What is "Western Civilization"?

Miscellaneous History
1

Is anyone able to outline what is “Western Civilization”? And the seeming derivates of this term; “Western Culture” and “Western World”?

What is this “Western Civilization” built on, what impersonifies it. What does it encompass and most of all who is a part of it today? Who lies outside it, were are its borders?

When Tom Woods tells us the Catholic Church built Western Civilization, what is this civilization he is talking about? It is something that is puzzling me.

And an additional question for non-Americans. Would you say in your culture the terms “Western Civilization” and “Western Christianity” are seldom heard, or often heard?

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I read this a long time ago and remember liking it

http://www.capitalism.net/Education%20and%20Racism.htm

the second paragraph is titled The Nature of Western Civilization

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Ok im bumping this and adding two more inquiries.

What is that makes Taiwan part of the western world, but not Ukraine?

How can “Western Civilization” encompass cultures to which the term “Western” would not have meant anything?

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we are not talking about something that is a hard science or admits of fully objective facts.

but given that preamble:

what is it that makes simon and garfunkle a folk music act but not metallica?

How can ‘Folk Music’ encompass different musical groups to which the term ‘Folk’ would not mean anything.?

now metallica, could adopt the stylings of a folk band, and become a folk band. but until they do they arent. and why is Folk Music called Folk Music and not XWhatever Music? convention/historical accident.

6

Until 1989 I cannot remember to have heard his term. We used the “western world” on one hand. This meant all non-communist-Countries. Beside of this did even exist at the immagination of “land of the sunrise” (Morgenland in German) and “land of the sunset” (Abendland in German) whish in some way was quite close to “western civilisation” - but actually not the same because this terms were used when reflecting the past. And the countries of the sunrise were mostly interpretated as the near and middle east. And in these expression was nothing at all to express superiority or inferiority or even politics.

I think the “western civilisation” is an expression that did arise just to have something to replace the former Communist World as Anti-Part.

The cultural approach dose by the way not fit. Even in Bosnia or Romania you can find plenty of cultural Elements that do show that there is not a borderline seperating “western” and “eastern” civilisation. Just listen to folk music - or have a look on the different tratditional food you will find at restaurants.Or have a look at the furniture in the homes.

For example there is within Romania a quit big “step” from Transilvania to Valachia. As an Austrian I feel quite at home in Transsilvania. But Valacha remeinds me on many stays in Turkey - Even thogh Romanians are Orthodox Christians.

Just these examples do show that the expression does not fit at all to at least the reality in the “old World”. The borders of “cultures”, “religions” do not correspondent with national borderlines.

For example take Turkey. This state has at least two faces. A very western face within state organisation, military and the elites. And a more “eastern” face at the same moment. Even though most Turks are muslims - I would tend to say that they are a part of the “western Civilisation”.

So my answer to the question: The expression “western civilisation” is totally missleading and confusing.

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In general, the historical “Western Civilization” comes from the Roman Empire in the west after the split with it’s eastern territories, around 400 AD. The Holy Roman Catholic Church was the predominant political-religious organization throughout the early period - up to the Reformation period. From these origins, the “West” expanded considerably. From the 1600s to the 1900s, Britain was the leading nation of the Western movement, with France and some of the other European countries having a good deal of influence as well. The U.S. began taking on the role of leader of the West between WWI and WWII, and was the clear “super-power” of the West after WWII up to today.

“Western Civilization” is a self-descriptive term for those who consider themselves to be a part of it.

Modern usage of the term tends to associate developing nations as being part of the West - a lot depending on political positions rather than culture.

The culture of Western Civilization is supposed to be born from of Hellenistic-Roman origins, and includes most western European thought.

The Holy Roman Catholic Church is often referred to as “Western Christianity”, while the Greek Othodox Church and other minor Christian movements are often referred to as “Eastern Christianity”. You will find that there was much more tolerance for different Christian positions in the East than there was in the West (witness the way the Holy Roman Catholic Church went after so-called heretics and Protestants).

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Most music is labeled from where it was believed to originate, and the application of such labels are a relatively recent practice, historically speaking. American Folk music was the music practiced by the “uncultured peoples” of America - specifically those living in rural areas in the Appalachian Mountains. American Folk music was rather broad based on the origin of the peoples: Welsh, Irish, Scot, German, Polish, French, African, etc. Folk, derived from the German word “volk”, which means people, is a rather simple classification.

Metallica is considered a Heavy Metal or Hard Rock Band, actually Thrash Metal. Rock coming from the rhythm borrowed from African-American culture and added to folk music, along with blues. The Hard Rock or Heavy Metal term comes from the hard metallic strings of electric guitars and basses, among other things without getting into the technical details. There’s some uncertainty on the origin of the term “Heavy Metal”, but my favorite involves the naming of the band Led Zepplin. The Yardbirds had some of the very same sounds that would become heavy metal, and when the Yardbirds disbanded in 1968, Jimmy Page and Chris Dreja were authorized to use the name of the Yardbirds, then called the New Yardbirds, to finish the remaining dates. Upon completion of the tour, the band decided to change their name. When asked about the sounds Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck were proposing, Keith Moon and John Entwitsle from The Who said “that will go over like a lead balloon.” The band took on the name Lead Zepplin, but dropped the ‘a’ because their manager was concerned Americans might mispronounce it. Being the first band with that sound, it’s not too difficult to associate the term “Heavy Metal” with Led Zepplin. Of course there were other bands and performers who also had an influence on both the sound and the name, and twice as many who will claim the terms origin.

In addition performers, much like authors, get assigned a label or genre based upon the market and shelf-space. When a performer is associated to a specific genre, he can have a large variety of songs that bridge the technical terms associated with music. The identification is used more for the purposes of finding his market more than anything else. If you were to attempt to bill Simon and Garfunkel as Heavy Metal, and even if they did indeed play music matching the technical description of Heavy Metal, I don’t think the market would recognize it since people have associated the former group with another genre of music for a long period of time. It’s sort of like Dr. Seuss writing books in favor of Austrian Economics.

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I think an example more analogous to mine would be, what is it that makes Simon & Garfunkle a folk act, but not someone like Waylon Jennings? Is it because Waylon is not sophisticated enough, not urban enough? Not up to date enough? Is it because unlike Simon, Waylon actually is folkish?

What are the specific requirements of being “Western” and how does Taiwan (Republic of China) correspond to those requirements more closely than Ukraine does?

It can not. At best such musical groups can be deemed proto-Folk.

Between Transylvania and Wallachia is exactly where the charlatan Huntington draws the line seperating Western Civilization from something else. Much more likely than there being any notable differences between two Romanian regions the contrast was really in your mind and more about how you felt crossing that line. Due to the attitudes and expectations you had already come with to Romania. You are right, that probably had a lot with you being an Austrian. I am certain that to Romanians the most important border is between their nation and the rest of the world and not some line splitting their country in half.

@K.C. Farmer, what you write is correct. Those are the attitudes. But do they ring true? Take “Western Christianity” whatever it used to mean it is now meant to designate both Catholicism and Protestantism and contrast the two with Orthodoxy. But how much sense does that really make? Anyone can see that Catholicism and Orthodoxy have much more in common than either has with Protestantism. Why then something as nonsensical as the grouping together of Protestantism and Catholicism for the specific purpose of jointly contrasting them with Orthodoxy?

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“In general, the historical “Western Civilization” comes from the Roman Empire in the west after the split with it’s eastern territories, around 400 AD.”

Indeed - but in this way it is used today only when making the difference between the orthodox church(es) - Romania, Greece, Russia… and the Catholic countries.

“The culture of Western Civilization is supposed to be born from of Hellenistic-Roman origins, and includes most western European thought.”

What means “western European thought” - and is Greece as the “Center of the hellenistic World” not part of the western Culture just because most Greeks ar Orthodox? Or just because that Greece was occupied by the Osman Empire for a while?(Can you hear the difference between Greek Folk music and Turkish Folk music? I can not!)

I think we should realice that through history many things did change. History per se is perpetual change. Yes - Once people did regard the West-Roman-Empire as the West - and the east Roman empire as the East. But do we still (outside church) see this change today? No - at least not really.

Since 1492 did happen quite a lot of things in both parts - The turks were standing at the doors of vienna - occupying a quite big part of eastern and southeastern Europe. The mongolians ran as far as France - Colonists from “Germany” (which did not even exist) from the Rhine-Area did move to Hungary and Transilvania - Colonists went to River Volga. Vikings went from Sweden to colonice northern parts of Russia (In the finnish language Sweden is called Ruotsi (that reminds on Russia!) and even after 1945 we again can see Movements of Populations and Culture. Just visit Cities in the far Russian East as Tomsk or Irkutskt. You will not “feel” the distance to Vienna or Prague even thogh you will find even buddhist Temples along the road there.

The more you know from Europe - the more you will understand that there actually does not exist very much of difference between east and west. Just have a look on Mises himself. Today his home would be in Poland (or maybe Ukraina?). Until 1918 it was Austria. Austria as well as a big deal of eastern Europe were Roman Provinces. But Galizia never was. Are those Jews that fled from Spain throghout Europe to Galizia Europeans? When or how did they became it. Crazy folks as Hitler even said that they are not real human beeings at all. Hitler was “sozialized” in Europe. Was Mises “sozialized” by Europe or by his Jewish “Stetel”. Mises and Hitler actually were sozialiced in the same Country - The Austrian-Hungarian Empire. A multiethincal country that did burst after WW1 in many differnt States. Slavic states as for example Serbia and Tchecoslovakia . Serbia feels close with Russia. The Tchechs do not at all. And we do have Countries in the far west that speak romanic languages. But even Romania speaks a romanic language. But even Serbia and Croatia were Roman provinces. And they do speak slavic languages.

I think the only thin we all have in common in Europe is our weird history. You will not find something like a Link that works as a rational measure to deviede between East and West. Maybe ther just is not such a Thing - any longer. There are just some leftovers. Rudiments of any importance.Sometimes there do apperar People (like Hitler) that insist in making Differences between People. Those people devide by words and expressions.

Even today we still have such people who want to make us believe that we are very different to others. Of course we are different - totally different. And that is the reason why it is just stupid to searc for points of views to make some sort of “invisible” border possible. The “Clash of Civilisations” is just a fraud - because it es hardly possible to define what civilisations really could mean.

OK we had this “Clash of Civilisations” between France and GErmany in many wars - Propaganda on both sides made the other side to something totally strange and different. So different that is is worth fighting it.

To make it short: Give me a Border you want to see - and I will find to you some reasons for just that border. On the ohter hand I could give you even more resons that just that border ist just of any importance.

We peoples should be clever enogh to understand that it is not to our benefit if we let some mighty persons make us belive in the importance of any kind of differences.

Ron Paul found some good words for this in his “Revolution”.