
Unlocked: Myth of the Month 8: "The West"
12 snips
Jul 7, 2020 AI Snips
Chapters
Transcript
Episode notes
The West Is A Modern Construct
- The modern idea of a single coherent "West" is a recent invention that solidified in the 20th century.
- Historians project that constructed category back onto ancient and medieval societies, creating a false continuity.
Technologies Traveled Across Eurasia
- Eurasian societies have long exchanged technologies and ideas, so "western" achievements often originated elsewhere.
- Gunpowder and printing came from China and diffused gradually to Europe, undermining claims of unique western invention.
Western Civilization As A Constellation
- "Western civilization" functions like a constellation metaphor: useful but an illusion of coherent pattern.
- It mainly serves to explain the prehistory of modern liberal industrial states, not an absolute cultural unit.
