Globalization And Sexuality

GLOBALIZATION AND SEXUALITY Ashutosh Bhupatkar INTRODUCTION

Cultural differences across the world can be seen in the meanings and attitudes to phenomena associated with sexuality. With globalization there is greater exposure to different cultural influences and it appears that this exposure coupled with interaction of cultures is posing a challenge to traditional societies. Economic exchange involves also exchange of images, meanings and frames of reference. These meanings and frames are cultural in nature, acquired in a given society over long stretches of history. The computer, for instance in a country like India, symbolizes modernity, the laptop progress and the idea that you must progress from the current (desktop) to the contemporary (laptop). The new experience calls for dealing with frames of experience. Accommodate the new within the existing frame of reference. Take in the new after modifying the existing frame. Or, jettison the disused parts of the existing frame and repair. In the last resort, reconstruct and renovate the frames of reference. Sexuality means, to me, behaviour with respect to certain dimensions of sex. At the individual level, there is physicality, sensuality and sensitivity. Sex is physical, sensual and intimate. The actors may however choose to act out one or more levels of sexuality. In common usage, we refer to these as eroticism, beauty and love respectively. These phenomena essentially are expressions of the dynamics that happens between own needs and concern for the other. Again the needs are physical and psychological and bounded by social mores. The erotic concerns the physical attraction. The sensual moves from the physical to the intimacy of relation. The sensitive sexuality is the union of hearts. At the collective level, there are dimensions of power and economics that lead to exploitation and inequity. I will not touch upon the collective dimensions for the time being. I quite understand that the collective interacts with the individual level in complex ways. The process of globalization has led to greater exposure of female physicality – the skin show across the ‘new geographies’ of emerging markets. This has become ‘necessary’ for the advertising industry, which uses competition as a justification to make products and messages attractive by use of female models. The modern ‘science’ of marketing indirectly promotes the use of Western modes of communication, which bring along the Western way of viewing sexuality from the physical angle. The ‘skin show’ principle of advertising spawns a huge business activity: cosmetics, fashion, photography, modeling, entertainment and publishing. All these are the ‘gifts’ of the Industrial Society to the world. The pure entertainment of skin show also perfected itself in Europe, notably in the cabaret shows. Asian countries such as India that hopped on the bandwagon of globalization have witnessed a tremendous spurt in cosmetics, fashion, modeling, photography and publishing. More complex than this use of female anatomy for promotion of products and services is the attribution of genders to products. Products are seen as masculine or feminine. Cars

are seen as feminine, while old time watches have become ‘chronographs’ and very male in appearance. Sanitary fittings are promoted with and for their sex appeal.

IN THE WEST

It seems there are differences in emphasis by cultures and within a culture the emphasis differs with gender. For instance, pornography and sex shows are purely a Western phenomenon. That is an indication of sole emphasis on the physical dimension of sexuality in sections of those societies. At the same time it is an overt acceptance of physicality. Two issues merit attention in this churning of cultures around sexuality. First, it is necessary to understand the prominence the West seems to have given to the physical dimension of sex. It has been argued along the Marxian line of thought that the process of alienation and the resultant dehumanization brought about by large military-industrial systems result in physicalization of sex, since it affords an opportunity to experience the illusion of power and domination. The system denies the opportunity of empowerment to vast sections of society, who must turn to substitution through sex, drugs, alcohol and the like. This leads to commercialization of titillation through various forms and modes and objectification of female body. The feminist movement made an attempt to oppose this kind of commerce of sexuality. Even their failure to arrest this trend has been historically productive. The second issue concerns women’s liberation from the prejudices of the past. The growth of business, industry and services in varied branches brought greater participation of women in the modern work systems. It gave them economic independence and social standing in growing degrees. At individual level, women could resist, repel, wreck or reconcile with the attacks on their sexuality as they chose. Those who gathered competence within the economic system could also stand a chance of asserting their rights, including the right to sexual preferences. Feminism certainly has enabled women in the Western world to own up their sexuality and exercise the right to deal with it. Culturally speaking, the West shows pluralism in its attitudes toward sexuality. While porn flourishes and adult entertainment thrives, others are free to practice the Art of Loving as they choose. The physical dimension of sex seems predominant and the sensuous and the sensitive dimensions are not emphasized in the cultural products that the West exports. IN THE EAST

I doubt if there is a word for sexuality in most of the Asian languages, certainly not in the Indian languages. It suggests the absence of the concept in the respective cultures. There are hundreds of terms for Beauty and Love in contrast. The whole idea of sexuality is subsumed in the institution of marriage and certain historical forms of entertainment for the rich and the powerful, such as dances in India. In some of the Asian cultures,

sexuality must be treated sensually if it has to appeal to the finer senses as beauty. Hence there is a high level of investment in elaborate decor of the female body and development of rituals to initiate girls into the fine art of stylicism. Significantly, the Arab cultures have suppressed the physical and the sensual dimensions of sexuality and have sanctioned only the collective dimensions of sexuality. It is a mystery to me as to how Arab women hold sexuality in their living processes. In Persian culture, the dimensions of sensuality and sensitivity receive emphasis as seen from the themes of Beauty and Love in their arts and literature. In some cases, the sensitivity transcends sexuality and is transformed into spirituality of the being with the Supreme. Poets like Rumi have played upon this phenomenon. Again, the way women hold sexuality in such cultures is not understood. In the Far Eastern cultures of China-Japan-Korea, the physical and the sensual dimensions seem to overshadow the sensitive dimension of sexuality, perhaps as a result of the power dynamics of the male gender. As a result, these cultures seem to be congruent with the Western acceptance of the physicality of the sex. It is no wonder many sites of sex tourism have come up in the Far East. Between genders a new dynamics seems to be taking shape in the Asian countries. With globalization of consumer goods and the media, there is greater exposure of female body; the Asian male seems to have shifted his view of the woman-as-slave to woman-as-flesh. Traditional culture still does not sanction owning up of physicality in such countries in both men and women. Winds of modernity are blowing into the citadels of tradition. The skin show is on view in the market place and everywhere. Economics of the lure will finally tilt in favour of acceptance of physicality. The media covertly bestows legitimacy to skin show and physicality. But to actualize the physical act of sex, the youth needs support in the form of private spaces, which then becomes a matter of providing infrastructure. The Agrarian Societies are fast being transformed into Industrial Societies, though still lagging behind the Information age and post-modernism. Hence the male feels justified in demanding his ‘pound of flesh’ from the female. The girls are still steeped in the ‘dutiful beauty’ concept of womanhood, but with education they expect sensitivity from the male. The clash of male demand of physicality with the female expectation of sensitivity seems to lead to a large number of discords. These culminate in divorces on a rising scale if the woman is economically independent. The Interaction between Cultures

This is a curious scenario. The West seems occupied with physicality of sex and its myriad expressions. The Asian – excluding the Far Eastern - seems to struggle with the suppression of physicality and its consequences in the emerging globalization of sensibilities. The bridges between the West and the East are now in place thanks to the revolution in Information Communication Technologies and to the process of globalization. It is not only the tangible products and services that flow across boundaries, but also the soft or communication products in the form of art, literature,

music, dance and films from the West continue to pour into the ‘emerging’ markets. The culture of physicality of sex now engages with the culture of suppression of physicality. Expectedly, the custodians of tradition and traditional power bases rise in indignation against the cultural ‘invasion’ by the West. Sections that have vested interests in the internationalization of capital and markets such as the consumer goods industry, the media, the entertainment industry and the newly rich educated elite working in the IT and outsourcing industries support the ‘intermingling’ of cultures with the slogan, ‘change with the times’. It is difficult to make a prognosis of this interaction of cultures. I would eagerly look towards the vision of a new planetary consciousness that enables men and women to raise sexuality to true love and beyond. I also understand that this calls for restructuring of work, family and power systems. Till this happens, it would be my concern and responsibility to become aware of the dehumanizing influences and to deal with them. ON A PERSONAL NOTE

As an Asian male, I have played true to type by disowning my physicality, while becoming a sort of Peeping Tom. The adolescent attraction for the female anatomy was always dealt with surreptitiously. In marital relations, I managed to transit from the purely physical to the sensuous and only much later to the sensitivity that love brings to intimacy. Even now it is difficult for me to own up my sexuality. It is still a closet operation. When I look at my collaboration with Colin on the Tribute to Rumi, I see it as an interaction of cultural meanings. Rumi to me represents the Turk-Persian culture of Transcendental Love. I have tried to keep to that ethos in my verses. Colin, coming as he does from the Western cultures, accepts physical dimensions of sexuality, as reflected in his choice of nudes. He tries to portray the sensuousness through artistic nudes. Does it go with the sensitivity demanded by transcendental love of Rumi? My opinion is: No. But I am speaking from my cultural sensibilities. The Artistic Nude is alien to it. I grant in my mind that Colin could have a different sensibility. So I hold my opinion without disrespecting his. I am not breaking my frame of reference within which my sensibility is located. But I am trying to modify it. It is fraught with turbulence, because I have not learnt to own my physicality or sexuality. The danger is that in owning physicality I don’t have to necessarily buy into the conception of sexuality as physicality. Gurgaon

3 Oct 2009.