Free will society
International communication
May 2014
CANCLINI AND THE CONCEPT OF HYBRIDITY can we still define ourselves through our cultural identity? In today’s post, I would like to talk about the concept of cultural identity as defined by Canclini. To put it back into context, Nestor Garcia Canclini is an Argentinian born academic and anthropologist. He is known for his theory on the concept of “hybridity”. According to his article, LA globalización: ¿productora de cultura hibridas? He describes the various evolution of the use of the Word hybridity and its concept throughout history. First the word was used in biology only, to describe the cross between two separate races of culture. Hybridity was only considered as racial mixing at that point. The use of the term is also associated with the post colonialist period. Indeed, colonialism was the core illustration of a mix between two different culture and traditions. Therefore the term was use in a broader sense and not only in a biological one anymore. Canclini defines the concept of hybridity as “the sociocultural processes in which the former distinct structures and practices, which existed in a separated form, combine themselves to generate new structures, objects and practices.” Another aspect of the term, and the one that interest me the most, is its relationship to globalization. Today, hybridity is considered as one of the main effect of globalization. In fact, Marwan M Kraidy defines hybridity as “the communication based phenomenon characterized by the intermingling of people and media from different cultures”, but more important he affirms that hybridity “entails that traces of other cultures exists in every culture, thus offering foreign media and marketers transcultural wedges for forging affective links between their commodities and local communities.” This shows that even if globalization is creating more common ground between different cultures through phenomenon such as hybridity, these new culture still have to be linked to the remains of local cultures in order to have any influence. According to Canclini, the continuous concept of hybridity forces us to put the concept of cultural identity into perspective. Indeed, it prevents from trying to establish identities as “pure” and “authentic”. For him the hybridity processes show that it is not possible to talk about identities as if it was the sum of fixed characteristics. We cannot use cultural identity as the essence of an ethny or a nation because today, no one can be describe as a pure French or a pure Mexicans. Throughout history nation and people leaving in those nations have blended and mixed between each other. Everyone is a unique result of hybridity. For Canclini “cultural identity” should be understood as a way in which community perceive and construct themselves, but not as the essences of a culture. Our world is too interconnected for us to define any virgin cultural identity. Globalization through the phenomenon of hybridity did not lead to and homogenized society, it led to a society where everybody is a unique mixed of cultures. Therefore, it forces us to put the whole concept of cultural identity at another level. For example, I cannot only define myself as French because I am a lot more than French a lot of people in the history of my family crossed borders and made me who I am. Today, we need to define ourselves through the experiment we
Free will society
International communication
May 2014
have, the life we live and the people we meet. This allows us to have a more personal point of view and more free will.