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Sights of Contestation: Localism, Globalism and Cultural Production in Asia and the Pacific |
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Year of Publication : 2002 |
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Publisher : Chinese University Press |
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Review : |
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This is the third book emerging from a multi-year research project, “Localism and Globalism,” initiated by the three editors, Kwok-kan Tam, Wimal Dissanayake, and Terry Yip. This explains the overarching theme of this collection of fourteen essays: the interaction between the global and the local in the disparate processes of cultural production in Asia Pacific. It displays a remarkable diversity of approaches, methodologies, and intellectual concerns. One contributor laments the popularity of cultural studies in literary scholarship, but others emphatically use cultural theory to explore issues of cultural politics. There are discussions of “global citizenship,” but most essays deal with changing constructions (or subcontracting) of local identity through novels, films, or language. There is also a mix of theoretical and empirical works. Overall, there are three major tendencies in this well-conceived collection. The first tendency is a celebration of local difference. The book opens with the essay, “‘Modernisation’ and ‘Modernity’: The Construction of a Modern Chinese Civilisational Order,” by Ambrose Y. C. King, a revered scholar of Chinese sociology, which lays out an important perspective on globalization by linking it to the universalizing hegemony of (Western) modernity. Indeed, academic discussion of globalism has often been mapped onto the earlier discourse of modernization (i.e, West vs. East, developed vs. developing nations), Thus the major debate has been whether globalization is in effect a homogenizing force and therefore a new form of Western domination or a heterogeneous field of local resistance (and differences). After a sweeping analysis of Chinese experiences with global imperialism and China’s struggle to modernize in order to catch up with the West, King argues that there is certainly “universality” in “modernity” but that modern cultural orders are not necessarily “homogenous.” (p. 11) This argument leads him to argue that while China is “condemned to modernize” as a result of the globalization of the West, yet its “modern turn” is determined largely by its historical contours and cultural practice, and China (and East Asia) will develop an alternative form of “modern civilization distinct from the Western model of modernization.” (p. 10) King’s emphasis on understanding alternative forms of modernity in East Asia is insightful. The second tendency is a challenge to the prevalent dichotomy in academic discourse on globalization. This is evidenced in Michael Curtin’s fascinating essay, “Hong Kong Meets Hollywood in the Extranational Arena of the Cultural Industries.” Rich in empirical research and theoretical insights, Curtin’s essay is convincing in its nuanced analysis of the changing and increasingly interconnected histories of Chinese-language media industries in Hong Kong and the mainland in a global context. He argues that transnational media corporations did not seek to “homogenize” viewing habits and cultural styles in Asia Pacific (even if they have done so) in pursuit of profits, and local media industries responded to global pressures less by resistance than by a mix of innovative programming and expansion of their markets worldwide. Curtin is at his best in analysing the interaction of global, regional, and local in the change of business structure and programming strategy of the Hong Kong television industry. His discussion on the media industries of the mainland requires more research on the shifting business conditions and the varied influences of transnational media corporations there. The third tendency is a focus on the specific histories of identity formation in Asia. A fine example is Kwok-kan Tam’s “Post-Coloniality, Localism and the English Language in Hong Kong.” In a richly contextualized narrative of the decolonization of education in pre-1997 Hong Kong, he discusses the transformation of English pedagogy and its connection to the construction of local identity. English was arguably the most important cultural capital in the colony that produced all kinds of power and privileges, so issues of what was English, who could learn it and how it would be taught had shaped the education system there. Since the 1970s, English teaching had been challenged by a plethora of anti-colonial discourses, including the gradual emergence of local consciousness, and the emphasis in the curriculum has shifted from a standardized London-oriented, Oxford-centred form of the language to world English with local ESL relevance. Tam argues that this transformation had an important, though little-studied impact on the formation of a flexible, “hybridized” Hong Kong identity. On the whole, this well-conceived, wide-ranging book makes a timely contribution to the ongoing debate over globalization in Asia Pacific. Poshek Fu |
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