1. ANTHROPOLOGY OF GLOBALIZATION
SOCI 202
Spring 2010
Instructor: Deniz Yükseker

2. The study of culture change
European colonialism Decolonization in mid-20th century Neocolonialism Cultural imperialism Globalization (economic and cultural)

3. Cultural effects of European colonialism
Acculturation : cultural borrowing as a result of contact Syncretism: a mixing of elements from two or more cultural traditions Assimilation: replacing a group’s culture with that of the dominant society; a one-way acculturation process as a result of unequal power relations between two groups

4. Cultural change in the postcolonial world
National liberation movements
Revolutionary movements
 Nationalism and nation-states
Modernization theory: explains the economic development of nation-states in a unilineal framework
World-systems perspective: looks at the historically unequal economic relations between groups of nation-states within the framework of an international division of labor
 core, periphery and semiperiphery

5. Globalization
Globalization: intensification and speeding up of cross-border flows of
Capital (multinational companies, stock exchanges, etc.)
Goods (international trade)
People (tourists, professionals, migrants, refugees)
Ideas (fashion, human rights discourses, ideologies, etc.)
Images (TV, films, music, fashions)
Information (TV, internet)
as a result of the improvement in (tele)communication and transportation technologies in recent decades

6. Consequences of globalization
A reordering of time and space
Speeding up  time-space compression (David Harvey)
The world becomes more interconnected
Stretching out  time-space distanciation (Anthony Giddens)
Social, political and cultural processes across borders are “stretched out”
“The global” and “the local” are entangled

7. Culture change under globalization
Flows of people
Deterritorialization of cultures (cultural pluralism and diasporas)
Flows of signs and symbols
Cultural imperialism
Cultural homogenization
Cultural diffusion
The shifting of meanings and symbols under the impact of globalization
Flows of ideas
Identity politics
Human rights discourses
Cultural rights of groups

8. Culture change (cont’d)
Flows of goods and capital
New patterns of industrialization, investment, trade, etc.
All aspects of the impact of globalization on cultures are interrelated!

9. Case studies
Sushi goes global Global trade in human organs

10. Global sushi
The use of bluefin tuna to make sushi in Japan Since the 1970s, the trade in bluefin tuna became global What does consuming sushi outside Japan denote? How does the trade in bluefin tuna affect the lives of US fishers, Spanish fishers, Japanese consumers, Japanese wholesalers, etc.? How are bluefin tuna populations in the Atlantic affected by the globalization of sushi consumption? In short, how can we interpret this example using our terminology for globalization?

11. Global trade in human organs
What do you think of organ donation and organ transplantation? What do you think of the trade in organs? What does it have to do with globalization?

12. Organ trade Globalization results in
diffusion of transplant surgery technology
flows organs from South to North
Flows of patients from North to South
market exchange in body parts
redefinition of meanings:
Bodily integrity
Scarcity in human organs
Meaning of life and death
Persons and nonpersons
Rumors and facts