Final Post Leah Feutz

Leah Feutz

Final Post- Resisting Globalization and Class Reflection

            As our final reading for our class, Arundhati Roy’s article “The Ladies Have Feelings So…Shall we Leave it to the Experts?” looks at a couple of interesting themes in terms of resisting globalization. She starts from the context of a locality, explaining that “India lives in several centuries at the same time”. She goes on to say India is undergoing a process of regression and progression within a microcosm of the world on an unparalleled magnitude. She writes that, “In India, your face is slammed right up against it. To address it, to deal with it, to not deal with it, to try to understand it, to insist on not understanding it, to simply survive it-on a daily, hourly basis-is a fine art”. I think that this speaks to the experience of reading and discussing most of the articles/topics from our class. There are so many conflicting thoughts that come up when addressing these issues within globalization and globalization in general. Sometimes I find myself feeling idealistic, and wondering if there isn’t a way that we can genuinely do things better in our world and for the people in it. At other times, however, the sheer number, complexity, and magnitude of many of these problems seem insurmountable and overwhelming. I tend towards more of a negative lens, unfortunately: that there are so many corrupting influences within the world, that the drive towards enacting positive change is consistently impeded by greed and the desire for power. However, I want to find as many instances as possible that can challenge and maybe reverse this.

Roy brings up a very interesting set of questions when she asks, “What is the role of writers and artists in society? Do they have a definable role? Can it be fixed, described, characterized in any definite way? Should it be?” I really liked her response, where she fears the assertion that writers and artists should somehow have an “immutable charter of duties” dictating that they must be socially and politically conscious and have certain prescribed beliefs. The only “rules”, then, that she states are that there are no rules and then, (ironically but secondly), there aren’t any excuses for “Bad Art”. There are inherent responsibilities of engaging in the art itself, but the top-down, societally imposed responsibilities are where the complications lie and where creativity and excellence can be subverted. From this, I thought her question “If what we have to say doesn’t ‘sell’, will we still say it?” was particularly striking. I definitely feel that, for many people, the commercial viability of whatever they are creating is central to their impetus to pursue an idea. Also, though, I tend to believe that people who are artists and writers and dancers by profession genuinely want to share their work with people, and so commercial viability is symbolic of a willing and interested audience. I don’t blame anyone, then, (if this last idea could be generally true), in wanting their art to be perceived as having monetary value.

One of my favorite quotes from this reading is where Roy writes that, “everything works in Paradise”. She says that under certain conditions, (“if we have the right institutions of governance in place – effective courts, good laws, honest politicians, participatory democracy, a transparent administration that respects human rights and gives people a say in decisions that affect their lives”…etc.), globalization will be beneficial to all people, poor and rich. Just as Roy states, however, these are lofty aspirations for a world that is undeniably imperfect. She also questions whether or not the world leaders are genuinely doing whatever they can to achieve these conditions, if they are perhaps working towards something completely opposite, and what is even meant by “right institutions of governance”. These types of questions have come up in a lot of the courses I have taken, especially in what types of systems of government work well and the most effectively, and how this can be drastically influenced by locality and the cultural and social environment. I have always been really interested in U.S. government and politics, and many of my courses address the question of the degree to which our government system is truly democratic. I also know that there are innumerable problems within our society, which is intrinsically tied to the systemic and political flaws within America. This is where I see the same connection to Roy’s idea- in which good government can help render a better world, but that, in the same vein, perhaps, bad government keeps society from certain levels of improvement. I think that one good answer to this bind could be found in Roy’s condition of participatory democracy and people having more of a voice, because this at least gives the chance for more accountability. I don’t think, though, that this is by any means the full answer and I am definitely left wondering how all of these issues can even begin to be addressed. Maybe there is never really a coherent, obvious, or articulable solution (equally as complex and confusing as the issues themselves).

In reflecting on this semester in our class, I definitely had some favorite readings and discussions, as well as questions that still remain unanswered (or perhaps are just unanswerable). One of my favorite readings, or I guess the one through which I started to develop my lens of analysis and understanding for a lot of the subsequent ones, was the article about McDonalds in Hong Kong. It stressed the various different factors that made this common symbol of globalization an outside influence, but also how locality did truly have an influence on how McDonalds is seen and experienced there. This helped me to understand the importance of cultural and local specificity, and that generalizing often leads to inaccurate analysis or conclusions. We saw this in particular when discussing the veil, which built upon the idea of seeing historical background to get a more full and accurate picture. Also, the articles on sweatshops and what the factory environments were actually like reemphasized just how different experience can really be, to an even more “local” degree (as in, not just seeing locality as nation or region, but that experiences vary even within miles of each other, just as we see on our college campus versus the city of New London). 

I also loved all of our discussions of culture and globalization, especially seen through media representations and common perceptions. I think that the question of what is “culturally authentic” is one that is perhaps unanswerable, especially even that I don’t think there is one person or authority to whom that question should even be posed. Furthermore, I was consistently frustrated with the feeling that a lot of these issues seem irreversible. It isn’t that self-education and learning as much as possible isn’t effective in reversing perceptions, but that access to (and even desire for) a more nuanced understanding of other cultures is often very restricted. Additionally, I know how stubborn I can be in continuing to believe what I already do, and just seeking out information that helps to support what I think I already know. I sense that people have an understanding of their own truth and have a pretty solid view of the world, and there isn’t that much that can penetrate that view. It is convenient that I find it important to try to understand these types of issues better (especially in hindsight having taken this class). This is why I do feel some sort of reservation when people deaminize the ignorance of others; just as I am a product of my environment and experience, so to are those who present views that I do not agree with. There are, obviously, certain viewpoints and opinions that I do not tolerate and do really hate, but I don’t necessarily blame all of these people for what they believe. However awful it is that people are prejudiced, hateful, intolerant, commit violence, etc., I do feel some sense that this comes from somewhere, and not out of the inherent evil in people’s hearts.  

Just as Roy puts it, “We don’t live in a clean, perfect world”. While I am left questioning where solutions to all of the issues we discussed could lie, I really like Roy’s following statement: “Time to ask, in ordinary language, the public question and to demand in ordinary language, the public answer….One is not involved by virtue of being a writer or activist. One is involved because one is a human being”. This resonates with me very strongly- we all do have a hand in the way that our world works, and, even, because this is not an equal hand for many people,  it is essential that the idea of “the public” be revitalized in order to have everyone’s activism included and heard.