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And bravo!
Edit--ack; just got the SWEET ref. [call me slow e]
What I really want to know is: how did the court clerk spell the word?
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Say aorto, what you ask for is a term to describe a cultural process that has maybe a semantical political function, but not a proved function in fact. Hypothetically, perhaps such a word would be useful, but I doubt it. With today's consensus understanding of the nature of madkind's  ever-changing culture, such a process has no standing in the cognitive thoughts of those who think deeply of such matters , so, unless you yourself can demonstrate the reality of the transformation that you wish to name, your new name will quickly be rendered clutter; but if you can make your point, then you can certainly name it as you please and all will be happy. So if you please, please make your point about MacDonaldism.
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Forgive me, Aorto, if I am being presumptuous in interjecting this response: "McDonaldism" and "Coca-Colanization" are really the same thing, but "Coca-Colanization" has a longer history in the vocabulary of cultural studies. Here is a good review: Coca-Colanization (koh.kuh-KOH.luh.ny.zay.shun) n. The spread of Western (especially American) culture throughout the world. Also: Coca-Cola-nization, cocacolanization. Example Citation: "Things have changed a lot over the years," said Jean-Philippe Mathy, a native Frenchman who teaches at the University of Illinois and authored "French Resistance: The French-American Culture Wars." "The youth have been great consumers of American clothes and products, ever since the '70s," Mathy said. The ongoing opposition to "Coca-Colanization," as it has long been called, comes mostly from French cultural elites and "what's left of the radical left," he said. —Scott Leith, "Coke makes an art of selling in France," Cox News Service, August 26, 2002 Earliest Citation: What has been called the creeping Coca-Colanization of the world has been the major U.S. business story since World War II, with international activity now accounting for one-third of all U.S. corporate profits. —Joanne Omang, "A New Form Of Protectionism," The Washington Post, July 23, 1978 http://www.wordspy.com/words/Coca-Colanization.aspI understand Aorto's interest is in looking beneath the process to the impact which the process is having on the pysche of the peoples who are being transformed by it. And I think Aorto is looking even deeper than that. She is looking at the impact the culletization of these cultures is having on our own culture. Aorto is asking a very important question: Are we, as the dominant culture, not losing something ourselves by culletizing all of these other cultures? [It has, in fact, turned in upon itself as it is now culletizing our own culture. This is Aorto's point about 'Wal-Mart culture', which should be a contradiction in terms, but, revealingly, isn't a contradiction at all. But 'Walmart culture' is really the absence of a culture, not a distinct culture itself.] What Aorto is getting at, I think, is something more profound, more insidious, than "McDonaldism" or "Coca Colanization". It is the transformation of civiilization itself, universally. For the McDonald's and the Coca Colas and the Wal Marts of the world are only propelled by commerce. "McDonaldism" is not a malignant force in and of itself, of course. For that is what these ubiquitous, multi-national entities are: businesses. What Aorto is getting at, ultimately, I think, is the transformation of civilization itself -- into what? Perhaps into a culletization, a cullletization of all cultures into something which possesses no culture. Where is the soul in that, themilum? If I have it wrong, I'm sure Aorto will straighten me out soon enuf. :) P.S. Why do I assume Aorto is a "her". I'm not sure. There is a sensitivity in Aorto's voice which I associate with a feminine perspective. It is a fact that women are usually the care-givers in our society. Most people give what they feel [like giving].
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" P.S. Why do I assume Aorto is a "her". I'm not sure. There is a sensitivity in Aorto's voice which I associate with a feminine perspective. It is a fact that women are usually the care-givers in our society." ________________________________________________________ No Plutarch, don't flatter Aorto, he is only a man. A woman doesn't have time to worry about the abstract ramifications of cultural transmutations, she is too busy living life as it is. Sadly it is a man's plight to fuss and quibble over such trucks and trifles, it keeps them from being underfoot. Wanna bet?
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Wanna bet?And what do you propose as the prize, themilum? One of those bottles of wine named after the most prominent ladies in our midst? BTW how many ladies have signed up for those labels? :) On second thought, Aorto is definitely infusing this Board with new blood rich in himoglobin. And "Aorto" is the masculine form of "aorta". You are so clever themilum. You never cease to amaze.
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Plutarch,
Wow. You expressed it better than I did. You really cleared up a few things. One statement made a bigger point: It is the transformation of civiilization itself, universally.
I really believe that we are living in a new age. It used to be that world conquering civilizations eventually faded. Rome and Greece, for example, conquered the world (which, in hindsight, was obviously not the entire world).
However, with globalization as an economic term, we are speaking of the entire world. Burger King in Baghdad. KFC in China. We see the trend.
Here's an example. My spouse is from Jamaica. We all know the cliche, the 'Ya mon' which brings to mind Jamaicans with dreadlocks. Aside from the fact that it is mispronounced by everyone, the cultural meaning is lost.
This is the process: a business, for example, whether it be a tourist agency, a record company, a movie producer, whatever, recognizes this unique tidbit of culture that is distinctly Jamaican.
So this essence is extracted (which is why the word 'lixiviation' is really close to what I'm after) and is marketed out of context. Even if the context was known originally, all we know now is that it is from Jamaica; what we fail to understand is its genuine cultural context. The meaning has been eradicated. It has been extracted, drained and depleted.
It's kind of like our pharmaceutical industry: extract the essence of one plant, market it and don't worry about the side effects.
Universally, in an absolute linear sense, this process could do the same for everything that is unique, everything that makes cultures distinct and unique. I remember going on a cruise and we went to one of those manufactured islands owned by the cruise lines. It was hideous. My spouse and I busted out laughing. They were trying to duplicate the superficials of Caribbean culture but it was manufactured, safe, neat and absolutely meaningless. If there was meaning, it too was manufactured. No cultural context other than huts on a beach. It was horrible.
Manufactured meaning?
The transformation in an absolute sense is the abstraction of meaning, the depletion of culture as a whole, where everything is an but imitation of culture.
Paradoxically, 'the absence of culture' is a culture itself. And a culletization of culture is good; culture is eventually being grinded slowly to a pulp to the point that even the pulp will be found wanting of a meaningful essence, relegated to the dustbins of history.
I think the telltale sign is that we recently experienced a 70s revival. Disco and bell bottoms came back. It seems as if the 80s are soon to be upon us again. Then the 90s. What happens when we catch up to ourselves?!
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What happens when we catch up to ourselves?!If that ever happens, Aorto, there will be hope for us. You are such a treat, Aorto. What an infusion of fresh blood! [Himoglobin or Heroglobin - you have been cleverly opaque about that, referring only to your "spouse". Themilum must be tearing his hair out. :) ] Yes, the extract of some trace [or not even a trace but a facsimile of a trace] which is marketed as the genuine whole [holus bowdlerus], like a perfume. Like "J Lo" perfume. Or the one they named after Elizabeth Taylor. And Britney Spears has her own perfume on the market. I don't know the name because all I see is the face. Selling a scent with a face. Where is the sense in that?* In the perfume category, Aorto, the trace is not a facsimile. It's a facesimile. * Indeed, where is the soul in that? Where is the soul in any of that? We may have to put the remnants of some of these genuine wholes into zoos, Aorto, so people can go to these zoos to find out what civilization is all about. Going back to your original question, Aorto: What happens when we catch up to ourselves?!T. S. Eliot answered it best, did he not? "We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." And perhaps T. S. Eliot also gave us the single word you were looking for, Aorto, when you started this thread. Does anyone know a word for understanding of something 'to be stripped of meaning'?What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water.
--------------------
What is the city over the mountains
Cracks and reforms and bursts in the violet air
Falling towers
Jerusalem Athens Alexandria
Vienna London UnrealThe Waste Land [1922] http://www.bartleby.com/201/1.html If T. S. Eliot were writing "The Waste Land" today, what cities would Tiresias name after "London", I wonder? I Tiresias, old man with wrinkled dugs
Perceived the scene, and foretold the rest—
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Plutarch,
The quote from T.S. Eliot almost brought tears to my eyes. Here I am perusing dictionaries and thesauri and, low and behold, the voice of the poet from the din. Sigh...
The notion from Themilum that there is a consensus understanding of 'mad-kinds' ever changing culture ties right into the notion: the actual idea of a consensus. A consensus understanding of something can only be rendered such by a power elite (or someone who deems themselves so). By stating such as an absolute, you've actually lixiviated dissent. Insert smiley face, I don't know the code.
While I may not be considered a deep thinker, I am observant. What I have observed is that there is a Burger King in Baghdad. We (speaking from the soil of the U.S.) export our excess waste. As the U.S. is composed of cultures from everywhere else, this is perhaps the one thing that could be considered 'culture' in the U.S.
My spouse used to work as a buyer for Macy's. The buyers would travel all over the world, looking for those unique little cultural icons, bring them back and mass produce them. Eventually, those little icons ceased to have meaning. They were just 'exotic' imports from somewhere else. It continues to happen on a larger scale today. The transformation is currently taking place.
The term 'gentrification' is close from a sociological context. The people in the poorer parts of a city have cheap real estate. Artists move in because it is cheap; it becomes 'hip' and suburbanites go urban slumming, causing property values to rise. The poor can soon no longer afford to live there. That is a process with a name.
I think the reality of the transformation as process is the fact that it is happening. Insidious, yes. If we take it to a logical conclusion in a complete and absolute linear sense, it is not too difficult to envision the end of culture as all will be the same.
'When everyone knows good as good, this is not good.' Tao Te Ching
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'When everyone knows good as good, this is not good.' - Tao Te ChingBullslip! Culture is a device like the mechanical structure of colonial corals that enables groups of individuals to continue through time much better than a single biological unit. Need I go further? Your nostalgic notions are misplaced.
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Agreed, actually. That is why the loss of culture is so detrimental.
Culture: the integrated pattern of human behavior that includes thought, speech, action, and artifacts and depends upon the human capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations.
What happens when the only thing to pass on (i.e. culture) to succeeding generations is a trip to your local Wal Mart? What refuge have we, what asylum can we take from the homogenous zone?
Postage stamps used to have important leaders and politicians: stamps now have Daffy Duck and movie stars.
Television shows now make reference to other television shows, not from years past but shows currently running along with them.
It used to be taboo for advertisers to mention other competitors. Now advertisers blast other competitors no holds barred.
We're seeing the last remnant of any semblance of culture (if we can, in fact, call it that!) in American society. The small town, red states are soon to be eviscerated. Oh, the apocalypse is upon us!
But seriously, I found an interesting quote: we are headed toward "a Disneyfied existence with one global culture." Guess there are lots of other goofballs like me out there. More importantly, we are inbreeding, forced to use corporate terms to describe the very same process I'm railing against. Quite the conundrum, thus the obsession to find a word outside of this process to describe it.
Perhaps eviscerate is a better word than lixiviate. Cultural evisceration; culturally eviscerated; evisceration of culture. That just might work.
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