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Transnationalism and Globalization

Sifting through this history on the changing notions of culture it should be apparent that anthropologists have long questioned the discreteness and boundedness of culture as something that can be fixed to a particular group located in space and time. We can refer to early 20th century diffusionist theories where cultures were presented as an assemblage of traits brought about by cultural interconnections over space, links and contacts with different people. Later World Systems theories, though concentrated on the economic interconnections between core and periphery, laid the ground for consideration for the global study of cultural and symbolic capital flow.

Increasing concern for these interconnections clearly grows out of the recent technological advancements in communication and transportation which has accelreated the transnational flow of people, objects, ideas, and images beyond Boas' wildest diffusionist dreams. Appadurai (1990) has provided a classification that differentiates the different kinds of transnational flows and spaces that are important units in the study of transnationalism. He includes: ethnoscapes (movement of people), technoscapes (information and technology), finanscapes (financial capital), mediascapes (ideas and images about others), and ideoscapes (transfers of national ideologies).

A wide range of research interests surrounds transnationalism and globalization. Studies focusing on deterritorialization consider how production, consumption, identities, communities, become detached from local places. New kinds of community spaces are formed such as: diasporic communities, "hyperspaces" (like fast food, airports, etc.), virtual communities, border-cultures, etc. Other studies focus on the fate of nations and nationalism. While the nation as a homogenous cultural unit is being called in to question, it is simultaneously being vehemently defended. Questions having to do with embracing and insitutionalizing a multicultural society within our nation-states are increasingly popular. Peraps one of the biggest areas of investigation in the anthropology of transnationalism is in the effects of globalization on identity and culture. On the one hand, some anthropologists argue that the cultural imperialsim of the core to the periphery will result in the homogenization of culture-the eradication of cultural difference. Others argue that cultural flows articulate with local meanings, providing new materials and symbols with which to articulate new "hybridities." Both processes may very well be simultaneously present.

Kearney (1995) points out the irony that while transnationalism forces us to rethink the validity of the culture concept, the growth of transnationalism is causing the state system to pay more attention to it, -for example, cultural considerations into legal proceedings. Another more recent area of research is on global and transnational politics, human rights and the internationalization of social movements, particularly with the mobilization of indigenous grass-roots organizations. Such activity provides interesting ground for theorizing on the persistence, resurgence, or creation of ethnic/indigenous identities for political purposes.

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