It is the proposition of the author to combine the opposing definition of culture, the culture as “the way of life of a people” and the culture as “the information and identities available from the global cultural supermarket.” The first definition alludes to “culture shaped by the state and the second one refers to “culture shaped by the market.” He went on to discuss the theory on cultural shaping of self and then investigated the questions on cultural identity.
I agree with the idea of the author that both definitions of culture are problematic in the presence of expanding diversity, interrelations and the arrays of choices. It is sad to note that at present culture is reduced to “a matter of personal taste,” a mere picking from the wide variety of choices. Although, as mentioned in the article, the freedom to choose is curtailed by factors in the social world such as class, gender, age, economic status and nationality.
Going deeper on the idea of culture shaped by the state, the author implied that culture is manipulated and may even be invented by the state to justify its existence. For its legitimization, the education and media is used to facilitate and shape nationalism or having a national identity, when before such claim, there is no such thing as a nation, only groups. However, there is a resurgence of ethnicity and ethnic identity that may pose as a threat to the identity of the nation as a whole, though; this is insignificant to the strength of market identity of the cultural supermarket. Compared with the forceful exploitation of the state, the manipulation of the cultural supermarket is more of seduction with the glitters of advertising. In a way, it is a subtle way of persuasion that is difficult to refuse.
In the author’s discussion of “cultural shaping of self,” he mentioned three levels; the deep shaping, middle-level shaping and the shallow shaping. It is the distinction of actions done “without thinking,” actions done “because you have to,” and actions done “because you choose to,” respectively. He linked these to the definitions of culture, in which he categorized the 2 deepest levels of the self’s cultural shaping to be under culture as “the way of life of a people,” and the shallowest level is under culture as “the global cultural supermarket.”
He made an exception, though, for those in the upper economic strata wherein, it is the realm of the cultural supermarket that is taken for granted because of the notion that one is free to choose. Accordingly, the two contradictory principles discussed in the article, that of the state and that of the market, is not seen as contradictory by most affluent people because it is in the taken-for-granted level, that of the shallow stage.
Retracing Mathews’ discussion in the limitation of our choices based on the make-up of our social world, I think this is a precursor to having a global identity that transcends national or cultural identity. Having arrays of seductive choices, and easy access to most, it breaks the distinction of other people in other places. But, this may also be detrimental in a sense that it may lead to the slow but cannot be stopped erosion of acknowledging roots and history. Except, of course, for those who chose to leave and migrate to other countries and still consider themselves Filipinos, acknowledging that this is their home country.
I find the article refreshing to read and I agree to most of the discussions. The bias I saw, though, is how the author chose his respondents for his study. He chose only “those of the elite in their societies, and in the world.” This is with the positivist assumption that “their struggles resonate throughout their societies.” I just want to point out that there should have been a balance of getting both the perspectives of what the author consider as the “intellectual and economic elites” and what he consider as “less well-off people in their societies and in the world.”
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