Page 31 - Culture Technology Communication

16 Charles Ess

community ties); and (2) communication that creates an “umbrella
cosmopolitan culture” required for communication between people
from different cultures. Hongladarom further suggests that we dis-
tinguish between a Western culture which endorses human rights,
individualism, egalitarianism and other values of a liberal demo-
cratic culture (a “thick” culture in Walzer’s terms), and the cosmo-
politan culture of the Internet as neutral (a “thin” culture). 12 The
Thai experience suggests that the Internet does not force the impor-
tation of Western cultural values. Instead, Thai users are free to
take up such issues and values if they wish, and they can do so while
at the same time preserving their cultural identity. 13

A First Philosophical Response: Whither the Electronic
Global Village?

These essays demonstrate the importance of cultural attitudes in
shaping the implementation and use of CMC technologies, whether
those technologies are introduced within distinct but still Western
cultures (Hrachovec and Rey) or in the diverse cultures of Asia and
the Middle East. First of all, these chapters directly call into ques-
tion the characteristically American confidence in communication
technologies as making possible democratic discourse and equality,
especially when confronted with the radical linguistic and cultural
diversities of India (Keniston) and the deeply entrenched gender
roles of Kuwaiti society (Wheeler).
These essays likewise counter the Manichean dualities of
American discourse, whether in terms of cyber-utopias (including
McLuhan’s global village) versus cyber-dystopias, or Barber’s dou-
ble dystopia of Jihad versus McWorld. Rather, Heaton’s account of
Japanese redesign of CSCW systems and Hongladarom’s experi-
ence and model of a “thin” Internet culture coupled with “thick”
local cultures (especially as facilitated by localized software, as
Keniston recommends) demonstrate first of all that these tech-
nologies indeed embed and abet specific cultural communication
preferences (such as for high content/low context vs. low content/
high context) and values (democratic polity, equality, etc.). How-
ever, they are not unstoppable forces. On the contrary, they can be
localized and reshaped—and stripped, if necessary—of the cultural
values and preferences they convey.
In philosophical terms, the hopes of computer-mediated heaven
and fears of cyber-hells rest on a view called technological determin-
ism. Such a view sees technology and whatever effects follow in its