Like the bullet of an imaginary revolver : the specter of popular culture in Europe

              One of the iniportant results of my book
is to demónstrate that other regions of
the world have a sepárate history. When
we draw a distinction between Europe
and the rest of the world, it does not
mean that the rest of the world is ene
huge undifferentiated mass. In Iranshahr
we can, beyond any doubt, see that the
región has its own distinctive history,
which is not arbitrary in any sense.
This is directly and indirectly a
critique of Eurocentrism. l.e. the idea
that history has an universal pattem
which does not change significantly
throughout world history. First history
took off in Egypt and Mesopotamia,
then in The Mediterranean, then in the
early Moslem civilization, but after that,
Europe took the lead, and the rest of the
world was reduced to insignificance. We
have to understand that every región has
a history in its own terms. If we claim
that Iranshahr suffered a decline, we are
proposing a far too simple explanation.
We have to ask, what kind of decline,
regarding the population, culture etc. In
the end we may find a very unique
history, which cannot simply be
summarized as "decline". AU regions
have their own histories with specific
phases, ups and downs, and in each case
we find specific, limiting enviroimiental
conditions. And if we add all the other
elements of the particular history, it is
impossible to maintain the
undifferentiated notion of decline. The
only way we as historians can gain
scientific knowledge is by establishing
comparative parameters.
A.M.: Does this lead to a
multicultural position regarding history?
P.C.: We have to acknowledge that it
was the Europeans who colonized the
world, and, so far, it is also Europeans
who have written a great part of world
history. The world bears the mark of
Europe, whether one likes it or not. In
this respect we might even claim that
Europes history is the most important
history in the world. This is not a
Eurocentric position. Europe cannot be
a model of world history in any sense of
the word. On the contrary, all this
means, is that we can only understand
the history of Europe if we understand
the history of the world, and thus we are
led to a multicultural perspective on
world history. We may also say that the
history of Europe is played out in the
world, not in Europe, and this decenters
Eurocentrism. It may sound as a kind of
deconstruction but I see it as a strength
of the historical science, i.e. of the
inherent criticism, and self-criticism in
professional history. I don't want to
deconstruct the scientific consistency of
the discipline, but I accept that the
worldpicture of many European
historians has become somewhat
obsolete. But I also see a way out of this
which is consistent with the present
paradigm of comparative world history,
as presented above, and as such I cannot
adhere to the doctrine of deconstruction.
A.M.: In other words, out of the
environmental perspective on the history
of Iranshahr develops an openness in
history. Environmental elements, which
must be considered a somehow common
physical factor for all societies and
cultures - despite or exactly because of
the differences mentioned above - can
lead to a multicultural and diverse
perspective on history?
P.C.: I think so, and I also believe
that this may indicate a way of
producing relevant historical knowledge.
If environmental history can créate a
pluralistic approach to the histories and
cultures of the world, and thus reverse
Eurocentrism, I think we have achieved
a very important result. In this respect
one may cali it a political perspective,
because it shows a way forward
conceming action towards
environmental and other global
problems.
LIKE THE BULLET
OF AN IMAGINARY
REVOLVER
THE SPECTER
OF POPULAR CULTURE
IN EUROPE
BY DIONISIO CAÑAS
Some years ago, Bemard-Henri Lévi, the
French thinker, declared that "populism
and one of its variants, the cult of
youth," constituted one of the most
serious threats to European culture.
Recently, Luis Gordillo, the Spanish
artist, wrote that "very soon we shall see
the debarkation of anti-art, though not
by the expected and already proven
sectors (appropriation and reductionism)
but by a generalized populism." This
alarmist attitude towards the invasión of
European cukure by popular elements is
not new.
James Joyce wrote, in the early part
of this century, that the most important
Irish theater "had strayed from the past
that leads to artistic progress, by giving
in to the wishes of the masses." In 1922,
José Ortega y Gasset published, in the
joumal España, an article with a title
that clearly was intended as a manifest:
"The Imperative of Intellectuality." The
Spanish writer states that: "The
annihilation of European intellectuals
goes hand in hand with their
mobiUzation" by poUtical groups. Ortega
goes even further; towards the end of the
article, he peremptorily asserts: "If the
'people' are spontaneity and
abandoiunent, then aristocracy is
discipline and regimentation. So then, a
nation is the organization of 'the people'
by the aristocracy."
Of course, he refers to an intellectual
aristocracy.
Fifty years later, Fidel Castro said
that "there has been a certain inhibition
in the circles of true intellectuals, who
have left cultural problems in the hands
of a small group of sorcerers." Then,
who are the true intellectuals? The
answer is elementary: those who are
revolutionaries and popuhsts. However,
in 1968, a Cuban writer (Leopoldo
Avila), declared that "the enemies of our
culture are those who have been
concemed, not in doing artistic work for
the people, but in establishing
International relations, favored by and
using the means of the revolution, in
order to use these means against it."
Furthermore, "those who have not
known how to use what they have
received [from the people] assume
aristocratic and patemalistic roles, thus
forgetting the fact that one ascends to
the people; that in a revolution the
people are the best teachers."
In this fashion, the word "people" is
used, like the bullet of an imaginary
revolver, by elitists and populists in
^^w
order to wound one another. The
"people" have not participated in those
debates, and quite probably are not
interested in doing so. On the other
hand, Ortega's declarations have not
had great impact on the behavior of
European intellectuals, and Castro's
heated recommendations have not been
able to créate any significant group of
"truc intellectuals" revolutionaries.
Any populist stance, by European
intellectuals or creators, reeks of
opportunism. Claude Grignon and Jean
Claude Passeron, in the introduction to
Le savant et le populaire , define
populism "as a paradoxical form of
disdain towards the popular social
classes, which nevertheless appears,
deceptively, as disdain for the
intellectual." But it is probably not
necessary to dramatize excessively
the situation of the "populist"
intellectual.
It is an obvious fact that every
moment is marked by a domineering
class, which imposes its aesthetic codes
by means of "its" artists and "its"
intellectuals. Marx used to say that the
prevalent ideas of any historie age are
the ideas of the domineering class of any
historie age. Outside of these imposed
codes and marginalized by them, the so-called
subcultures and also anticultures
(Michel Maffesoli has recently studied
the tribal spirit of these marginal
cultures in Europe) manage to subsist.
However, if one would observe all the
cultural levéis that coexist in a European
country, without classifying them by
attitude or rank, it would soon be
evident that there is only one culture:
the one created through dialogue,
interferences and struggles between the
different cultural levéis in a country, in
a región, or in a city. Cultural pluralism
and social heterogeneity seem to belong
together, thus revitalizing a European
culture that, when seen as a homogenous
entity, would be a distortion of reahty
that derives its main energy precisely
from "mestizaje."
In the latter part of the 18th century,
Friedrich Schiller states: "There are
moments in Ufe in which we dedícate
some love and emotional respect towards
nature in plants, minerals, animáis,
landscape, as well as to human nature in
children, in the mores of rural people
and of primitive ones, not because it
pleases our senses, ñor because it
satisfies our intellect or our pleasure (it
could often prove to be the contrary),
but because of the mere fact that it is
Nature J" For the father of the romantic
sensibility, the rural worker was on the
same level as savages, stones, animáis
and children.
Claude Grignon and Jean-Claude
Passeron establish, with great clarity,
the cultural problem that marked
intellectual endeavor in the 18th and
19th centuries: though Nature could be
seen as the source of artistic inspiration,
the attitude of those intellectuals
towards the rustic was disdainful. The
rural worker was the one who truly
"lived" nature, but his inability to
contémplate it by means of a rational
process, transformed the rustic himself
into nature, inte an object of study
which absolutely bore no resemblance to
the cultivated person. Thus the rustic
became a landscape, a member of the
animal or plant kingdom. Grignon and
Passeron also point out that this
ethnocentric approach considers the
popular mass as "barbarian," "natural,"
"uncivilized;" as people who are inferior
t o US.
Ethnocentrism of a certain social
class, a naive outlook which arises from
a privileged position and is spoused by
the privileged, has frequently adopted
extreme practices, generally the most
eloquent and rationalized, among
intellectual fractions of the domineering
class or among groups that are closely
linked to power or that aspire to
positions of power. And that, without
even mentioning the horror towards the
"lack of culture" of the people, shown
by the intellectual bureaucracies of
traditional States, ñor the simple disdain
[practiced by technocrats in modem
States], towards the "irrationality" of
popular behavior.
Schiller presented the dilemma of the
return to Nature (not to the rural world)
by the cultured man as a voluntary act
of aesthetic and ethical consequence.
Besides from the elitist views expressed
by Schiller's discourse, I would like to
stress this willful return of the human
being to his origins. This ancient
problem has not been resolved. It is
indeed surprising to see the members of
the European avant-garde in the 20th
century engage in the effort of
understanding the peculiarities of this
dilemma. Thus, Piet Mondrian, in some
essays regarding "Natural reality and
abstract reality," states: "We are no
longer natural enough to be conjoined
with nature, and we are not yet spiritual
enough to be completely liberated from
it." Kandinsky, who did not dismiss
nature as a source of inspiration for
abstract art, declared: "Art can
reproduce any setting, but not through
extemal imitation of natiu-e, but through
an artistic reproduction of the intemal
valué of that setting."
The conflict of a possible return to
nature (understood as a primary link)
through intellectual exercise and
contemplation, as expressed by Schiller,
has continued to be of interest in Europe
even in the avant-geirde movements of
the early part of this centiuy. It must be
pointed out that, in all the texts already
mentioned, Nature is considered as an
abstract forcé, seen through the eyes of
the intellect, and in no form is the rustic
a mere part of it; the rustic is, in fact,
the landscape.
The gradual development of an
interest in the rural worker and in the
proletariat has possibly changed the
approach towards agricultural labor and
workmen in Europe. Grignon and
Passeron thus assert that "the
rehabilitation of popular culture has
followed, though somewhat delayed, the
rehabilitation of distant cultures."
However, in 19th century Europe, the
stance toward the "dangerous classes,"
towards the "humble and simple folk"
was much more radical, when compared
to the approach towards the colonized
cultures; "class racism, understood as
the certainty of a given social class to
monopolize the cultural definition of a
human being, and subsequently, of men
who have to be amply recognized as
such, is still present today in a great
number of sectors of the domineering
class." On the other hand, the
legitimization of academic discourse is
almost exclusively based on the study of
what is considered as "high culture."
"Popular culture" has only been
acknowledged when it has been recycled
by the superior culture, or when it has
been dignified by the passage of time. It
is indeed paradoxical to see the study in
academic circles of the medieval
"cancionero popular," while the popular
song of the 20th century is ignorad with
olympic disdain.
In Europa, only tha bourgeoisie
(upper or lowar), and more recently, the
middle class, are considerad the
guardians of "good taste" and the
rapository of cultural models. This is a
delusion created by the imagas offared
by media and advertising. There is no
uniformity in what is or should be
considered "good taste" and no
possibility of reducing bourgeois
behavior to some infallible structuras.
Grignon and Passaron declare that as an
opposition to "somewhat edifying
descriptions of the domineering class,
one feels like introducing, within
sociological discourse, the vast librarías
with unread books, the museums that
are visited by hurrying patrons, the
concerts that are heard by an audience
that is half-sleep, the buffet dinners that
are assaulted...'" This is so true in
Europe that, contrary to what one may
think, a great number of those who are
considered "paople" sometimes do go to
concerts without faliing sleep, visit
museums, read books, and do not
"assault" a buffet dinner, even though it
may be free of charge.
These stereotypes of social classas
(and thair "cultures") are arbitrary and
useless. It is, however, a fact that the
tastes of the upper class, cheapened and
interpreted by the middle class, are
taken over by the working class,
sometimes becoming a caricature. This
happens in pattems of behavior, in
clothing, in interior decoration and even
in linguistic usage, This gama of
influences, which normally foUows a
descending pattem (from tha upper to
the lowar classes) has acquired a
peculiar dynamic in the rural population
of European countries.
It is a privilege enjoyed by the
domineering class "to convert into
cultural delicacies popular products that
have been transformad into consumar
goods''(Grignon and Passeron). This
recycling of popular artifacts and cultura
is evident in European interior
decoration: the pieces of fumitura that
had baan discarded by the rural
households, in order to modemize their
homes, became the latest trend in urban
circles and recently these pieces have
been revalued and restored by rural
households. The enormous influence of
magazines is a contributing factor (all of
them monopolized by the great
European urban centars; Hola is
publishad simultaneously in Spain and
in England): many people in rural áreas
fumish their bomas, dress, copy
bahavioral pattems, and acquire
information and gossip tidbits from
glossy magazines. One wondars whether
the rampant consumerism of rural áreas
is the result, in part, of true and real
needs, or whether it is an offshoot of the
willingness to imítate symbolically the
middle and working urban classes.
After romantic populism came
modemity and modem naopopulism,
and later, postmodem "Pop." And thus,
urban popular culture has acquired
enough prestige to leava an imprint on
our century, particularly in the second
half of the 20th century. But, what has
happened to rural popular culture in
Europe? It is difficult to establish what
elements of daily life in a rural área ara
ramnants of oíd and ancient customs, or
which ones result from the imitation of
urban models. If one avoids the extrame
position of categorizing certain
expressions of rural popular culture as
forms of resistance, one can nevertheless
State that, in it, "essential things take
place by the mere fact that it is forced to
function as a ruled culture, that is to
say, unfailingly as a culture of
abnegation and a culture of denial, as
subculture and counterculture." And
"the characterístic difficulty in the
sociology of a ruled symbolism is
founded on the fact that the traits and
the behavior of such are never purely
autonomous ñor purely reactive." Thus
"the neglect of domination is, without a
doubt, only ona of the principies of the
activity of popular symbolization "
(Grignon and Passeron).
To a certain axtent, specially for
these two thinkers, all that happens
within what is known as popular
culture, is "an activity of popular
symbolization." For, after all, and we
strongly agree with Grignon and
Passeron, the "tortured consciance of
cultural indignity" occurs more
frequantly within the middle classes and
appaars less in the popular ones. In
ordar to be hyperobjective one must
analyze tha total "spaca of popular
cultura" (nutrition, domestic culture,
amployment, the establishment, the
culture of adolescence, streat culture, the
culture of the factory, the cultura of the
bar, of tha supermarkets, of sports, of
televisión, of videos, of the automobile,
etc....); perhaps only than can we know
the reasons why popuhsm is seen as a
threat in Europe.
Translated from the Spanish by Doris
Schnabel and the author.
GRASS ROOTS
THE ITALIAN'S
DESERT
BY FRANCESCO BONAMI
After ''Arte Pavera" and the
"Transavanguardia," an "Untitled" and
autonomous generation ofltalian artists
is ready to enter onto the international
contemporary art scene. Mario Airo',
Stefano Arienti, Massimo Bartoliní,
Vanessa Beecroft, Maurizio Cattelan,
Eva Marisaldi, Liliana Moro, Alessandro
Pessoli, Massimo Uberti, Vedova Mazzei
are only some examples of those who
speak a completely transformed creative
language. Despite this energy, however,
no one is able to enter or exit the
"fortress" Italy in order to establish the
international dialogue than can no
longer be put off.
Capucci, Riccardo Cavallo, Amalia
Dal Ponte, Paolo Gallerani, Paola
Gandolfi, Gianni Pisani, Angelo SavelU,
Vito Tongiani, Mino Trafeli, Giuliano
Vangi. Who ara they? Maybe some of
you will get to know them. You will get
to know them if you visit the Italian
Pavilion at the next Venice Biennial.
They are some of the artists invited to
represent (in a theatrical sense, I
imagine) Italian contemporary art. They
must be those Tartars that the second
lieutenant Giovanni Drogo is waiting for