Questions for 3/4

Kingery discusses the process of change in technology and suggests that technology is neither right nor wrong just appropriate for a certain culture. In his analysis of ceramics of the Italian Renaissance, he contends that the change in Renaissance ceramics was evolutionary and that “unquestionably there was a paradigm shift in ceramic technology” (225). I ask does this same technological process of evolution and paradigm shifts hold true today because new technology has such a rapid turn around. Perhaps the process has been sped up, and if that is the case, how does this affect the process of development and acceptance of new technology?

Jan Nederveen Pieterse discusses globalization’s effects on the formation of identity and suggests that personal identities have become hybrids themselves because individuals are able to construct themselves from several organizational options – religious, political, national, etc. He explains, “globalization is the framework for the diversification and amplification of ‘sources of the self’” (664). The question that arises from this concept is not one that challenges his theory, but, rather, one that causes me to think about my personal identity and what I have pulled from to create it. My question, then, is a rhetorical one: Is your own identity a hybrid? What bits and pieces of culture, politics, religion, etc have you pulled together to create your personal identity?

In Globalization as Hybridization, Naderveen Pieterse talks about the global mélange and mentions Asian rap in London, Irish bagels, Chinese tacos, and a few others as examples. These examples reminded me of an experience I had in New Zealand. The picture below (is goofy and embarrassing) shows three White American girls (including myself) and three Maori girls teaching us the Soulja Boy dance. We were on a traditional Maori marae and had just experienced a traditional Maori welcome and meal, and three teenage girls started teaching us a dance from the rap culture of American. It was an interesting mix of cultures and circumstances, and looking at it now, I think this photo represents globalization in some complex ways.