Cultural exchange

“ The problem of nationalities and cultures. What new schemes of attitudes and values, or what substitute for the isolated national state as an instrument of cultural expansion, will stop the fight of nationalities and cultures? ”

“ The diaspora of European culture which we are witnessing, the arrival of so many of its bearers, representatives of all categories of science and art, to these shores; their more or less involuntary decision, transformed, however, into an amor fati, to complete their work in the American air of life,—that is something very strange and unprecedented; it opens unexampled possibilities of exchange and equalization and may be supremely helpful in creating the new feeling of humanism of which I spoke. ”

“ We recognize the essential contribution of our common European culture and our shared values in overcoming the division of the continent. Therefore, we underline our attachment to creative freedom and to the protection and promotion of our cultural and spiritual heritage, in all its richness and diversity. ”

“ To turn from the distribution of culture in different countries, to its diffusion within these countries. The quality of mankind which tends most to make the systematic study of civilization possible, is that remarkable tacit consensus or agreement which so far induces whole populations to unite in the use of the same language, to follow the same religion and customary law, to settle down to the same general level of art and knowledge. ”

“ In this way a process which on the surface was nationalistic became fundamentally a part of the organic evolution of civilization, which redirected the cultural processes of a nation and eventually of what was, then, the modern world. ”

“ Particularly marked in representations of the rainbow nation circulated for purposes of tourism and advertising, are depictions of cultural diversity reduced to superficial representations of difference that fail to do justice to the richness or complexity of cultures, or to the real material differences in people's lives. ”

“ Modern means of communication made possible the achievement of a cultural unity among the dismembered parts of nations ruled by various states—nationality became a conscious force, language its practical exponent, and social literature in its widest meaning became the expression and the most valuable organ of nationality. ”

“ To the extent in which all nations in Europe participated in promoting culture, the various languages became richer and more valuable from the cultural point of view, and the result is the growing, cultural equality of languages in analogy to political and international equality in the rights of nations. ”

“ The stage over which affairs, political, industrial and cultural, run their course is no longer Continental or British, but cosmopolitan, comprising all civilized communities and all civilized interests. ”

“ If therefore we are to discover in what form the destiny of the Western Culture will be accomplished, we must first be clear as to what culture is, what its relations are to visible history, to life, to soul, to nature, to intellect, what the forms of its manifestation are and how far these forms — peoples, tongues and epochs, battles and ideas, states and gods, arts and craft-works, sciences, laws, economic types and world-ideas, great men and great events — may be accepted and pointed to as symbols. ”

“ It is known, that men improve by example and intercourse; but in the case of nations, whose members excite and direct each other, why seek from abroad the origin of arts, of which every society, having the principles in itself, only requires a favourable occasion to bring them to light? ”

“ What would an universal society be that should have no particular country, that should not be French, nor English, nor German, nor Spanish, nor Portuguese, nor Italian, nor Russian, nor Tartar, nor Turkish, nor Persian, nor Indian, nor Chinese, nor American, or rather that should be all these societies at once? ”

“ And mingling, but not blended, with this world of Asiatic thought and sentiment and manner, is a European world, partly native, partly foreign, with ideas of freedom, science, education, bustle, various languages, railroads, tramways, ladies in the latest Parisian fashions, church bells, the banner of the Cross, newspapers and periodicals from every European and American capital, knitting scattered children to the life of their fatherland. ”

“ The truth comes in upon us from different sources, and in divers streams. The simple details of common culture, the inobtrusive elements of schooling, the plainest fabrics of constant wear, the enjoyment of the staples of daily life, the facts of commerce, and the observations of travel, however limited by individual observation; all, with clearest tone and manifest significance, bespeak the mutual dependence of the different families of men, as also the obligation of all states and commonwealths and empires to contribute to human well-being and the progress of nations. ”

“ The common people, who went up into the interior to trade, fell in with their customs with a degree of plasticity and an air of gaiety and full assent, which no other foreigners have, at least to the same extent, shown. ”

“ Commerce, religion, politics, capital and labor, education, our whole social fabric, must be affected more or less. Occident and Orient stand face to face at last, and the meeting must signalize a notable era in the history of mankind. ”

“ Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that each of the component elements making up the expanding civilization--each people, city, state, nation, empire--developed its own total culture pattern, subject to the pressures mutually exerted by neighboring communities. ”

“ But where works of art can travel, ideas can travel too; and can travel right across the frontiers of race and language and even of religion; meaning at all events by these, the customary observance of each region, and of its endemic population. A few merchants, or craftsmen, or philosophers, work transformations in culture and bring about uniformities, of which language, or cult-edifices give us no indication at all, or at best an aftermath of decadence. ”

“ The influence of political relations with several countries of Europe operated not less than the spirit of mercantile enterprise, in giving to the arts, and fashions, and costume of our country, a complexion in which foreign peculiarities are continually to be traced. ”

“ And we add, as a new and farther limitation, that we shall confine ourselves to the simple and obvious traces of civilization which have come down to us; employing only our own History,—that of civilized Europe, as the existing domain of Culture ”

“ A revolutionary movement within the societies under consideration. In each experiment with civilization the culture pattern was transformed from pastoral and/or agricultural to a culture based on trade, commerce and finance ”

“ Sundry sturdy European ideas, transplanted into this western soil, have triumphed over all competitors and thriven so mightily as to react upon all parts of the Old World, some more, some less, and thus to modify the whole course of civilization. ”

“ But, above all, in our own country has culture a weighty part to perform, because, here, that mechanical character, which civilization tends to take everywhere, is shown in the most eminent degree.... ”

“ And for our civilization at any rate these movements are international. They are not the products of isolated discrete groups, impenetrable to each other, but of a relatively universal, continuous experience. ”

“ A part of this culture is of native origin; a part, in every European nation probably by far the larger part, is of foreign origin, and has been acquired by the acceptance of ideas and beliefs from without its borders, by the copying of institutions, customs, arts, from foreign models. ”

“ Thus widely are spread the traces of the connexion of the progress of civilization with national intercourse. In our own country a higher state of the arts of life is marked by a more ready and extensive adoption of foreign productions. ”

“ What contribution has western civilization made to human nature, to human society and to mother nature, and what further contribution can it make in the foreseeable future?
Individuals, born or reared in any form of society are adjusted, shaped and conditioned by the social pattern of which they are a part. Each society attempts to stamp the individuals with its own image and likeness. ”

“ They shelter the cultural activities which have difficulty acclimatizing themselves to the excesses of commercialism, and they provide means for the independent existence of worthy activities within their own walls. ”

“ Literature, even more than commerce, diminishes the oppositions and increases the amalgamation of nations. On her lofty plane nations breathe an air in which their quarrels die. The same idea grew up of itself among the working classes, not only in England, but in Germany, Italy, France, America. ”

“ Thus the way was opened for the restoration of European culture to more than its pristine prosperity; for the many valuable lessons which the cultivators learnt in the school of their adversity have stood them in good stead now that fortune has again smiled upon them. ”

“ It is only through the establishment and transmission of customary standards that one generation is in any way superior to its predecessors. Customs, in civilized life, include all the established effective ways of civilization, its arts, its sciences, its industries, and its useful modes of coöperation. ”

“ So the mores which have been developed to suit the system of great secular states, world commerce, credit institutions, contract wages and rent, emigration to outlying continents, etc., have become the norm for the whole body of usages, manners, ideas, faiths, customs, and institutions which embrace the whole life of a society and characterize an historical epoch. ”

“ Countries which were almost unknown a century ago are now competing in art and wealth with the mother countries. Civilization has made a decided step forward; but in some countries, civilization has made, in one respect, no progress ”

“ Attempts are made—well meant, no doubt—to foist that state of culture which the West calls “modern civilization,” or “civilization” pure and simple, upon the reluctant people of the Near and Far East. We are forgetful of the fact that these nations have had a civilization of their own, and that something more important is included in this forcible change than the change of a dress. ”

“ Then there is the consideration of the effect that one race or community inevitably has on another with which it comes in contact—either through conquest or through the establishment of commercial relations. ”

“ We have seen that the relationship in which the original people of the modern world stood to the progress of modern culture was as follows: the former received from the incomplete, and never more than superficial, efforts of foreign countries the first stimulus to more profound creative acts, which were to be developed from its own midst. ”

“ Their civilization is more or less adulterated by new languages and customs, and they import not only foreign merchandise, but foreign fashions, to such a degree that nothing can continue unalloyed in the national institutions. Those who inhabit these maritime towns do not remain in their native place, but are urged afar from their homes by winged hope and speculation. And even when they do not desert their country in person, still their minds are always expatiating and voyaging round the world. ”

“ The exchange of international thought which alone can save us, is the exchange of thought between craftsmen—between the statesmen of the different countries; [6] the lawyers of the different countries; the scientists, the financiers, the writers of the different countries. ”

“ It gives them nations, instead of neighborhoods, to look upon and think about. They catch110 glimpses of the international connections of their trades, of the universal application of law, of the endless variety of life, of diversities of race, of a world teeming with men like themselves, and yet full of strange customs, puzzled by dim omens, stained by crime, ringing with voices familiar and unfamiliar. ”

“ The national customs, culture, and recreations which made the country a pleasant place to live in, have almost disappeared, and with them one of the strongest ties which bind people to the country of their birth. ”

“ To be sure there is much the country may well learn from the city, the finer phases of real culture, the cultivation of social graces in place of rustic bashfulness and boorish manners, and the saving element of industrial cooperation ”

“ But the most active agent in the diffusion of civilisation was probably commerce, which, by bringing neighbouring nations into close contact, by enlarging the sphere of their experience, and teaching them the advantages to be derived from peaceful intercourse, has in all ages softened and refined mankind. ”

“ The civilized nations of Europe have been stimulated into unusual activity, so that commerce, trade, travel, and thorough acquaintance among people of different nationalities, has become common; whereas, before, it was but the few who had ever had the privilege of going beyond the limits of their own country or who knew anything about other people. ”

“ The dissemination of knowledge, customs, habits, and laws from common centres of culture has been greatly augmented by population movements or migrations, by great empires established, by wars of conquest, and systems of intercommunication and transportation. ”

“ Now this known diversity of character is the distributing social force among people in this world, whereby they are arranged into different groups or societies. In general, different races and nationalities do not incline to associate. But Africans prefer the society of Africans; Chinamen the society of Chinese; English. French. Germans, Italians, etc., the society of those of their own nation. And for this obvious reason: that people of the same nation are usually most alike in their tastes, habits and feelings; and people everywhere prefer the society of those who are most like themselves. ”