Question

Modern civilization in 100 to 150 word's

Answer 1

Modern Civilization revolves around Technology and the end goal of Technology is to remove the dirt from under the fingernails of Man and make him cultured. In fact, showing a great bias towards city dwellers, the word “Civilization” itself is derived from the Latin word “Civitas” which denotes the townsman who is more refined than his country dwelling contemporaries. But Modern culture and Civilization is characterized by a distancing from nature.

The tension between the nature and technology (one of the most important basis of Modern culture prevalent in the cities) forms the basis of his celebrated essay “The Metropolis and the Mental Life”. At the outset Simmel talks about what man requires in his Life. He says “Man is a creation whose existence is dependent on differences, i. e. his mind is stimulated by the difference between present impressions and those which have preceded”. City life is characterized by concentration of a vast humanity in a limited place.

As Elisabeth Adams explains it in her aptly titled article “Alone in the Crowd: human reactions to urbanization”, “The average resident of a city dwelt in far closer proximity to other people and saw many times more members of his species in one day than his ancestors only a generation or two removed might have seen in a lifetime, and yet the city became known as a world of profoundly impersonal relationships between people. ”( Elisabeth Adams) Taking this argument forward Simmel proposes the concept of blase attitude that characterizes the city dwellers.