Over the past few months, I have undergone a challenging of much of my ideology. Not only have my religious beliefs, but also my political views been under investigation and evaluation. I have been reading a book titled In the Name of Identity that raises many questions about people's identities and why people think what they think. The book is written by an Arabic Christian who lives in France. In his book, he investigates many issues concerning Islam and Christianity, and the differences between Western and Arabic culture.
Here is an exerpt:
Wherever on the planet one happens to live, all modernization is now westernization. And this trend is merely accentuated and accelerated by technical progress. True, monuments and other great acievements bearing the imprint of other civilizations are to be seen everywhere. But everything that is newly created - buildings, institutions, aids to knowledge or improvements to life-styles - all is produced in the image of the West.
This reality is experienced differently by those born in the dominant civilization and those born outside it. The former can change, advance in life, adapt without ceasing to be themselves. One might even say that the more Westerners modernize themesleves the more completely in harmony they feel with their culture. Only those among them who reject modernity find themselves out of touch.
For the rest of the world's inhabitants, all those born in failed cultures, openness to change and modernity presents itself differently. For the Chinese, Africans, Japanese, Indians and American Indians, as for Greeks, Russians, Iranians, Arabs, Jews and Turks, modernization has constantly meant the abandoning of part of themselves. Even though it has sometimes been embraced with enthusiasm, it has never been adopted without a certain bitterness, without a feeling of humiliation and defection. Without a piercing doubt about the dangers of assimilation. Without a profound identity crisis.
More on this subject later.
I leave you with this question. What makes our culture better than any other culture?
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7 comments:
I'm not sure that there is much that makes "our" culture better, unless it be improvement in the status of women, and opennness (sometimes) to new ideas, which allows for some real advances in medicine and agriculture, as well as being more open to the gospel. Probably our culture has been more aggressive than better.
i hope my post didn't imply that I think that "my" culture is better than others...in fact its just the opposite. I think that our culture is flawed just like others, yet we somehow view our way of life as superior.
I don't know if your comment was directed to me, but, if so, I understood what you were trying to say. It's important not to confuse culture with Christ, and I'm glad that you are wrestling with this question. I wish I could say that I was satisfied with my own attitude on that subject, and that He was.
The author of your book is lamenting progress. Progress happens (like it or not)in a very culture-blind manner: what works moves forward. What used to work but no longer does is replaced by that which is more conviennt, more profitable and and more efficient. As long as one culture is on the cutting edge, that culture will be adopted and imitated. Once it was the Egyptians, then the Babylonians, Persians, Chineese, Turks, Greeks, Romans, Europeans, and right now it is America that sets the trend. America has done one thing dfiferently, though, then these other historically dominant cultures, and this sets us apart. We have not imposed our culture by force, our culture is adopted by those who see that freedom works. Unfortunately we may be in the waning years. If America looses its vitrue and its values, the very things that have propelled it to the forefront, she will ultimately be replaced by the next culture. Americans as a whole need not feel guilty that others around the globe wnat to be like us. We only need to understand the fagility and reponsibility that comes with our presnet lofty cultural status. "Pride goeth before a fall and a haughty spirit befeore destruction."
It's funny that people keep talking about the immigrants need to assimilate. It seems as if we are to important to be troubled, but we forget what our ancestors did to assimilate. Of course, we also forced assimilation in a sense on the Indians. Isn't our twofacedness funny at times.
Rusty... you also need to remember that we are one of the ONLY societies that bends over backwards to be "diversity friendly." Ever been to another country where they don't speak English? You are expected, in those cultures, to learn the language and learn how to act. Many Americans get so wrapped up in our diverse origins that we forget that we do have a broad national culture. Having pride in that culture and expecting others to respect that pride is not a crime. Immigrants to the United States should be held to cultural standards just as we would be held to them in their countries.
It's time to post again.....! I want to hear about your new adventure in Virginia..>!
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