Continuity, Transformation, Change

1
Continuity, Transformation, Change

• Exploring Ways of Marking Time
• Tradition, Modernity, Postmodernity
• Hasnt this Happened Before?

2
Exploring Ways of Marking Time

• Cyclical Time
• The Life Spiral
• The Seasons, A Life, Astronomical Time (the Maya
  Count, Stonehenge, Medicine Wheels)

3
Exploring the Ways of Marking Time

• Dreamtime Origins and Meanings
• The Dreaming has different meanings for
  different Aboriginal Australian groups. The
  Dreaming can be seen as an embodiment of
  Aboriginal creation which gives meaning to
  everything. It establishes the rules governing
  relationships between the people, the land and
  all things for Aboriginal people.
• The Role of Oral Tradition
• Australian Aborigines have the longest cultural
  history in the world, which some estimate at
  65,000 years

4
Exploring the Ways of Marking Time

• Linear Time
• Chronicle, Heroic Exploits, and the Right to
  Rule
• The Role of Writing
• Cuneiform in Mesopotamia 3300 BC
• Hieroglyphs in Egypt
• 3100 BC

5
Tradition

• belief, values, way of life the passing down of
  elements of a culture from generation to
  generation, especially by oral communication.
• harmony with the past
• tightly knit community and family
• Merriam-Webster Dictionary
• 1 an inherited, established, or customary
  pattern of thought, action, or behavior (as a
  religious practice or a social custom)
• 2 the handing down of information, beliefs,
  and customs by word of mouth or
  by example from one generation to another without
  written
• instruction
• 3 cultural continuity in social attitudes,
  customs, and institutions
• 4 characteristic manner, method, or style

6
Modernity

• a 20th century idea, although its roots are in
  the Industrial Revolution
• related to the idea of progress (which can be
  traced back at least 2000 years to Classical
  times)
• goal oriented and developmental
  (underdevelopment)
• based on transformations in mechanization and
  factory production (hence Fordism) and changes in
  society (e.g., gender and family changes)

7
Modernity

• changes in society (e.g., gender and family
  changes)
• shift from primarily production to primarily
  consumption begins for early industrial nations
• alienation from work (make only a component not
  the total product)
• alienation from family and place
• increasing mobility
• increasing diversity of personal experience
• increasing social problems
• decreasing health
• loss of traditional identities and the search for
  new ones in a changed world
• increased independence but also responsibility

8
Modernity

• Merriam-Webster
• 1 a of, relating to, or characteristic of the
  present or the immediate past CONTEMPORARY
• 1 b of, relating to, or characteristic of a
  period extending from a relevant remote past to
  the present time
• 2 involving recent techniques, methods, or
  ideas UP-TO-DATE
• 3 capitalized of, relating to, or having the
  characteristics of the present or most recent
  period of development of a language
• 4 of or relating to modernism MODERNIST

9
Postmodernity

• critique of economic and social conditions
  brought on by industrialization
• attempt at a return to elements of tradition
• rebellion against unchecked capitalism
• stress on the individual increases and greater
  need for escape (addiction, religious fervor)
• Merriam-Webster
• of, relating to, or being any of several
  movements (as in art, architecture, or
  literature) that are reactions against the
  philosophy and practices of modern movements and
  are typically marked by revival of traditional
  elements and techniques

10
But Hasnt this Happened Before?

• The Classical World
• Hesiod (fl. 700 BC), in Operae et Dies (Works
  and Days), bemoans how things are falling apart,
  wishes to return to a truer, simpler time (this
  is called the Primitivist tradition in Classical
  scholarship)
• Ammianus and other writers admire Progress and
  glorify Roman achievements against the Barbarian
  tribes (Positivist Tradition in Classical
  scholarship)
• Our Current World
• Jihad vs. McWorld
• Fundamentalists (both Christian and Muslim)
  decry the debasement of the modern world
• Just as Modernization did, Globalization sweeps
  away traditions that knit societies together,
  standardizes what we eat, drive, wearand
  eventuallythink.

11
Continuity, Transformation, Change

• A Dialectical Approach
• Cancel old ways,
• Preserve some things from that time,
• Transcend to a new state
• Studying Continuity, Transformation, and Change
  in human societies is a core pursuit of
  Anthropology