how to be alone
This was in response to a blog, which reflected on a random meeting I attended today with my friend Clay and a few strangers..no longer so strange... http://exitcreative.net/blog/?p=157
Though you may need to read the blog for context, this was my comment in response.
I am always interested in how identies are shared. While in India, I found that in more rural settlements, identity was less important than belonging to a family. Several boys in the villages had the shared the same name and even last names, though they had no blood relation. Everyone referred to eachother as "brother and sister; auntie and uncle", and even my fellow travellers were referred to as such..
With the onset of capitalism and the premium put on the value of the individual, I believe the idea of "community" is somehow lost. This particular community in India will see no threat of modernization so long as its natural resources, and tourism potential stays off the radar--unlike its neighboring villages. You see this same threat in Amish communities where there is an intense reviewing process each "new technology" must go through before it is allowed by the Ordnung (an institution made up of elders that keeps Amish law in check). In his book "The Amish Struggle with Modernity" Donald B. Kraybill writes,
"...modernity is a process of social separation that fragments and differentiates. Thus the Amish, in order to maintain cohesive communities have tried to remain separate from modernity, the Great Separator" (23).
Some social theorists like Kraybill are in agreement that the application of technology (industrialization) to virtually all aspects of social life is the "prime catalyst" in the modernizing process. And thus, perhaps, the movement towards total individualism. In the book "How to Be Alone" by Jonathan Franzen, he writes about a Tokyo University where it's possible to go through an ENTIRE YEAR in the city without seeing a single other human being! Where is our value of community going?
I'll tell you: what astounded me after today's meeting, is that blogging, myspace and other related sources, bridges both an encouragement of individualism and a creation of community. Today's meeting is a brilliant example of how in spite of modernization (in respect to how technogolical advances have individualized us), it has also opened up new ways of building, and restoring community. People in the comfort of their homes, away from the bustle of random social interaction, find interests with other people and meet. This building is what Quaker scholars at my school referred to as the "holiest of practices".
But I wonder, how sincere are meetings and community building if they take place solely on the web? I know this is something we talked about before...and perhaps I've been on too many tangents, but to ask once again in a different light: Is it more genuine when you've met in person? Does it need validation? Internet identity can be so easily manipulated, and true, communities may not exist on genuine practices--yet I think today's meeting showed me its beautiful potential.
Though you may need to read the blog for context, this was my comment in response.
I am always interested in how identies are shared. While in India, I found that in more rural settlements, identity was less important than belonging to a family. Several boys in the villages had the shared the same name and even last names, though they had no blood relation. Everyone referred to eachother as "brother and sister; auntie and uncle", and even my fellow travellers were referred to as such..
With the onset of capitalism and the premium put on the value of the individual, I believe the idea of "community" is somehow lost. This particular community in India will see no threat of modernization so long as its natural resources, and tourism potential stays off the radar--unlike its neighboring villages. You see this same threat in Amish communities where there is an intense reviewing process each "new technology" must go through before it is allowed by the Ordnung (an institution made up of elders that keeps Amish law in check). In his book "The Amish Struggle with Modernity" Donald B. Kraybill writes,
"...modernity is a process of social separation that fragments and differentiates. Thus the Amish, in order to maintain cohesive communities have tried to remain separate from modernity, the Great Separator" (23).
Some social theorists like Kraybill are in agreement that the application of technology (industrialization) to virtually all aspects of social life is the "prime catalyst" in the modernizing process. And thus, perhaps, the movement towards total individualism. In the book "How to Be Alone" by Jonathan Franzen, he writes about a Tokyo University where it's possible to go through an ENTIRE YEAR in the city without seeing a single other human being! Where is our value of community going?
I'll tell you: what astounded me after today's meeting, is that blogging, myspace and other related sources, bridges both an encouragement of individualism and a creation of community. Today's meeting is a brilliant example of how in spite of modernization (in respect to how technogolical advances have individualized us), it has also opened up new ways of building, and restoring community. People in the comfort of their homes, away from the bustle of random social interaction, find interests with other people and meet. This building is what Quaker scholars at my school referred to as the "holiest of practices".
But I wonder, how sincere are meetings and community building if they take place solely on the web? I know this is something we talked about before...and perhaps I've been on too many tangents, but to ask once again in a different light: Is it more genuine when you've met in person? Does it need validation? Internet identity can be so easily manipulated, and true, communities may not exist on genuine practices--yet I think today's meeting showed me its beautiful potential.