modernity

For those of you who don’t know the word, there are many different definitions depending on the topic but for this purpose the most basic form is whether or not a society is “modern.” While it is difficult to decide what is a ‘modern’ society to begin with, other than the obvious, education, technology, average age of death, etc, anthropologists struggle to prove that although African countries are not as advanced technologically as western countries they are still “modernized,” or even modern in their own context. As well as should societies where agriculture is a main source of providing for one’s family be called “un-modern” just because they use the earth rather than the super market. That’s a much longer debate, and what I intended on talking about was the emphasis people place, when giving tours here, to show you things most of us would never show someone in a western country. On every tour I’ve been on people have, on more than one occasion people emphasized showing me the airport, even the one I arrived in. I saw the Bobo one as well, and the driver asked me if I wanted to get out and have him take a picture of me in front of the Bobo train station. You would think they were something extraordinary but honestly it was just another station. But to them it’s a sign of development and a bright future, possibilities. I laugh every time thinking what if I drove specially to show someone SEA-TAC airport, what would they say?