Sunday, April 7, 2019

Warrior Marks Essay Example for Free

Warrior Marks EssayHow often do we seek to nock between the Western and non-Western ethnical thinking? How often instead of looking deeper into social, ethnographical and anthropological implications of non-Western cultural imposts, do we increase the existing gap between Western cultural appropriateness and non-Western social severalty?It appears that ethnographic enquiry does not always lead to cultural reconciliation, and whenever scholars try to combine professional research and commercial profit, they inevitably limit themselves to subjectivity, canceling the most interesting and controversial social tensions and expanding the boundaries of never ending racism. Grewal and Kaplan (1996) argon confident that when trying to create an objective picture of otherwiseness, we are being torn between the devil opposing forms of cultural representation, and this western/ non-western paradigm shapes our attitudes and predetermines our reactions to everything that goes beyond the acceptable limits of western cultural thinking. This binary structure of our cultural perceptions seems to contradict to the generally accepted principles of multiculturalism, and turns neo-colonial representations into the essential comp peerlessnt of any ethnographic narrative.It should be noted, that US cultural feminism constructed an un conundrumatic narrative of liberation based on a universalized and essentialist identity as woman. This form of cultural feminism, as it has been practiced in the US and Europe from the 70s to the present, often turns its attention to world(a) sisterhood (Grewal Kaplan, 1996). As a result, both footnote and Parmar seek to analyze the tragedy of African womanhood through the lack of sisterhood and the predominance of cruel and almost roughshod patriarchal traditions.Certainly, the essence of ethnography is to represent societies other than those in which we live moreover, the aim of any ethnographic research is to review the hidden implicat ions of otherness as opposed to modernity to which we belong (Grewal Kaplan, 1996). In this context, Walker and Parmar intentionally emphasize the role which foreignness and exoticism may play in constructing new global images of other cultures.Both agree upon the need to create an atmosphere of global terror, which is expected to underline the order of womanism as well as complete and intentional negligence toward women in other communities. Finally, Parmar and Walker cannot avoid integrating colonial experiences and perceptions with those generated by the vision of female genital surgeries in Africa, which for Walker stand fall out as the signs of the so-called patriarchal wounds (Grewal Kaplan, 1996)The question is, however, how appropriate, objective, and unbiased this horrified gaze of genital surgeries in Africa is. Moreover, the acidulate of Pramar and Walker creates rather limited ethnographic impression and seems to border on their subjective feminism. On the one hand, this horrified impression is the result of placing the concept of genital surgery against the background of western feminist determine here, genital surgeries look like the brightest representations of patriarchal otherness and the instrument of violating the basic human rights.On the other hand, this horrified gaze prevents authors from breaking the eternal binary Western / non-Western paradigm and turns into a barrier on the way toward a more objective and multicultural understanding of gender practices in other societies. The problem is that the authors erroneously apply their westernized vision to gender practices in societies, which adhere to a completely different set apart of values.Walker and Pramar exploit the features of a universalized female body, which makes it impossible to review the similarity between genital surgeries in Africa and the impact of liposuction, cosmetic surgeries, in vitro fertilization, and mastectomies on female body in Western societal tradition (Grewal Kaplan, 1996). This lack of objective vision is the source of the major anthropological asymmetries, which position otherness along with the vox populi of unnaturalness, cruelty, and helplessness, terror, victimization, and a whole set of feminist misconceptions.Unfortunately, the work of Walker and Pramar is the combination of commercialism and the search for popularity. In the pursuit for multiculturalism and ethnographic objectivity, it is not enough to create a sense of terror toward patriarchal practices in otherness, for these do not always fulfill their scientific function but on the contrary, occasion the source of distorted racial attitudes and bias.ReferencesGrewal, I. Kaplan, C. (1996). Warrior Marks Global womanisms neo-colonial discourse in a multicultural context. Camera Obscura, 39 (4) 5-33.

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