Civilization

[poliphilo]

It's odd to be reading a book that attacks Civilization.

It's an old book, published in 1911. The author, Algernon Blackwood, says that Civilization alienates us from Nature and Our True Selves. He- or at least the hero of his book- is an extreme kind of Nature mystic. This character is currently (I am about three quarters of the way through) plunging deeper and deeper into the Caucasus in search of Union with The Earth Mother.

The Caucasus: it is- hmmm- a little hard in the light of recent events to see it as a heaven on earth.

Poor old book. You are falsified by 20th century history. You are innocent enough, but your attacks on science and reason are hard to bear.

The sleep of Reason begets monsters.

Begets true believers and God on our side and the rolling back of the Geneva conventions.

The opposite of civilization is not dancing with nymphs in a woodland glade to the wild music of Pan. That vision- that Arcadian vision- is in fact a product of Civilization.

I have one word for you- Poussin.

To the actual peasant the wild world of nature is simply a work-place.

Bloody trees.

For a man who hates Civilization Blackwood knows lots and lots of long words.

The opposite of Civilization is Barbarity.

Comments

Devil's Advocate

[arielstarshadow.livejournal.com]

Is barbarity such a bad thing?

Re: Devil's Advocate

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Ha- you've put me on the spot.

So I'm turning to Chambers Maxi Paperback Dictionary which gives me the following definitions.

Barbarism: savagery, brutal or uncivilised behaviour; rudeness of manners ; a form of speech offensive to scholarly taste.

and

Barbarity: savageness, cruelty.

So, yeah, I will stand by my position. It's a bad thing.

Barbarism

[arielstarshadow.livejournal.com]

If the word were only used in the technical sense, I would definitely agree with you. But many times, in history and today, it is used to mean simply "those who aren't like us" or "those who aren't as 'learned' as we are and thus can't possible be happy/smart/know what's good for them" which I most certainly do not agree with.

Re: Barbarism

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Interestingly my older dictionary (Oxford Pocket, 1934) comes up with definitions closer to those you suggest. A barbarian is, for example, among other things, "foreign....non-Greek, outside the Roman Empire, or non-Christian".

Re: Barbarism

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

My high school Latin teacher told us that the Romans called all foreigners "bar bars," meaning, she said that their language was gibberish and had no meaning.

I don't know what her source was--I just assumed she was correct! Now I wonder.

But the origin of the word "barbarian" may have a more neutral meaning.

Re: Barbarism

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I've heard that one too. I don't see why it shouldn't be true.

Re: Barbarism

[kaysho.livejournal.com]

And the Romans, in good fashion, borrowed their word "barbarus" from the Greek "barbaros", meaning the same thing. Etymologists are unsure if the "bar-bar" comes from the tendency of Germanic languages to use the hard "r" sound, as opposed to the Mediterranean trilled r; or if it comes from a tendency that stammering people have to make sounds like that.

Sanskrit, for example, has the adjective "barbaras", meaning stammering or blithering.

OK, I'm taking your comment stream even further off topic here ... :)

Re: Barbarism

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

No, that's really interesting. I was hoping someone out there in LJ world would have the scuttlebutt on this.

Re: Barbarism

[besideserato.livejournal.com]

I am taking the argument even more far away. In modern Lima, we use the slang barbaridad to describe an atrocity, generally in terms of a social faux pas. Learned that one from Mother dearest. Interesting, yes?

Re: Barbarism

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Moving further and further off topic, but do you know this poem by Sir John Betjeman?

http://www.passageway.com/teatrader/HowToGet.htm

It a compendium of things that constituted social barbarism in 1950s Britain. :)

Re: Barbarism

[besideserato.livejournal.com]

Don't you love it when this happens in entries? You just keep talking and talking, like little conversations (and I am already an hour late for the gala, but I cannot stop!).

Oh, I love that poem! I am sending it to Mother immediately. She is going to have the most fantastic laugh!

Re: Barbarism

[arielstarshadow.livejournal.com]

Exactly. By this definition of barbarism:

1. I do not think it is the opposite of Civilization
2. I do not think it is a bad thing

Maybe it is because I am an historian focusing on medieval and ancient history that the way I view barbarism is tthis way, and not the "modern" way.

Re: Barbarism

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Fair enough.

But the "modern" meaning is valid too. And I can't think of an adequate alternative.

Hmmmmmm

[arielstarshadow.livejournal.com]

There must be one! It only waits to be found, in the dusty pages of the dictionary or thesaurus! We must seek it out! :)