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Impacts of globalization on culture
Globalization And Culture
Impacts of globalization on culture
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A movie No one knows about Persian cats ask us this question? I would change the title somewhat to ask “no one who knows about Persian people”. No one knows about Persian cats takes us into the underground music scene in Iran. Many in the western world and especially in the United States may look dumbfounded when you talk about an underground music scene in Iran. I believe the director Bahman Ghobadi’s movie about the underground music scene not only exposes the repression of the existing Iranian government on freedom of expression, but also shows a side of Iranian culture most would never have thought existed. I believe this movie upholds many truths about democracy and freedom of speech, but also exposes the demagoguery of many in the west who portray Iran as a united front of political Islam. Lastly, it also shows the fallacy of Samuel Huntington's the Clash of civilizations.
The movie No One Knows about Persian Cat’s centers around two musicians recently released from prison for performing music without permission. Negar and Ashkan are two musicians along with their promoter Nader trying to get a band together to go play music in Europe since they are not able to play in Iran. The movie has all the synergy of a Cold War spy novel with our protagonist stealthily walking into basements and padded rooms all over Tehran. Interspersed they meet a wide and varied group of people amazingly most of these people aren't singing songs about raging against the West. They are very much as American independent bands directing their music towards issues in their own life. I believe one part of the movie tends to dispel the notion that all people from the Middle East and Western Asia are hell-bent on destroying Western civilization. In Samu...
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...s as well as in many others (December, 2007). Instead of always confronting strife and war I believe the United States would do better to support various independent groups such as musicians, artists and scholars. This I believe in the long run would lead to a better world for those living in Iran today as well as for relations between the two countries and those of the Middle East.
Works Cited
Bahman Ghobadi , (2009). No One Knows About Persian Cats [DVD]
Bahman Ghobadi, (2004). Turtles Can Fly [DVD]
Green December, L. L. (2007). Comparative Politics of the Third World. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers Inc.
Khalidi, R. (2009). Sowing Crisis. Boston: Beacon Press.
The globalization Reader Frank J. Lechner John Boli , Blackwell Publishing
Samuel P. Hunington “The Clash of Civilizations” Foreighn Affairs 72.3 Summer 1993 Council on foreign Relations , Inc
Not only did the religious history play a large role in Iran’s beliefs but also foreign invaders have been imposing their power on the Iranian region for thousands of years. Iran...
Nagle, D. Brendan. “The Second Persian Invasion” The Ancient World; A social and Cultural History. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2002.
Due to the serious tensions looming in the air, many people would think it is strictly forbidden to laugh a little or have fun in Iran. The constant political instability makes it seem like the citizens live like robots under extreme oppression. However, in Marjane Satrapi’s biography, Persepolis, she gives an inside look at her experiences growing up in Iran and adds comic relief throughout the novel. As the main character, Marjane, evolves from an innocent girl into a mature woman, Satrapi adds bits of comic relief to highlight her typical personality while living in the midst of an oppressive society.
Marjane Satrapi’s graphic novel, Persepolis, is a story based on her own childhood in Iran. The story consists of the struggles her family and friends are forced to deal with, changing Marji’s view of Iranian life and its people. The book starts during a revolution, the Iranian people are trying to overthrow the emperor and when they finally do, war breaks out between Iraq and Iran. During the war thousands of people’s lives were taken, women, children and men of all ages. During this Marji’s parents forced her to leave Iran because they know it is too dangerous for a child of her age to live in the middle of a war so severe and life threatening. During the time Marji did live in Iran, she heard many tales about the umpteen conflicts and struggles that lower class people were faced with. Marji saw her maid whom she loved and cared for, not being able to date her love, their neighbor, because she was embedded in a different social class. She experienced the harsh realities of divergence between men and women. Women were compelled to wear a veil in order to not “distract” men with their hair. Younger boys in the lower end of the class system were given a “golden” key to take to war, which was actually plastic; this key meant that if they were killed fighting for what they believed in, it would guarantee their entrance to heaven. In Iran, there were a variety of ways in which the people of Iran can be distinguished between social classes. Your social class affected you in every way there was during this horrible time in Iran.
The introduction to Persepolis gives a great deal of background information to the unrest in Iran leading up to the Islamic revolution. Iran had been in a state of unrest for “2500 years” (page11). Iran was ruled by foreign nations and exploited by the western world for its rich expanses of oil. In 1951 the prime minister of Iran tried to take back his country’s wealth by nationalizing
Huntington, Samuel P. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. New York: Simon & Shuster Inc., 1997.
...th and early 20th centuries entwined a power struggle between Great Britain and Russia, which only intensified after the discovery of oil in Iran in 1901. Following this discovery, western nations systematically exploited Iran for its natural resources, and fought to install sympathetic governments in the hopes of acquiring better oil deals, culminating in 1953 with the overthrow of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh by a combination of US and UK forces (Yergin). The continual fighting left Iran a political mess that was only rectified by Khomeini’s strong, Islamic government. Though he severely limited the power of the Iranian citizens, he increased the power of Iran within the Middle East, and world at large, as its strong military presence and large oil reserves empower the country to resist interference from countries that wish to take advantage of them.
In Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi’s childhood experiences allow her to demonstrate the cultural changes that occurred in post-revolutionary Iran, as well as those perpetrated by western culture. In Persepolis, western culture plays a major role in the author’s attempt to dispel the
As revealed in Azar Nafisi's book Reading Lolita in Tehran, Iran's radical religious and political views are the driving force behind the domination and maltreatment of the country's people. Throughout the book there are many examples of this oppressive treatment which is enforced because of strict religious convictions. Nafisi compares the oppression happening during a tense period of revolution with various works of fiction that mirrors what is becoming life in Iran. The tyrannical treatment of Iranian people can be analyzed by uncovering themes found throughout Nafisi's book.
The west, who trusted the Shah to rule Iran safely with the help of CIA trained SAVAK, never picked up on the momentum of the revolution within Iran. They perceived that the Shah had Iran under control and therefore did not intervene until it was too late. The Shah also had a misperception of Khomeini and his revolution. The Shah believed that by exiling Khomeini from Iran, he had taken care of any threat Khomeini posed. He was oblivious to the fact, however, that Khomeini had been establishing himself and nurturing anger towards the Shah ever since the White Revolution, sending cassette tapes into Iran from his exile in Paris with his preachings. With these tapes, Khomeini inspired demonstrations and unrest within Iran until the Shah was forced to abdicate in 1979. Finally, Khomeini also perpetuated a misperception that the groups of the opposition, including the bazarris, the peasants, and the Ulema, had the same goals and complaints. This perception unified the opposition under an ambiguous banner whose broad definition promoted inclusion and
In the 1970’s Iran, under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was a very centralized military state that maintained a close relationship with the USA. The Shah was notoriously out of touch with working class Iranians as he implemented many controversial economic policies against small business owners that he suspected involved profiteering. Also unrestricted economic expansions in Iran lead to huge government expenditure that became a serious problem when oil prices dropped in the mid 1970’s. This caused many huge government construction projects to halt and the economy to stall after many years of massive profit. Following this was high rates of inflation that affected Iranians buying power and living standards. (Afary, 2012) Under the Shah, political participation was not widely available for all Iranians and it was common for political opposition to be met with harassment, illegal detention, and even torture. These measures were implemented by the Iranian secret police knows as ‘SAVAK’. This totalitarian regime combined with the increasing modernisation of the country paved the way for revolution.
Although the Iranian Revolution was both a political and religious movement in that it resulted in major shifts in government structure from an autocracy to a republic and that Islamic beliefs were fought to be preserved, it was more a religious movement in that the primary goal of the people was to preserve traditional ideology and in that the government became a theocracy intertwined with religious laws and desires of the people. Although the Iranian Revolution was caused by combination of political and religious motivations and ideas, the desires of the people supporting the movement were more dominantly religious ideas that were wished to be imposed in society and in a new government. The Shah, or king, of Iran at the time was Muhammad Reza Pahlavi, who had developed relations with nations in the “western” world, specifically with the United States. The United States supported the White Revolution, which was a series of social reformations the Shah made to remove Islamic values, law and tradition from the government to boost the country’s economy (White Revolution, 2010).... ...
...ous and being there can raise concern. These political concerns relate closely with issues addressed in the film particularly with the war in Afghanistan and the threat of terrorism. The senior Taliban leader Ahamd Shah depicts an accurate image of what members of the Taliban are like, which means killing any American who comes into their country.
The Islamic Republic of Iran, formerly known as Iran or Persia, was crowded with a young generation looking for full freedom against the Shah. Persia, once as a powerful country with vast oil resources, soon became a vulnerable nation, ready to accept a new leader to guide them. The people were ready for change, but were the changes they got the changes they were looking for. The people wanted freedom against the shah, (For generations Iran was ruled by Kings) who allowed some freedoms, but it was somewhat limited. The people wanted freedom of speech, so that the press could freely publish their own opinions. They wanted to get rid of a law that made all eighteen-year-old males attend two years of military service unless they are accepted to a university, which would allow them attend the army later as a service worker. The shah was anti-religious, which was not ideal for many of the civilians in Iran. Savak (Secret organization of Iran) was accused of many anti – human rights actions, such as killing students who protested and immediately jailing press members for inappropriate conduct. A major problem was that the shah was a “puppet” of the United States many say, because the Shah would constantly confer with the U.S. of all of his decisions as ruler. The after affects of the revolution resulted in similar conditions, however. Human rights are horrible, the government limits all freedoms, the economy has suffered greatly, average salaries are hard to live with, most of the educated people in Iran fled to foreign countries, the quality of public schools is horrible, and the government still controls all television broadcasts and keeps a watchful eye on the newspapers. From bad to worse is what many people feel has become of Iran, but the people are ready for a real change.
Bani-Sadr, Abol Hassan. My Turn To Speak. Iran, the Revolution, and Secret Deals with the U.S. Macmillan Publishing Company. New York City. 1991. William Ford