FINAL PAPER

Hi folks – please be sure to see the final paper guidelines here. Your final paper will be due May 1st by EMAIL by 10 p.m.
Be sure to double check that you actually sent the attachment!

For Tuesday, April 20th

We will be meeting in Innovation Hall, Room 209.

For Tuesday, April 20th, please read the following (note that I am not requiring you to read the last reading on the original syllabus):

• Abi-Lughod, Lila (2002). “The Objects of Soap Opera: Egyptian Television and the Cultural Politics of Modernity” in K.M. Askew & R. Wilk (eds.), The Anthropology of Media: A Reader (Oxford: Blackwell).
• Klein, Naomi (2002). No Logo (New York: Picador), Chapter 16

This will be our last actual class in the classroom.

For Tuesday, April 16th

We will be meeting in Innovation Hall, Room 209

For Tuesday, April 13th, please read:

• Toby Miller & Richard Maxwell, “Film and Globalization,” in O. Boyd-Barrett (ed.), Communications Media, Globalization, and Empire (London: John Libbey, 2006). (on blackboard)
• Tyler Cowen, Creative Destruction: How Globalization is Changing the World’s Cultures (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002), Chapters 2 and 4. (on blackboard)

For April 6th

Hi folks – as you know, there is no actual class next Tuesday, April 6th. Your take-home midterm will be due by midnight on that day via email!

CULT 320-004 Globalization & Culture

Spring 2010

Take-home Mid-Term Exam

Choose FOUR out of the following questions to respond to, in short essay form. While considering the questions below, be sure to make reference to at least two readings for this course, as well as one outside source. Be sure to provide textual evidence (to support your conclusions and/or arguments) and at least one significant example.

Approximately two pages for each question will likely be needed to adequately discuss each question you choose, but I’m more interested in quality of response over quantity of words. Please type each question before you answer them. Papers should be double-spaced and in widely accepted font and size such as Times New Roman font, 12 pts. Be sure to also use proper citations and include a works cited or bibliography page at the end.

Midterms should be submitted as a MS Word document, by EMAIL by midnight on April 6^th. This paper will be graded out of 200 points, each essay with a possible 50 points.

1. As discussed in class, the word “globalization” has been a rather ubiquitous term, but one that is complex and often misunderstood. Describe, in your own words and backing it up with sources, what you understand by the term “globalization.” Provide textual evidence and examples to support your conclusion/s.
2. John Tomlinson says there is an “intrinsic unevenness of globalization” (Globalization & Culture, p. 7). Expound on what you think he means by this, backing it up with examples and other course texts.
3. Discuss the role of communication and transportation technologies in globalization. How has technological innovation, facilitated by various agents (individuals, corporations, organizations, nations, etc.), hindered or fostered this process, and with what consequences? Be sure to support your discussion with examples, course texts, etc.
4. John Tomlinson says that globalization transforms the local order (Globalization & Culture, p. 9). Explain what he means by this and the complex connectivity and spatial proximity that are characteristic of a globalized world. Use textual evidence and examples to support your discussion.
5. Explain your understanding of neoliberalism and its connection to globalization, using at least one specific example outside of (or not fully explored by) the readings that exemplifies your perspective. How do the theories of neoliberalism either contradict or support the actual practices? You may argue whatever position you choose to take, but must back up your conclusion with evidence and examples.
6. Expound on what David Harvey means when he notes, while its origins are Anglo-American, neoliberalism has become “hegemonic as a mode of discourse…incorporated into the common-sense way many of interpret, live in, and understand the world.” (A Brief History of Neoliberalism, p. 3). Use examples and course texts to back-up your statements.
7. How has globalization affected the global assembly line and workplace? What kind of workers has emerged in a globalized world? Discuss the various shifts that have occurred in the production of goods and products, using at least one specific example outside of or not fully explored by the readings to support your arguments.
8. While globalization celebrates the free movement of capital, commodities, and labor, in practice, states strive to build bridges for the exchange of capital and commodities, but not for the exchange of labor and movement of people. Yet the opening of global markets has also led to an increase in international migration. Explore the reasons for this increase and the challenges faced by migrants, especially those moving from the global south to the global north.
9. Global migration is both an economic and social process. Discuss the various theories of migration that encompass these two intertwined processes. Why do people migrate? Which theories do you find more compelling? Back up your arguments with textual evidence and examples.
10. Explore what you deem to be either a major negative or positive impact of globalization on culture, focusing on any specific cultural phenomenon or artifact of your choosing (i.e. video games, a music genre, “traditional” cultural practices of a particular country, media – film or television, technology, etc.). You can interpret “negative” or “positive” however you like and take whatever position you want, but you must back up your conclusion with evidence and examples.
11. Explain a theory, concept, topic or specific issue explored in class thus far that has most impacted your understanding of globalization. This is an opportunity for you to re-explore something that most caught your attention and explain how you understood this issue to either inform or reflect globalization and culture. Whatever position you take on the issue you explore, be sure to back up your argument with textual evidence and examples.
12. Discuss what role you believe that you have in the process of globalization. Whether you approach globalization from a positive or negative viewpoint – or somewhere in between—this question is geared towards helping you articulate your own individual (potential) role in the larger process of globalization – for better or worse – whether as a current consumer of culture, a producer, a potential activist, a worker, a global citizen, etc. Your answer to this question will obviously be somewhat subjective and individualized, but you still need to support your conclusion with reference to the texts and examples. You could, for example, explain what role you believe you have thus far played and what, if any, changes you may make in the future and why.

Readings for March 30th

Tuesday, March 30th: Special Topic: Globalization & Food/ our class meets in Innovation, Room 209

• Wilk, Richard (2006). “The Global Supermarket” from Home Cooking in the Global Village. Oxford and NY: Berg. [Available on Blackboard]
• Watson, James L (2006). “Introduction: Transnationalism, Localization, and Fast Foods in East Asia” AND “Update: McDonald’s as Political Target: Globalization and Anti-globalization in the Twenty-first Century,” Golden Arches East: McDonald’s in East Asia, 2nd Edition. Stanford: Stanford University Press. [Available on Blackboard]

Tuesday, April 6th: NO CLASS: Take-Home Midterm DUE by midnight by email

Readings for March 23rd

Hi folks – below are the readings assigned for class discussion on March 23rd. We will be meeting in the JC, third floor, Room A.

• Cowen, Tyler (2002). Creative Destruction, Princeton University Press. Chapter 1. [Available on Blackboard]
• Sharon Zukin, Naked City: The Death and Life of Authentic Urban Places (New York: Oxford, 2010), Chapter 5. [Available on Blackboard]

Also DUE on March 23rd is your final paper proposal. Please see the guidelines for the final paper.

Readings for March 16th

For Tuesday, March 16th: Human Commodities in the Global Supply Chain - we will be meeting in the JC, third floor, Room A.

Please read the following and be prepared to discuss all in class:

• Yeoh, Brenda and Shirlena Huang (1998). “Negotiating Public Space: Strategies and Styles of Migrant Female Domestic Workers in Singapore” Urban Studies, Vol. 35, no. 1: 583-602. [Available on Blackboard]
• Liechty, Mark (2005). “Carnal Economies: The Commodification of Food and Sex in Kathmandu,” Cultural Anthropology, Vol. 20, No. 1: 1-38. [Available on Blackboard]
• Clark, Michele (2003). “Human Trafficking Casts Shadow on Globalization” Yale Global Online.

Also DUE on March 23rd is your final paper proposal. Please see the guidelines for the final paper.

For Tuesday, March 2nd

Hi folks, for Tuesday, March 2nd, we’ll be discussing Migration, Culture, and Identity. We’ll be meeting in Innovation, Room 209. Please read the following. If you write a blog response, please be sure to make reference to both readings, not just one. You can put more emphasis on one than the other, but I’d like to see more connections made between readings, rather than isolated comments about just one.

• Peter Stalker, The No-Nonsense Guide to International Migration (London: Verso, 2001) – to purchase from bookstore.
• Uy-Tioco, Cecilia (2007). “Overseas Filipino Workers and Text Messaging: Reinventing Transnational Mothering,” Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, vol. 21, no. 2: 253-265.

For Tuesday, February 23rd

For Tuesday, February 23rd, we will be meeting in the JC, third floor, Room B. Please have the following read before coming to class:

Regarding Life in the Global Assembly Line: Two Perspectives

• Raworth, Kate (2004). Trading Away Our Rights: Women Working in the Global Supply Chain (Oxford, UK: Oxfam International). [Available on Blackboard]- just up to page 29.
• Ross, Andrew (2004). No-Collar: The Human Workplace and Its Hidden Costs (Philadelphia: Temple University Press), Chapter 5. [Available on Blackboard]

Group # 3 will be presenting their case study after class discussion of readings. To see schedule of case studies and guidelines, click on tabs at top menu.

Also – please continue watching Walmart: High Cost of Low Prices (we’ll discuss in class next week); and, if you’d like, you can write a blog response to that film (but if you want to also do the readings, you need to do two separate blog responses).

For February 16th

UPDATED: For next class, Feb. 16th, class meets in Innovation Hall, Room 209!

Since class was canceled yet again, I had to make some adjustments to the syllabus (click on link to see updated syllabus schedule) and the case study schedule. So be sure to check out both of those updates.

In the next class, be sure you’ve read the readings assigned in the past two weeks. Groups # 1 & #2 will both be presenting their case studies.

(Readings for last Tuesday, February 16th):

• Harvey, David (2007). “Neoliberalism as Creative Destruction,” The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 610; 21. [Available on Blackboard]

I’ll accept blog responses for this reading (above) up until just before class on February 16th.