Friday, June 26, 2015

To understand the most important characteristics of a society, one must study its major cities.

My thoughts on this issue:
Major cities of any society give us a mixed sort of information. When I think of major cities whether it is in any country in the world, some big cities like San Francisco, New York, London, Mumbai, Sao Palo, Beijing, Tokyo, come to my mind.
In terms of culture, what exactly do we find here? We find here a cosmopolitan sort of culture. People from all over the state, country and world arrive here for the purpose of making livelihood, traveling, or studying. With them they bring the culture of their own society, and gradually all the culture gets intermingled, and present a very homogeneous blend of overall culture. This blend does not describe how the people of the native society are.
It takes a lot of effort to understand the culture of such a society if we are to only study it in the major cities. What we will have, may be such a homogeneous mixture that it will be hard for us to tell that a particular kind of cuisine belongs to which culture and to what extent. Therefore studying a culture in major cities of a society is not very wise.
A seeker can find the true essence of the culture of any society more effectively in less known cities or towns, or may be in villages. But towns would give one the best view of what they are looking for. In fact, if a tourist decides to spend even a smaller time in a less known town of a society, they will get to know much more about it and will themselves be able to inculcate or inherit more of the true nature or characteristics of that society. Being in the major cities will only give them a chance to be more comfortable in the cosmopolitan arena.

My take on this issue is not in agreement with the given statement. According to my understanding a Major city seldom gives out the true essence of a society hence it is not advisable to read the culture of a society in Major cities.

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