Arjun Appaduari
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| Image courtesy of: Wikipedia |
The discussion this week in class had to do with the idea put forth by Arjun Appaduari (the handsome and happy gentleman featured above) and his “theory of scapes in the formation of globalization” (Rantanen, 2005, p. 13). Appaduari maintains that globalization consists of the intersection of five different “scapes”:
Ethnoscapes – basically people who are on the move (i.e. tourists, immigrants, refugees)
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| Image courtesy of: globalissuesclass.wordpress.com |
Mediascapes – the distribution and production of information
Technoscapes – both the mechanical and informational technologies
Financescape – basically currency markets, national stock exchanges and commodity speculations
and Ideoscapes – Primarily the enlightened world view (consisting of ideas, terms, images such as freedom, welfare, rights, sovereignty, representation and democracy)
When I had to think of a way to incorporate this principle into an everyday scenario from my life it actually ended up being pretty easy! Appaduari writes that these “scapes” are “deeply perspectival constructs, inflected by the historical, linguistic and political situatedness of different sorts of actors” (Appaduari, 1998 , p.33). One of these “different sort of actors” falling into a more intimate sort of subset was that of family…bingo!
My mother is Canadian, born and raised in the prairies of Saskatchewan. My Dad was born in Melbourne but emigrated over to Canada in the early 70s, met my Mum and lived happily ever after (moving back to Australia to raise their kids, me included). My very family is a prime example of one of Ethnoscape Appaduari writes about with my upbringing being a cross cultured mix of Aussie and Cannuck. Coincidentally, my parents are back over in Canada as I write this on a 4 month long holiday, helping to spread further the idea of the global Ethnoscapes as well as Australia’s great reputation with elderly tourists.
Here's a photo of a Buffalo they almost hit while riding through Yellowstone National Park
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| Photo courtesy of: Tom Swan, 2013 |
Come to think of it, I get a call from them once a week through Skype for them to check in and let me know they’re alive and my Dad uploads a photo a day (example above) to his Facebook page…Bam! Another example, Technoscapes this time! They did forget to call me on my birthday last week though so maybe we’ll just forget about the Technoscapes for now…
Reference List:
Rantanen, T 2005, The Media and Globalization, Sage, London pp.1-18
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