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Consequences of industrialization in society
Consequences of industrialization in society
Affect of industrialization on society
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Tribal Wisdom
David Maybury Lewis (1992) wonders if we, as Americans, by having systematically chosen to dismiss as 'odd', 'weird', and not the 'right' way to live; in our views of foreign tribal cultures, have been hoisted by our own petard. By using his definition of a tribal society (for which there really is no one single way of life): "small-scale, pre-industrial societies that live in comparative isolation and manage their affairs without central authority such as the state", (p 6) he questions whether cultural roads industrialized "modern" societies have chosen have caused the serious social problems we suffer today. We are the modernists, defined by myself as the opposite of tribal/traditional society.
The article is easy to follow, articulate, and I related well to its theories. Maybe the fact that I related too well causes me to wonder a bit at the objectivity behind Maybury-Lewis' thinking. He did well to provide a structured compare and contrast type essay, presenting tribal viewpoints with modern viewpoints regarding the same subjects. He touched on relationships between man and man, and man and his environment. He compared teenage youth from culture to culture. He explained violence in terms of political science. He covered, what I feel to be, the most important issues of all: those of spirituality. But in each case, tribal viewpoint with its conseq...
In “It Takes a Tribe” by David Berreby, he claims that humans are born with the urge to belong, and our experiences in life subconsciously shape who we are, placing us in groups. Berreby first provides examples of stereotyping and states how judging groups is a serious problem today, comparing it to prejudice and racism (par. 1-2). He moves forward to discuss how easily humans adapt to their surroundings and how this causes us to be placed inside these “exclusive” groups (par. 4-5). Berreby uses “college loyalty” and “school spirit” as examples of this, showing that colleges are the perfect place to study this behavior as they are strong comparisons to this behavior in the rest of the world (par. 8-9). Berreby also shares that “us” vs. “them”
He makes a point of how American’s place an extreme emphasis on “lineal order”, we take pride in “lining things up, getting thing in line… We have it all neatly separated and categorized” (16). This statement is absolutely true, if we look about our society, the city we live in, the design of our houses, the way desks are arranged in a school, everything is in straight, orderly lines. In contrast, in Native American communities “the reverse is true… instead of separating into categories of the sort, family groups sit in circles, meeting are in circles” (17). These are examples of how the Native American culture places great value on coming together and including people in their traditions. In Toelken opinion, these differences in spatial systems also affect our relationships with
In the article “Individual Autonomy and Social Structure”, Dorothy Lee talks about individual autonomy. She goes through the topic by examining different groups such as; the Wintu Indians of California, the Sikh family, the Navaho Indians of Arizona and New Mexico, and the Chinese culture. All of these different groups and societies give personal freedom to the individuals regardless of age groups. The example of Navaho Indians is used by Lee to demonstrate how “personal autonomy is supported by the cultural framework” (Lee, 1959, p.5). She points out the individual autonomy of non-western societies to the individuality of western society. One group gives full independence to an individual while the other does not and puts restrictions in place through some form. She states “...in a heterogeneous society such as ours, and in an era of induced change and speeded temp of living, it has been difficult to implement this tenet in the everyday details of living” (Lee, 1959, p.5). She points out the fast living pace of western society, where the personal autonomy given from the other cultures is lacking.
Watching the Amish riding their horse drawn carriages through Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, you catch a glimpse of how life would have been 150 years ago. The Amish, without their electricity, cars, and television appear to be a static culture, never changing. This, however, is just an illusion. In fact, the Amish are a dynamic culture which is, through market forces and other means, continually interacting with the enormously tempting culture of America. So, one might be led to wonder how a culture like the Amish, one that seems so anachronistic, has not only survived but has grown and flourished while surrounded by a culture that would seem to be so detrimental to its basic ideals. The Amish, through biological reproduction, resistance to outside culture, compromise, and a strong ethnic symbolism have managed to stave off a culture that waits to engulf them. Why study the Amish? One answer would be, of course, to learn about their seemingly pure cooperative society and value system (called Ordung). From this, one may hope to learn how to better America's problem of individualism and lack of moral or ethical beliefs. However, there is another reason to study the Amish. Because the Amish have remained such a large and distinct culture from our own, they provide an opportunity to study the effects of cultural transmission, resistance, and change, as well as the results of strong symbolism in maintaining ethnic and cultural isolation.
When we think of civilization, what comes to mind? Some might think of etiquette, compassion, and many other concepts of that nature. These are the things that people have come to accept as proper human behaviors. However, what of our more primitive instincts? Things that are often frowned upon such as pride, gut-instincts, and looking out for ourselves first are some of our most basic human needs. People in the modern world would like to rely more on teamwork and recognition that pride and independence. They prefer to trust logic and scientific reasoning in place of trusting what we believe to be right. They also seem to want us to help everyone around us before we do anything to help ourselves. In London’s The Call of the Wild, primitive nature is not something to be feared and overcome, but rather something to be utilized and fulfilled.
Throughout American and World history we can see that dozens of cultures and people have gone through the process of deculturalization. Deculturalization is defined as the stripping away of one’s culture. Culture is defined by a group of people from a particular area with alike social behaviors. The process of deculturalization is to make it where a person’s lifestyle doesn’t involve their culture, beliefs, values, and norms of their well-known society. Deculturalization removes one culture from a group of people and gives them another culture.
The culture of a community invariably determines the social structures and the formation of a society. Developed over time, culture is the collection of beliefs and values that a group of people maintain together. Culture is never constant, and thought to be continually renewed over years as new ideas and concepts become mainstream. It ranges from how people live, day to day topics for conversations, religion, and even entertainment. It is analogous to guidelines, or the rulebook of the said group of people. Society, on the other hand, emanates from the social structure of the community. It is the very institutions to which create a regulated and acceptable form of interaction between peoples. Indeed, culture and society are so perversely intertwined in a
As Indians living in white culture, many problems and conflicts arise. Most Indians tend to suffer microaggressions, racism and most of all, danger to their culture. Their culture gets torn from them, and slowly, as if it was dream, many Indians become absorbed into white society, all the while trying to retain their Indian lifestyle. In Indian Father’s Plea by Robert Lake and Superman and Me by Sherman Alexie, the idea that a dominant culture can pose many threats to a minority culture is shown by Wind-Wolf and Alexie.
What if there was only one culture that everyone came from? There would be little to no diversity because no one had any differences. Without complex cultures, the world would be much different than it is today. A person’s culture defines where they come from and who they are. Culture in the stories An Indian Father’s Plea, Two Kinds, and Everyday Use informs the way one views the world and others.
Hyper-individualism differs from that of traditional individualism in the way that ‘. . . traditional individualism promoted self-reliance, hyper-individualism has atomized people into a state of alienation’ (Curtis 251). Through this state of alienation, the breakdown of communities began and led to moral degradation, because as communitarians argue: ‘Who we are and what goals we pursue are a function of the historically conditioned relationships we have with those we live among a communal context is a precondition of individuality’ (Curtis 251). This certainly seems true in both LETB and Trainspotting, where tradition, the past and family values, have all but been replaced by cold and calculating schemes, violence and separation. The reason why this is such an issue in poverty stricken communities is best argued through Robert Merton’s strain theory: ‘As Merton recognized, pervasive inequalities in the United States create serious barriers to success for many lower-class individuals. This particular configuration of culture (the culturally prescribed goal of monetary wealth) and social structure (inequality of opportunity) is said to generate strain. In particular, large segments of the population internalize the American Dream ethos but lack the
In order to understand this immense country that we call America, we need to study the culture. More specifically, we need to study the form of society in America. Is this society changing, or does it remain fixed throughout time? There are many aspects of our society, some of which are: traditions, values, and religion. The many realms of society contribute to a conglomerate culture, which cannot be described simply.
To address the first part of my argument, we fist must take in hand what exactly is this “pure” culture that has been mentioned thus far. Clifford believes that cultures, for the sake of the argument being made can be said to be impure cultures, “have had to reckon with the forces of ‘progress’ and ‘national’ unification,” and that essentially this has led to “many traditions, languages, cosmologies, and values [being] lost, some literally murdered” (Clifford, 16). He argues that inevitably, all cultures either will, or have experienced this, and in the end have transformed into an alternate version of themselves. I propose that a “pure” culture is one that has either not had to deal with such circumstances, or has dealt with outside influences, without altering what is wholly exclusive about itself.
The ways in which a society might define itself are almost always negative ways. "We are not X." A society cannot exist in a vacuum; for it to be distinct it must be able to define itself in terms of the other groups around it. These definitions must necessarily take place at points of cultural contact, the places at which two societies come together and arrive at some stalemate of coexistence. For European culture of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries this place of contact—this new culture by which to define itself—came from Africa, from those "primitive" cultures whose society was being studied and in some ways appreciated for the first time. The African natives became the new Other, the new way to define what Europe was at that time.
Siva, Manu. Difference in Cultural Values. India Today (20) 3. 45-48 Retrieved April 03, 2006
...pression. This social hindrance continues to modern day in a depiction of learned values and discriminatory beliefs. The American west is considered a dangerous terrain with even harsher social conditions for anyone unwilling to conform to the inherent beliefs of patriarchal superiority and the insistent fear of people pushing the societal boundaries. However, because of the transformative occurrence of those willing to work outside of their comfort zone as well as the increase in behaviors considered unmentionable, a substantial transition arises in order to shake the binds presented by a close-minded society to allow a shift in who can work and how they are allowed to appear. Eastern values began to be rewritten in order to form a new progressive era in Anglo-American belief, but not without challenging the practices of Native Americans and marginalized citizens.