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-~~DECKJS~~
-# Modernities, II #
-Ryan Schram
-ANTH 1002: Anthropology and the Global
-Lecture Notes
-September 2014
-## Multiple modernities ##
-This week and next week we are discussing the possibility that there is more than one kind of modernity. Specifically,
-* All societies change, but not all societies end up being the same.
-* Not all kinds of social change are progress.
-## Two main ideas ##
-* Parallel modernity, like Nigerian film audiences watching Bollywood movies.
-* Alternate modernity (next week). The same factors which transformed
-  European societies are also at work in non-European societies, but
-  in local variants.
-## Parallel modernity ##
-According to "modernization theory", African societies would
-eventually become like European societies.
-Brian Larkin argues that Nigerian filmgoers imagine that the future
-will be more like Indian society because they consume Indian popular
-culture instead of Western popular culture.
-Globalization does not just send Western culture to non-Western
-culture. There are **parallel** paths of cultural influence.
-## Alternate modernity ##
-Protestantism in Europe led people to see themselves as individuals,
-and to build social institutions based on individual personhood.
-In Indonesia, the late 20th-century Islamic revival is teaching women
-to see themselves as individuals, and to seek out social institutions
-based on individual personhood.
-Indonesian society is in the process of transformation, but it is
-following an **alternative** route to the same destination.
-## Why societies change ##
-When anthropologists criticize the idea of progress, development, and
-modernization, they are generally critizing a theory of social change
-put forward by Max Weber.
-## Max Weber: the man, the myth, the sociologist ##
-Max Weber (1864-1920) is widely considered the founder of modern
-sociology. Along with Emile Durkheim, he is credited with some of
-social science's main ideas.
-Weber's approach to social forms starts from the view that there are
-different types of society, and one can compare them to understand
-each better.
-## Weber and modernity ##
-For Weber "traditional" societies were different from "modern"
-societies.
-Traditional societies are based on following rules because 'this is
-the way it has always been.'
-Modern societies allow more freedom for individuals to make
-choices. Modern societies are based on agreements between individuals.
-Weber says that modern societies are **more rational** than
-traditional societies.
-## That doesn't sound like anthropology ##
-Weber did not look at cultural differences the way that
-anthropologists do. His views about social change are ethnocentric. He
-assumed that all societies were moving toward greater rationality,
-which he saw in the German state.
-## The Protestant Ethic ##
-The Weber thesis is that the development of an ascetic form of
-Protestant Christianity spurred the development of market exchange and
-capitalist production. This is presented in his famous book //The
-Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism// (1905).
-## The Protestant Ethic ##
-Calvin teaches that salvation is for the elect. There's nothing you
-can do to earn salvation.
-What you do with your life has nothing to do with your relationship to
-God.
-If you were successful, it was a **sign** that you were in the
-elect. Wealth is not valuable for its own sake.
-A person should follow one's "calling" as a duty to God.
-The **means** of earning a living (a calling) are separate from the **ends**
-(a living, wealth and success). Thus if one is wealthy, one can be
-deatched from this wealth and deal with objectively.
-## Twist! ##
-Protestant reformers condemned people for being consumed with
-worldliness: being greedy and venal. Greed is bad.
-Because their philosophy was based on a new way of thinking of the
-person as an individual, they actually paved the way for disembedding
-the economy from social relationships.
-Greed is good? Not really. Weber concludes that Protestantism led to
-people believing that self-interest is just human nature.
-## Modernization theory ##
-In the past, anthropologists and sociologists wanted to know how
-societies became more modern, and moved toward the type of society
-found in Europe. This school is called **"modernization theory."**
-Robert Bellah, Tokugawa Religion (1957).
-James Peacock, Muslim Puritans (1978).
-## Why is Weber's theory influential? ##
-Even though Weber was ethnocentric in some ways, he did think that
-culture played a role in the history of society.
-The values people learn from cultural institutions, especially
-religion, cause a society to change.
-## Next week ##
-Why has there been a "return" to religion even as the world becomes
-more "rational"? Why is membership in a religion so important for
-people of postcolonial societies such as Indonesia?
-We examine the "Islamic revival" and the revival of public forms of
-piety.
-## References ##
-Bellah, Robert N. 1957. Tokugawa Religion: The Values of Pre-Industrial Japan. Glencoe, Ill.: The Free Press.
-Peacock, James L. 1978. Muslim Puritans: Reformist Psychology in Southeast Asian Islam. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press.
-Weber, Max. 1905. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of
-Capitalism. London: Unwin Hyman. https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/weber/protestant-ethic/index.htm.

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