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Globalization and cultural differentiation is the first of a series of twice-yearly seminars organized by the CCCB and the MACBA. This seminar sets out to discuss various issues raised by the phenomenon of globalization, and more concretely to look at the responses which —in the form of an affirmation of identity and of cultural differentiation— are arrived at in different contexts. The transnationalization of the economy, the internationalization of political institutions, the electronic circulation of information and the increasing weight of of a partially shared and homogenizing culture have brought the issue of cultural imperialism and postcolonial identity into the foreground. The perspectives which have been developed from what is known as cultural studies give rise to a break with traditional disciplinary structures and a coming together of academic practices and social groups traditionally not included in the "Western" cultural debate, in this way constituting an effective form of mediation between the local and the global.

Programme

Globalization, the University and the Museum
Masao Miyoshi. Cultural critic and tutor of Japanese, English and Comparative Literature. University of California, San Diego (USA).

The new towers of Babel
Ignacio Ramonet. Journalist and editor of Le Monde Diplomatique, Paris.
Is what artists do culture? The territory of cultural practice in India
Geeta Kapur. Curator and art critic, writer, and founding editor of The Journal of Art and Ideas.

Derivas of the identity
Francisco Jarauta. Philosopher and Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Logic, Universidad de Murcia.

The novel in Africa
J. M. Coetzee. Writer and tutor in the Department of English, University of Cape Town (South Africa).

Towards a policy of democratic identity
Chantal Mouffe. Political philosopher and Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Democracy, University of Westminster, London.