1. The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Susan Wright
METU Faculty of Architecture Department of Industrial Design
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Dilruba Oğur

2. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Susan Wright
• Danish social anthropologist
• Professor of Educational Anthropology in Danish University of Education
• Research areas;
- Political nature of the concept of culture
- Process (transformation) of governance in the U.K. and Iran
- Gendered concepts of ‘individual’ and ‘ community’ in local organizations
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

3. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Aim and Scope
• does not aim to go through the numerous ‘culture’ definitions of anthropologists
• analyzes the distribution of culture in different domains in 1990s
• questions the way decision-makers politicize culture
• questions anthropologists impact on contemporary political use of culture
Keywords
culture, old and new meanings of culture, essentialism, contestation, anthropology, cultural
racism, politicization
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

4. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Overview
• Wright discusses old and new anthropological approaches to culture.
• Then she uses these approaches to examine how decision makers have introduced and
distributed culture in three different fields in the last 15 years.
• She explains the way politicians, officials and academic advisors use culture as a political tool in
all three fields.
Old meanings of culture New meanings of culture
Overseas British Right
development Organizational Wing Politicians
management
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5. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old Meanings of Culture
• In the early 20th century anthropologist differed in their theories;
Tylor Boas Malinowski
- inclusive definition - a product of not only - functionalist
- social evolutionism historical and social - distinct, rational way
forces but also biology of life
• However, they all shared the same idea that world is made up of ‘peoples’ each with a coherent
way of life, a ‘culture’.
• By the 1970s this idea of culture was criticized for seeing culture as a ;
- small scale, bounded entity,
- static,
- consisting of homogeneous individuals,
- authentic culture,
- self-reproduced meanings.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

6. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old Meanings of Culture
• Wright’s definition of ‘old idea of culture’ is;
- bounded, small scale entity,
- defined characteristics,
- unchanging, self reproducing,
- shared meanings: ‘authentic culture’,
- identical, homogeneous individuals.
• Wright criticizes ‘old idea of culture’ for not suiting well to the changing political and economic
situations, therefore making social transformation difficult.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

7. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
New Meanings of Culture
• Anthropologists namely; Cohen, Macdonald, Hall, Marley and Chen made it clear that in Britain
cultural identities;
dynamic x static
fluid x bounded
constructed situationally x inherent
Culture is a contested process of meaning making.
• In cultures key terms and concepts, which structure social relations, shifted in meaning at
different historical times over contests. For example;
contest over promoting positive images of homosexuality
contest over positive images against minorities during Thatcher government.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

8. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
New Meanings of Culture
• Wright’s definition of ‘new idea of culture’ is;
- active process of meaning making (through contests over definitions),
- not bounded,
- people from different positions try to make their definitions of a situation accepted,
- ideas never form a closed, coherent whole,
- in its hegemonic form, culture appears coherent, consensual and not ideological.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

9. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old and New Meanings of Culture
Old meanings of culture New meanings of culture
bounded not bounded
unchanging, self-reproducing dynamic, negotiable
identical, homogeneous ideas never form a coherent whole
defined characteristics contestation and transformation
Culture is not a homogenous zone of shared meanings
instead a zone of disagreement and contest.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

10. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old and New Concepts of Culture
In British Politics
• New concept of culture appropriated by New Right with political intentions.
• To replace the dominant ideology on their behalf, New Right manipulated words through
renaming and redefining key concepts for instance; difference, nation, race and culture.
They redefined nation as an entity with a particular culture rather than race.
Race was reformulated as a feeling of loyalty to people of one’s own kind.
• However, in this process of contesting and shifting meanings, the use of ‘we’ and ‘our’ as a
definer was claimed divisive and racist.
• Wright criticizes British right wing politicians as using culture in such a way to distance
themselves from biological racism yet promoting exclusion through oppressing minorities on
cultural terms.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

11. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old and New Concepts of Culture
In Organizational Managements
• Culture was used for a metaphor for new forms of organizing in managements.
• Both old and new ideas of culture were adopted as a tool of management.
Company culture (analogous to old concept of culture);
- bounded,
- contains specific group of people,
- organized hierarchically,
- checklist of behaviors.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

12. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old and New Concepts of Culture
In Organizational Managements
Company culture (analogous to new concept of culture)
- products are redeveloped,
- sites of production, employees and relations between them are changing,
- managers and workers participates in a process of meaning making.
• This kind of organization aims to exploit workers’ knowledge as possible.
• However, there is a sliding from new to old ideas of cultures in organizations.
• Wright suggests that managers should adopt both old and new ideas of culture to gain worker’s
active participation in organizing managements.
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13. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old and New Concepts of Culture
In Overseas Development
KAYAPO
• They used cultural politics to gain political
rights.
• They adopted old ideas of culture and
represent themselves as a homogeneous,
bounded group.
source: http://www.occupytogether.org/blog/tag/hunger-strike/
• Kayapo people objectify their everyday life as culture and make use of it to negotiate their co-
existence with the government.
• They used culture not just for identity but for physical, economic and political survival.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

14. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Old and New Concepts of Culture
In Overseas Development
UNESCO
• UNESCO (1995) report was an excellent opportunity for anthropologists to make an impact on
the political use of culture.
• Levi-Strauss has provided UNESCO with a map of world consists of discrete cultural entities.
• However it lacks the dimension of culture as a process of contestation over power to define
organizing concepts.
• Wright criticizes UNESCO report for being contradictory. It respects all cultural values while
making value judgments about acceptability of cultures.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

15. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
Conclusion
• How the ideas of culture (both old and new) are deployed in different domains is clarified
through analyzing culture’s adaptation as a political tool in three fields.
• It can be comprehended from the article that culture can be used as a tool to dominate political
dynamics. Distinct cultures and cultural relativism can be used to support minorities like Kayapo
example, however it is also possible to attack and oppress minority groups on cultural terms which
is similar to British right wing politicians’ approach.
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16. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
References
• Wright, S. (1998). The politicization of 'culture'. Anthropology today, 14(1), 7-15.
ID 501 Advanced Project Development in Industrial Design Dilruba Oğur

17. On Wright’s The Politicization of ‘Culture’
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