as a sign of a lack of emotion or intelligence; however, Native Americans view silence at the beginning of a greeting with a stranger as a possible reason for exhibiting bad manners (Miller, 186).

Media anthropology is an important emerging field that the book discusses which seems very interesting. It links linguistic and cultural anthropology, and people working in the field "study the media process and media content, the audience response, and the social effects of media presentations" (Miller, 188). Critical media anthropology, a subfield that I believe to be an important future topic, asks to what degree "access to media is liberating or controlling and whose interests media server" (Miller, 188). This topic is especially relevant with contemporary politics and various biases prevalent and numerous media outlets.

The chapter also raises the importance of colonialism, nationalism and globalization on communication and language systems around the world. In some ways these forces pose dangerous threats to the de facto systems of communication. For example, "nationalist policies of cultural assimiliation of minorities have led to the supression and loss of loval dialects and the extinction of many indigenous and minority languages" throughout the world (Miller, 196). This has led to the issue of endangered languages and the strive for many anthropologists to push for the renewal of them (known as language revitalization).

Chapter 10 follows suit and discusses religion, ritual practices, and the important world religions prevalent in our contemporary society and increasingly globalized culture. Religion consists of "beliefs and behavior related to supernatural beings and forces", and is essentially related to the people's worldview of understanding how the world came to be (Miller, 204). The book distinguishes between magic and religion, but makes note the prevalence of myths and supernatural forces in modern religions that marks the transisition of humanity from magic to religion to world religion.

A ritual is a "patterned, repetitive behavior focused on the supernatural realm" (Miller, 209). One example of a ritual is a rite of passage, or a life-cycle ritual, that marks a change in status from one life stage to another of an individual. Puberty is an important rite of passage in countless cultures. Another important ritual is pilgrimage, involving the travel to a sacred place or places for purposes of religous devotion. Mecca in Saudi Arabia is a prominent pilgrimage site, but some pilgrimages are partaken upon by several differing religious groups, such as Jerusalem. Sacrifice is another important ritual in many religions; however, in contemporary cultures it is increasingly viewed as part of the old order or even seen as pagan.

World religion is a term first coined in the nineteenth century to refer to religions that were "based on written sources, with many followers that crosses country borders and that had concern with salvation" (Miller, 213). When a world religion moves into a new cultural region, it encounters several local religious traditions. The local and world traditions clash, leading to a coexistence between the two, either as competitors or complements, in what is called religious pluralism. In numerous cases the world religion adopts important traditions of the local culture in order to ease the transition from old to new. This adoption is even apparent in Christianity, as numerous important Christian holidays are actually traced back to Pagan origins.

The final chapter of the book discusses expressive culture, focusing primarily on forms of art, leisure and newer forms of expressive culture such as tourism.

Defining art requires an abstract notion of what is involved in both the creation and interpretation of the object deemed art. The term esthetics is perhaps the most important notion to understanding art, as it refers to the socially accepted notions of quality. Prior to anthropological research and study, Western art experts believed that esthetics did not exist or was poorly developed in non-Western cultures. However, we know understand that esthetics exists in every culture, even if not formally written down, and anthropologists now refer to ethno-esthetics as culturally specific definitions of what art is. This is an important notion derived from anthropological work that transitions people from away ethnocentric views. In this sense, ethnography plays an important role in learning about the importance of art and music in various societies.

The chapter further discusses the importance of music in cultures across the globe. Ethnomusicology is the cross-cultural study of music and how it portrays the culture it is developed in as well as how it affects the perception of that culture to outsiders. An important question in this field is the topic of gender roles in musical performance. Are men and women encouraged to use certain music instruments over others? Are the performances of men and women given equal value by the culture they're presented in? These are important questions to ask and dependent upon whether gender roles in a specific culture and society are egalitarian or patriarch favored.

In analyzing architecture and decorative arts, it is important to note that styles allow people in a specific culture to express what is aesthetically pleasing to them. Important cultural values, and at times beliefs, can be recognized from these expressions of art. The style of architecture and decoration also displays the social positions of people. For example, a Victorian age structure may portray someone expressing sophistication and wealth. Observing the social strata through these means gives an anthropologist a look into the habitus of the person.

Increased leisure time and sustained wealth has led to the growing global market of tourism. Tourist demands for indigenous art has led to what some scholars deem as the decline in quality and authenticity of these arts. However, increased global tourism has also led to increased international and local support for the preservation of material cultural heritage. This includes "sites, monuments and buildings, and moveable objects considered of outstanding world value in terms of history, art, and science" according to UNESCO (Miller, 245). Intangible cultural heritage is another important goal of protection for UNESCO, as these manifested "living heritages", such as language, performing arts, and rituals, provide cultures with a sense of identity and continuity (Miller, 245).

From this information it is easy to see the importance of cultural expressions such as communication, religion, and art, to a society in global and local terms. Gaining a better understanding of the foundations of these topics can lead to a better understanding of where our increasingly globalized society is heading towards in the future. It also provides us with avenues of knowledge that will allow us to protect and preserve indigenous forms of these expressions before cultures become too homogenous and important cultural values are lost.

Postcards from Tomorrow Square

James Fallows understands that there are countless Chinas. His first visit was in the mid-1980s when he lived in Malaysia and Japan with his wife and two elementary-school-aged children. He returned, from 2006 to 2008, with his wife in order to live in Shanghai and Beijing and travel throughout China with the goal of reporting on and gaining a better understanding of China to report it to the Western world. He did so and his book, "Postcards from Tomorrow Square", is comprised of several articles he wrote for The Atlantic during this time period. Fallows is refreshingly aware that one's interpretations of this vast and elusive country are always changing based on the location and time period that one visits in. He makes it clear in the book that he is attempting to spread light on China's unbelievably fast ability to adapt to the global trade market, and in the process he further enlightens the reader on what Chinese entrepreneurs offer the world, the vast difference between the poor rural workers (especially of the West) and the booming industrial cities in Eastern cities such as Shenzhen, the governments apparent total control versus the lack of social order apparent to him through his travels, as well as warning America that the worst decision it could make in regards to China would be to cut off all ties with China and fight against its ideologies.

In the opening chapter Fallows offers "Four Cautions and Two Mysteries" which illustrates what surprised him most in the beginning of his time in China as well as what he is most curious about. Each offers insight into Chinese culture and a gateway into discussing further details from Fallows' reporting.

First, Fallows cautions: "Watch out, Japanese people!" He addresses the outstanding hatred that the youth of China harbor for the Japanese, pointing out that he can't put his finger on the breadth of hostility within the youth. What I found interesting here was the history less often discussed and hated that Fallows points out: "The Cultural Revolution, from 1966 to 1976, when the parent's of today's college students were sent into the countryside and often forced to denounce their own parents."(11) Why do the youth of China harbor such hatred for the Japanese while Chairman Mao is still culturally accepted as a leader to look up to (and whose picture is still on every denomination of paper money)?!

Caution two is a warning for the upcoming Olympians. Here Fallows points out a great positive versus a grand negative for present China. On the one hand, China is undergoing a massive economic boom owed to a government focus on industrialization, a massive cheap labor force, and an era of political stability that has allowed the communist government to attempt to implement a never-before-seen economic philosophy of "communo-capitalism". This makes for a phenomenal sight through a globalized glamourous infrastructure; however, on the other hand, China faces what Fallows describes as the world's worst air pollution. This is important to note, as the question arises among Chinese ideology of whether increased industrial growth for the sake of economic prosperity outweighs the environmental duty of protecting their air quality.

In reference to a "duty" that the Chinese people and their culture face, one may mention Mr. Zhang, an entrepreneur who Fallows describes as having all of the typical characteristics of a Chinese businessmen, and the "Win in China!" television show that goes beyond its American counterpart "The Apprentice", and what they offer the world. They also offer primary insight into Chinese culture.

Zhang Yue is a Chinese business tycoon who founded Broad Air Conditioning who built his dream town, aptly named "Broad Town", to house his main research and industrial center for his company and its workers. Two distinctive cultural references can be made from Fallow's interaction with Zhang. First, as Fallows states, "China, is too big, complicated, and contradictory to have any typical or representative character." (38) Zhang represents a minimal class of people, tens of millions out of well over a billion, that are able to think of more than just getting by. He speaks fast leaving little opening for interruption, looks to aviation and private jets as a future for China, and is very hard working and focused on building a company for the future not the present. Zhang represents the equivalent of the American entrepreneur according to Fallows, but this culture is vastly different when compared to the countless ethnic minorities within China and the overwhelming economic depravity that the West faces. (216) Zhang's dream town also offers insight into Chinese cultural background. The town, as with countless other factory towns and industrial cities throughout China, is highly uniform. The workers live on the compound all but one week a year; often work until midnight; have two days off per month; and survive by shoveling food down during their two hour break and then sleeping. Fallows claims this represents the contrast between China and Japan: less individual latitude, more collective success. Furthermore, most of the workers in factories tend to return home after working for 2-3 years. Once they've saved enough money they return home to help out their rural farming families, using money to sustain relatives and pay for children's education. Industrial and urban culture is clearly defined by speed, uniformity over individualism, and production. This, as Fallows notes but cannot contribute to, will be one of China's greatest challenges to address in the coming future. As China's money dreams are realized, how will the poor rural masses and their culture influence and be influenced by the industrial urban centers so many flock to work in?

Win in China offers further insight into Chinese culture through the values the show's producer, Wang Lifen, attempts to teach the show's audience as well as contestants. "The purpose of The Apprentice was very functional," Wang Lifen explained to Fallows. "There's some job that already exists, and Donald Trump is just looking for somebody to fill it, while providing entertainment. We want to teach values. Our dream for the show is to enlighten Chinese people and help them realize their own dreams." (54) By bringing in entrepreneurial experts, the show teaches its contestants lessons on business start-up, management and marketing. While the contestant learn the values necessary for a successful business, the audience learns of numerous Chinese micro-cultures from the manner in which the contestants compose themselves in interviews. Mr. Wang, a "minister-level" official in the Chinese government, reportedly called Wang Lifen to secure another two seasons of Win in China. "There is no religion in China, so it is very important to promote the right kind of values...Today for our society, the entrepreneur can be our hero." (64)

China Makes, The World Takes is perhaps Fallow's most important, certainly most recognized, article and chapter within "Postcards". The chapter's contents entail what Fallows addresses in his third and fourth cautionary statements at the beginning of the book: "Watch Out, America!" and "Watch Out, Everyone Else!". (14-25)  In his "caution" section Fallows warns America about its growing strictness in regards to accepting migrants from China. The answer to China and America's domestic educational worries can be answered through a greater osmosis process in visas issued to Chinese applicants. Chinese students, because they are culturally brought up to view education as a gift and a ticket to a better life for both them and their family, would "create more jobs, opportunities, and friends for America" while furthering China's growing base of educated entrepreneurs.

Furthermore, Fallows points out that the American stereotypes about Chinese social structure are skewed. In the "land of contrasts", as cliche as it sounds, Fallows argues it is difficult to make sense of the combination of rigid control and the near-complete chaos the newcomer sees in China. (18) One reason why Americans typically find China less "foreign" than Japan is that in Japan the social controls are internalized, through years of training in one's proper role in a group. "Control" in China, on the other hand, is not socially internalized from the ground up, rather they are embedded within class structure and the countless micro-cultures. According to Fallows, in China, "[controls] appear to be bolted on", ready to fall off at any moment.

There are several important pieces of information to be taken from "China Makes, The World Takes", the most important of which is Fallows' description of his experience at the Sheraton Four Points hotel in Shenzhen. This thorough portrayal depicts the daily economic life in a once small town (did not even exist on a map as recent as Ronald Reagan's presidency) turned large scale industrial city filled with factories and migrant workers from across China. This section is important in order to understand the social structure present in many urban areas of industrial China today that the cultures of the numerous Chinese people clash and mold with.

However, the most important thing to take away from the chapter is Fallows' warning to America and its ideology in regards to China. American complains about the RMB, about subsidies for Chinese goods and companies, and about other Chinese practices have this in common: they all assume that the solution to long-term tensions in the trading relationship lies in changes on China's side. Fallows finds that assumption naive. The trends that are being shaped in America following globalization (inequality, a sense of entitlement for some, stifled opportunity for others), and the American choices behind them, are what Americans need to address. (In essence, it is a class of dreams.) "They're not China's problem, and they're not the fault of anyone in Shenzhen." American ideology must be addressed, and the greatest way to address it is through continued and further exchange, both economically and culturally, with China.

Cultural Roots

Culture is represented by a shared (learned) system of meanings or ideas shaping what people perceive, think, feel and do (language, beliefs, values). When discussing cultural roots it is important to ask how do the numerous cultures and subcultures we belong to shape our lives? Paramount to this question is one's own sense of "reality" or what is "real". How do we think about or make sense of the world? Therefore, learning about our ancestral heritage and cultural roots gives insight into our unique sense of reality and ultimately defines our cultural identity.

Each side of my family has contributed countless cultural beliefs and values to my identity, but for the sake of space I will highlight the significant few that have shaped my perception of the world the greatest.

My mother's cultural roots stem from a great grandfather from Wales who migrated to the United States in the mid 1800s and settled in Gulfport, Mississippi where he became a small business owner. His business prospered and eventually he made enough money to purchase a large plantation in Tennessee (which is still in the family and used for family holidays) where he continued to run a family business. The family was heavily involved in the Methodist Church. Two generations later their grandson, my grandfather Hugh McCullough, attended Georgia Tech and graduated as the valedictorian of his class. He started several small businesses that failed before finally succeeding in the automotive supply industry. He was a certified genius who "wasn't afraid of hard work or to tackle new things", and he was substantially learned in politics and the economy; prompting him to invest heavily in Coca Cola, Home Depot, and General Electric prior to their financial booms.

Under my grandfather's household my mother grew up in a traditional middle class family with a stay at home mom. Kids were respectful of their elders - "seen but not heard" - and she does not remember ever being asked for her opinion on family matters even when her less intellectually gifted brothers were. She was the valedictorian of her high school and her class at West Georgia when studying both accounting and nursing school, so it's clear that this lack of democratic decision making based on a patriarchal hierarchy significantly influenced her growth. I understand now why she has always been the financial adviser for my family as well as given everyone, even me from a young age, some say in household matters.

In addition to a democratic family structure my mother has also instilled significant Christian values and beliefs into me. The Methodist Church has been at the center of daily life since the beginnings of her cultural heritage in America, and every Sunday during my lifetime was spent going to Church and then
spending time with the family. Through my life as a teenager Christian principles have been paramount to the way I've made sense of the world, and only since I've been at Reinhardt have I begun to perceive the world not as an outsider's perspective with cultural egoism but rather using a cultural realist's perspective of seeing the world as an insider before making judgments or even determining my own ideologies based off of these new experiences.

My cultural roots do not end with my mother's Christian democracy however. My father, James Lucian Baker, is the son of James L Baker Jr, who is the son of James L Baker Sr (notice the trend of James Baker's...including me!) James L Baker Jr was the twin brother of my great uncle Charles K Baker Sr, who along with his stories and ancestry.com provide the last details of this side of my family beyond my father's generation. James and Charles were the son of Nannie E Becker who was the daughter of Cherles Otto Becker. He immigrated from Germany sometime in the latter 1880s and married an American women named Sarah Jane Burnham. In census records, Charles Otto Becker frequently changed where he was from, sometimes saying he was born in New York, sometimes West Virginia, and according to family stories sometimes Russia. However, upon reviewing ancestry.com it appears Charles actually listed he was from Prussia on his final change of birthplace.

This is significant because Prussia was a military based absolute monarchy, and James L Baker Sr, Jr, and uncle Charles all served in the US Navy during their lifetimes. This patriotic and ultimately order based lifestyle passed down to my father who joined the police force before joining the Georgia Bureau of Investigation drug trafficking unit. Upon learning about my father's cultural heritage it is not surprising that I grew up in a highly patriotic and orderly household. "No wrong ever makes a right" has always been my father's mantra, and when I was arrested in Athens, Georgia for under age drinking you would have thought my Dad was told I had murdered someone. Growing up under the guidance of my father, it isn't surprising that my cultural identity is shaped significantly by patriotic, conservative and orderly values. 

*I have always perceived the world as a conservative Christian republican and everyone around me knows that I am an absolute control freak. This is my cultural heritage; however, my sense of "reality" is no longer simply affected by these roots. Ultimately study abroad trips to Germany, living with an all British soccer team, and the knowledge gained from a college education and the experiences with it's learned professors combine and clash with those cultural roots. What is "real" must not be perceived solely from an outsider's perspective, something my cultural roots (and anyone's for that matter) traditionally do not agree with. 

Cultures Interact and Change

Cultures interact with one another and change each other through contact by various means such as trade networks, telecommunications and migration. Globalization, or the "process of intense global interconnectedness and movement of goods, information, and people", is perhaps the most important force of contemporary cultural change (Miller, 16).

Globalization does not spread evenly, nor are its interactions with, and effects on, local cultures always positive. The change caused by globalization varies from positive change seen by culture's becoming more "worldly" and less isolated to cultural destruction and extinction, seen primarily through interactions with indigenous cultures. The book explains four models of cultural interaction that capture the variations of change, of which three I found to be the most interesting.

The clash of civilizations argument claims that the spread of Euro-American capitalism and lifestyle throughout the modern world has created a sense of disenchantment, alienation, and resentment among other cultural systems (Miller, 17). This model expresses the contemporary phrase of the "West versus the Rest", otherwise seen as Us versus Them in contemporary historical debate.

My favorite model, simply due to its title, is the McDonaldization model. It states that, under the influence of the U.S.-dominated corporate culture, the world is becoming culturally homogenous (Miller, 17). This is the model many people consider when they think of Globalization in my opinion. A "Fast-food culture," with its cultural principles being morphed into a conglomerate of the major corporate principles of mass production, speed, standardization and impersonal service. This method, among all others, poses the greatest threat to cultural homogeneity in my opinion because it essentially stamps out any indigenous cultures who's values may interfere with it.

Another pattern recognized is localization, "the transformation of global culture by local microcultures into something new" (Miller, 17). This model works off of and further explains the effects of the McDonald's example. For example, in many Asian settings, people are less concerned with time than in America; therefore, people resist the pattern of eating quickly and insist on family gatherings in a more leisurely setting. McDonald's managers in Asia accommodate this cultural preference by altering food service to create a slower turnover of tables. In this method, the global umbrella culture is forced to adapt to and transform because of the microcultures' values it covers resistance. This model, in my opinion, explains where contemporary society and culture are heading; towards a more homogenous global culture, but with each region's microcultures forcing the globalized culture to adapt in order to survive with contrasting beliefs and values.

In studying globalization cultural anthropologists have labeled two distinct attitudes that people express when their culture comes into contact with that of another. Ethnocentrism is when one judges other cultures by the standards of one's own culture rather than by the standards of other cultures (Miller, 20). This has fueled centuries of trying to change "other" people in the world, sometimes through religious missionary work or in the form of colonial domination, but in either scenario ethnocentrism fuels the idea of "Us versus Them". Cultural relativism, on the other hand, is the idea that each culture must be understood in terms of its own values and beliefs and not by the standards of one's own culture (Miller, 20). This form of theory offers a much more civilized approach, except when taken to the extreme form of absolute cultural relativism, and is the greatest hope for a globalized and truly homogeneous world culture.

After all, as Claude Levi-Strauss said, "No society is perfect".