Thursday 14 June 2012

Bondage, Dominance, S & M

Every great conqueror irreversibly changes the course of human evolution and leaves his undying fingerprints on the destinies of every generation yet to inhabit the planet. Alexander the Great, Ghengis Khan, Timur, Chandragupta Maurya, Hernan Cortez: this list is endless. Not only did these men bring great empires to their knees and stamp their authority upon the lives of millions of people, they changed the way these people behave and the way they think.

Some of these people have been forgotten but their influence lives on in our lives even today - we just don't think about it. Alexander still has a city named after him, not in Greece or Macedonia, but in Islamic Egypt. Cortez is almost the sole reason why the fourth largest continent is today called 'Latin America'. Without Adolf Hitler, there would be no reason for Israel's existence and Antisemitism would hardly be looked down upon even today. Maurya is said to have been one of the first people to have dreamed of Akhand Bhaarat. So each of these people have unquestionably changed the world for better or for worse... but no one has shaped the world as we know it today more than the British Crown.

Conquering is one thing, but consolidating territories and integrating people is a different ball-game altogether and the British perfected this art. You simply have to look around you today to notice the magnitude of the impact they have made. Well, I am making this post in English - if not for them, this would never have happened!

One of the most significant events in modern history is undoubtedly the shift of power in the erstwhile New World - why most of us say 'United States of America' and not 'Estados Unidos Americanos' or 'États-Unis d'Amérique'. Over time, this has ultimately come to mean that English is the language of the world - not Spanish, Mandarin or French. And language supremacy is one of the most primary measures used in achieving full and complete control.

Once the language of the land is established, you can easily say to a non-speaker, "C'mon, don't tell me you don't know English! You need to learn. And you need to learn it fast." On the other hand, he cannot tell you to learn Afrikaans, because you'll simply laugh condescendingly and say, "Fat chance I'm learning that!" He won't understand what 'fat chance' means... and that means more power to you.

A couple of years ago, I was sitting with a few friends in a canteen in Roorkee, discussing something - in cannot recall what - in Hindi. A fresher I'd met sometime earlier came up to me and asked me something in Tamil. Now when someone asks you a question in your mother-tongue, you answer in the same language. However, halfway into my answer, I found that I was speaking Hindi - a language which came naturally to neither him nor me. For a long while, it bothered me and to say that I was ashamed of that incident would be understating matters.

But then, a few days ago, in Abu Dhabi, I was talking to a friend in Hindi once again, when a few more people (mostly non-Indians) joined us at the table. This time, I was halfway into a sentence when I changed everything to English. Finally, my behavior two years ago made perfect sense! You cannot sustain a conversation in a language a majority of the people do not speak. The language of the land has long been established and there is nothing you can do about it.

And language is just the beginning. When I look around Dubai, I instinctively know that it is an extension of America, or maybe Europe. There is nothing Arab here: American bars made for American tourists who can pay American monetary equivalents. And you don't have to go to America to know this. Well, it's a brilliant business model - there is no questioning that! And the Emiratis make loads of money at the end of the day, but they remain incapable of selling their own culture.

On the other hand, you go to America to live like an American. Where you are from doesn't matter - you will become part of the culture there... People will argue that it's the most culturally accepting country in the world - a world full of immigrants; but really, no matter where you are from, you will end up accepting the local way of life. That's the most beautiful part of cultural domination - you set the rules. In Dubai and in so many other places, the tourists set the rules and the place adapts!

Cultural domination extends to most other aspects of life as well - the food we eat, the TV shows we watch, the books we read, the music we listen to, the clothes we wear... this is another infinite list. But what's more brilliant? - each of these aspects actually reinforces the dominating culture. So, while it might be seen as a criminal error when I say I don't know the difference between a Steakhouse burger and a Quarter-pounder, it's only expected that people of the international community don't know the difference between paneer and tofu.

Well, there's nothing much we people can do but to accept these changes, try to learn everything there is to be learnt and constantly try to excel at everything we do... and then one day, we'll be good enough. And then we will set the rules.

6 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  2. What rules? The ones that you learnt and tried excelling at?

    ReplyDelete
  3. The ones you are allowed to set having excelled at the existing ones.

    ReplyDelete
  4. A harvard prof has termed this 'soft power'. Dominance isn't established by war anymore, but by the person who has the better story to tell about his land. That way, Hollywood and McDonald's helped America way more than the army.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Soft power, eh? Nice way to describe it... And really, such a power far outweighs the power of military might. However, it is often brute force which brings about such 'soft power'.

      Delete
  5. Most of the things have been said here and I really don't have 'nothing' to say. This comment is to tell 'ya'' that I read this piece. ('-_-')

    PS: read the above 'comment' as an instance of effect by which locals affect a 'foreign' language.

    ReplyDelete