Throughout Global Matters, Paul Jay argues that neither cultural nor material approaches to globalization are sufficient, but that those studying globalization must recognize that culture and material economy “have always overlapped” and “are becoming increasingly indistinguishable” (56). Even more emphatically, Jay writes, “globalization is characterized by the conflation of cultural and economic forms” (34). Thus Jay does not merely claim that the cultural and the economic cannot be separated, but that their fusion is integral to the process of globalization. After considering Jay’s argument in relation to other theorists’ depictions of globalization as well as my own experiences, I would tentatively agree with Jay on both counts. While culture cannot be reduced to a material experience, neither can the material commodities that facilitate cultural participation be reduced to merely symbolic entities disconnected from the global flow of products, capital, and labor. Therefore, I believe Jay is correct to approach the cultural and the economic as unified forms of experience that are unevenly accessed and applied by people around the globe.

Arguing for cultural and economic coincidence, however, requires some discussion of how we define a cultural or an economic experience. If Jay’s claim is correct, it follows that in a global context there is no noneconomic cultural experience, nor any non-cultural economic exchange. Instead, as Jay writes, “Culture is a set of material practices linked to economies, and economic and material relations are always mediated by cultural factors and forms” (45). Rather than analyzing Jay’s statement by articulating specific forms of cultural and economic experience and attempting to confirm that they always comprise both cultural and economic components, I propose approaching the question of conflation by considering what it means to participate in a cultural or economic network. How does one participate in culture? Jay cites forms of cultural expression such as films, novels, advertisements, music, and performance, all of which exist largely as commodities in societies worldwide. This is, perhaps, the more easily established part of Jay’s argument. It is clear that many culture-infused commodities traverse the globe, spreading cultural forms and economic reach in a single package. To access culture, one must ultimately make purchases, whether to obtain products, education, physical immersion, or recognition from others as a member of a cultural group. Thus, culture always carries some form of economic ramifications. Similarly, the commodities through which consumers enter economic networks always wield cultural meaning, whether it is experienced consciously or not, and that meaning creates further desire for both cultural and economic extravagance. It would seem that cultural and economic forms are arguably experienced simultaneously as individuals engage with them in diverse locations and situations.

One could object that certain forms of culture are not entwined with economic forces — language, religion, or ethnic traditions, perhaps — yet even those experiences that are not purchased as commodities negotiate particular economic relationships as a result of the cultural perspectives they engender. Continuous participation in a culture requires economic engagements that shape one as a consumer as much as culture shapes individual identity. Consumers’ languages, religions, interests, activities, and customs shape their interactions with economic markets. Even cultures of poverty position individual relationships to economic forces through traditions of need, desire, and labor.

Regardless of one’s cultural association or economic status, the mutual mediation of cultural experience and economic engagement is a self-perpetuating arrangement. Arjun Appadurai writes in Modernity at Large, “consumption creates time and does not simply respond to it,” emphasizing the cyclical quality of the process by which cultural forces create consumption and consumption enacts experience, which shapes and reshapes cultural identity and fuels further consumption (70). If we accept Jay’s argument that the economic and the cultural are thus intertwined, how does their union pertain specifically to globalization, such that Jay claims “globalization is characterized by the conflation of cultural and economic forms” (34)? Jay’s argument suggests that the overlapping capabilities of the economic and the cultural to inspire desire, confer identity, and elicit participation across diverse networks are essential to the realization of globalization as Joseph Stiglitz defines it: “the closer integration of the countries and peoples of the world,” or, as Jay emphasizes, a process of “convergence” (53). The proliferation of simultaneously cultural and economic symbols, products, and experiences carves the global, multidirectional channels along which the convergence among consumers of both culture and commodities will continue to advance. Jay’s globalization is thus facilitated — even rendered inevitable — by the conjoined forces of culture and material economy.

     In Global Matters, Paul Jay writes, “The process we call globalization is characterized by the conflation of cultural and economic forms” (34). By establishing this relationship, Jay designates globalization as a complex process, determined by both economic and cultural factors. Jay cites Stiglitz to introduce economic globalization as, “…the complex product of dramatically increased and unregulated economic exchanges across national borders and the creation of institutional structures to manage and equalize those exchanges” (54). On the other hand, Jay presents literary narrative, cinema, television, and live performances as cultural forms and goes on to assert that these, “…are commodities”(55). In this sense, culture flows through the consumption of products related to these areas: books, movies, TV shows, and music. The aforementioned theorist presents this argument as a response to those who tried to explain globalization exclusively from a materialistic or a cultural approach, saying that, “…these forms of exchange have always overlapped” (56). Jay’s argument portrays the complexity and interdependence of cultural and economic processes. Furthermore, we are predisposed to accept this reasoning due to the fact that it is unlikely for a single factor to determine a transnational process in the complex world in which we live. Nevertheless, we ought to ask if cultural forms are reduced to literary narratives, cinema, television, and live performances. What constitutes a cultural form? Is the flow of culture confined to these expressions? And if they are, do they portray culture accurately? Is the culture being portrayed idealized, contaminated or is it a reliable portrayal?

     Additionally, Paul Jay’s linkage of economic and cultural forms is based on Appadurai’s theory of global flows and the role of the imagination in the configuration of imagined selves and worlds (35). Jay uses the “scapes” proposed by Appadurai (ethnoscapes, mediascapes, technoscapes, financescapes, and ideoscapes) to prove that there is a connection between economic and cultural forms. He states that for Appadurai they are “a complex set of global flows that have set loose contexts for the imaginative reformation of subjectivity across the borders of nation-states” (35). By portraying these flows as a set, Jay validates their interrelation. Even if we accept that these global flows are related, there is no impediment for us to question Appadurai’s assertion of the importance of imagination in the formation of subjectivity. Is the imagination paramount in our acceptance, imitation and appropriation of what we see in movies, read in books and listen in music? Is this in fact how culture flows? And ultimately, are these expression the only medium through which culture flows? 

     Paul Jay’s exegesis is very appealing. It incorporates different points of view, interpretations and explanations about cultural interactions. Nonetheless, there is an implicit assumption that culture only flows through mercantile operations of cultural products.

Our class blog is up and running! Over the next couple days I will make sure that everyone in the course is a user able to post pages and comments. Thanks for your patience while I complete this task. Hester and I are really looking forward to the discussions and debates our new blog will help us engage with over the course of the semester.