Before I could walk, a man named Ortiz coined a term that is particularly apropos now, transculturation. Why now? Because we have for the first time in our specie's history the means to accomplish this in real-time, interactively. You might ask, "Why is that important?" I would suggest that the pace of necessity dictates that we incorporate wisdom into our actions much faster than ink on paper alone would allow.
That you are reading this illustrates my point. As far as I know, what I have written here has not been committed to text inscribed on dead trees. You do not have to wait for that to happen. If I am all wet, you can tell me before I am able to dry myself off. And if we are lucky and I, by standing on the shoulders of the giants we all do, come up with something useful, you and others can put it to work, immediately.
This process is happening over our entire planet as I write this. No question, it is stumbling, hazardous process … like a baby learning to walk. But like that infant, it will lead to great things. It is only a matter of time (and not a lot of it).
Sunday, March 14, 2010
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Google, "ortiz transculturation wiki", and click on the wikipedia entry.
ReplyDeleteAs I discovered, I was just a year old when Fernando Ortiz named this phenomena in 1947. Go there to see an argument for why it is not necessarily a good thing.