File spoon-archives/marxism-thaxis.archive/marxism-thaxis_1998/marxism-thaxis.9803, message 254


Date: Tue, 10 Mar 1998 14:14:51 -0500
From: Yoshie Furuhashi <Furuhashi.1-AT-osu.edu>
Subject: Re: M-TH: Cultural hegemony


I forgot to add a couple of things to my reply to Hugh's cultural hegemony
post.

(1) It was Dennis, not me, who denied the cultural hegemony of
American-English and asserted that, for instance, "we all speak the Net" or
things like that. My position was and is that the American-English empire
lives, culturally and militarily. Don't make it sound as though I didn't
recognize this social fact. As the only regular poster on Thaxis whose
native language is not English, I know very well how English rules the
world. No need to remind me of that.

(2) Whatever your intention and practical truth about the hegemony of
English, the manner in which you talked about it is not likely to endear
you to non-English speakers, especially those whose language faces a very
real possibility of extinction in the near future. (Obviously, I am not
talking about Japanese here.)

Yoshie

>Yoshie is being very severe on Dennis:
>>
>>When you have enough courage to strip yourself of grad-school theory-speak
>>and used items from pop culture thrift shops, your words and thoughts, I
>>guarantee, will become more revelatory.
>>
>>One note of caution (this is the second time). Never turn a selective +
>>sexist import of cultural commodities into a synecdoche for the entire mass
>>culture of a given nation. Don't think that your local video store or comic
>>book market can give you a clue as to how others do culture, much less how
>>others live. (Re-read Edward Said in your spare time for good measure.) I
>>have an impression that you speak neither Japanese nor Chinese. If so,
>>learning either language might be a step in the right direction. (However,
>>given the pervasive nature of reactionary scholarship in the "area studies"
>>and foreign language instruction in the U.S., it might put you into a
>>right-wing direction.)
>
>
>Just a little note from reality, at least as reflected in on-the-spot news
>pictures from CNN. The placards being showed to the cameras in Kosova,
>Jakarta and wherever are in what languages? The local language and the
>language of international cultural hegemony. Is that Chinese? No. Is it
>Japanese? No. Is it English? Yes.
>
>Stop the ethnic cleansing in Kosova!
>
>Perhaps Yoshie could tell us what that is in Japanese for future use?
>
>Cheers,
>
>Hugh




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