Page 44 - Culture Technology Communication

Introduction: What’s Culture Got to Do with It? 29

evitable (and are in some ways the “normal” story of human his-
tory). But as initiated by such intercultural persons, we may be cau-
tiously optimistic that the collisions and collusions mediated by
global computer networks may also lead to a rich diversity of more
local and more global cultures, as these cultures take up new CMC
technologies.
In sum, we hope that these essays will contribute some of the in-
32
sights and understandings, both theoretical and practical, needed
to move towards a genuinely intercultural global village—one that
avoids both McWorld and Jihad as we learn to use CMC technologies
in ways that globalize communication while sustaining the integrity
of diverse cultural worldviews and communicative practices.

Notes

I would like to acknowledge with great gratitude several colleagues
beyond the CATaC group who contributed significantly to this essay with
their critical suggestions: Susan Herring (Indiana University), Caroline
Reeves (Williams College), and Henry Rosemont, Jr. (St. Mary’s College of
Maryland). In addition to their scholarly assistance, each of these scholars
exemplifies the polybrid intercultural person that I describe in my conclud-
ing remarks as necessary to a genuinely intercultural global village. I thank
them for their generosity, insight, and inspiration.
I am especially delighted to acknowledge here the enormous role
played by Fay Sudweeks. As co-chair of the CATaC’98 conference, she cheer-
fully and ably took on many of the innumerable and often daunting details
of organizing a first-time international and interdisciplinary conference,
with uniformly superb results. As co-editor of the several journal issues fea-
turing papers originally presented at CATaC’98, she has been a constant
source of encouragement, enthusiasm, and wise editorial judgment. Her in-
telligence, labor, and steady spirit have contributed to this volume in several
ways, ranging from initial assistance in editorial choices to insightful sug-
gestions and sage advice throughout the development and refinement of
these essays. All who benefit from the CATaC conferences and their expres-
sions—including this volume—owe Fay great gratitude.
Of course, I remain entirely responsible for error and poor judgments.

1. The concern that inequalities of access and power will only be am-
plified—rather than, as the enthusiasts promise, ameliorated—by comput-
ing technologies is not novel: see Brzezinksi (1969 [1970]). In addition to
his anticipation of what is now called “the digital divide” between the haves
and the have-nots, Brzezinksi also noted that as electronic communication
eliminates “the two insulants of time and distance,” and thereby engenders
the threat that “. . . the instantaneous electronic intermeshing of mankind