Eastern world
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
The Eastern Origins of Western Civilisation (2004) "This is a bouquet of acknowledgment by the West to the East… The Divan bears witness to the fact that the West, disgusted with its weak and cold spirituality, seeks warmth from the East's breast."--Heinrich Heine |
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Eastern world is an umbrella term for various cultures or social structures, nations and philosophical systems, which vary depending on the context. It most often includes at least part of Asia or, geographically, the countries and cultures east of Europe, the Mediterranean region and Arab world, specifically in historical (pre-modern) contexts, and in modern times in the context of Orientalism. Africa may rarely be included. It is often seen as a counterpart to the Western world, and correlates strongly to the Southern half of the North-South divide.
The various regions included in the term are varied, hard to generalize, and do not have a single shared common heritage, as is frequently claimed for the Western world. Although the various parts of the Eastern world share many common threads, most notably being in the Global South they have never historically defined themselves collectively.
The term originally had a literal geographic meaning, referring to the eastern part of the Old World, contrasting the cultures and civilizations of Asia with those of Europe (the Occident or Western world). Traditionally, this includes all of Central, North and East Asia (the Far East), Greater Middle East, Southeast Asia and South Asia (the Indian subcontinent).
Conceptually, the boundary between east and west is cultural, rather than geographical, as a result of which Australia is typically grouped in the West, while Islamic nations and much of the former Soviet Union are, regardless of location, grouped in the East. Other than Asia and some parts of Africa, Europe has successfully absorbed almost all of the societies of Oceania, and the Americas into the Western world, Turkey, the Philippines, Israel, and Japan, which are geographically located in the Eastern world, are considered at least partially westernized due to the cultural influence of Europe.
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Identity politics
Asian concepts
Although the concept of a united Asian people is not the same as that of the Asian race. It is even more debatable due to the fact that most of the world link the Asian identity to the people of South, East and Southeast Asia and exclude regions of Western Asia who do not consider themselves as part of the Eastern world such as the Arab nations, Israel, Turkey and Iran.
Additionally, a Pan-Asian identity is hampered by the broader racial and ethnic diversity in Asia, when compared to the continents of Europe and Africa.
The presence of many different cultures, environments, economics, historical ties and government systems whose peoples have strong traits of Nationalism and ethnic individualism results in restrictive cultural identities which are not inclusive of the entire continent. People of Asia may prefer to identify with their individual nations or ethnic groups rather than with their continent or region.
The division between 'East' and 'West' is a product of European cultural history, and of the distinction between European Christendom and the cultures beyond it to the East. With the European colonization of the Americas the East/West distinction became global. The concept of an Eastern, "Indian" (Indies) or "Oriental" sphere was emphasized by ideas of racial as well as religious and cultural differences. Such distinctions were articulated by Westerners in the scholarly tradition known as Orientalism and Indology. The notion of an Asian identity may considered as a primarily European construct. An intriguing fact to be noted is that Orientalism has been the only Western concept that was about a unified Eastern world and not about any specific region(s), but rather all of Asia together.
European concepts
During the Cold War, the term "Eastern world" was sometimes used as an extension of Eastern bloc, connoting the Soviet Union, China and their communist allies, while the term "Western world" often connoted the United States and its NATO allies such as the United Kingdom.
The concept is often another term for the Far East – a region that bears considerable cultural and religious commonality. Eastern philosophy, art, literature, and other traditions, are often found throughout the region in places of high importance, such as popular culture, architecture and traditional literature. The spread of Buddhism and Hindu Yoga is partly responsible for this.
Eastern culture
Eastern culture, also known as Eastern civilization and historically as Oriental culture, is an umbrella term for the diverse cultural heritages of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, belief systems, political systems, artifacts and technologies of the Eastern world.
While there is no singular and catch-all "Eastern culture", there are subgroups within it, such as countries within East Asia, Southeast Asia, or South Asia, as well as syncretism within these regions. These include the spread of Eastern religions such as Buddhism or Hinduism, the usage of Chinese characters or Brahmic scripts, language families, the fusion of cuisines, and traditions, among others.
Eastern culture has developed many themes and traditions. Some important ones are:
- Abrahamic religions (a.k.a. West Asian religions)
- Christianity — the majority of the modern world adheres to this faith although it isn't widely practiced in its native continent of Asia anymore and since the faith had spread to the Western World the notion of "Europe" and the "Western World" has been intimately connected with the concept of "Christianity and Christendom" many even attribute Christianity for being the link that created a unified European identity. Nonetheless, vibrant indigenous minorities in the Levant have preserved their ancient beliefs, adhering to Syriac Christianity (i.e. Assyrian and Maronite people), an Eastern Christian sect.
- Islam — the majority of the world Muslim population have always lived in Asia, due to Islam spreading and becoming the dominant religion of these areas.
- Judaism — the national religion of the Israelites/Hebrews of the Fertile Crescent, or what is now Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. They eventually evolved into the Jews (particularly Ashkenazi, Sephardic, Mizrahi) and Samaritans of today.
- Zoroastrianism — the monotheistic state religion of Sassanid Iran
- Eastern religions / Eastern philosophy
- Indian religions
- Buddhism — the path of liberation attained through insight into the ultimate nature of reality.
- Hinduism
- Jainism
- Sikhism — a religion that developed in the warring plains of Punjab in an atmosphere of ideological clash between Islam and Hinduism. Its followers retain spiritual as well as martial qualities.
- Taoic religions (a.k.a. East Asian religions or Far Eastern religions)
- Chinese folk religion
- Confucianism — the belief that human beings are teachable, improvable and perfectible through personal and communal endeavour especially including self-cultivation and self-creation.
- Shinto
- Taoism
- Indian religions
- Asian Cinema
- Middle Eastern cuisine
- South Asian cuisine
- East Asian cuisine
- Southeast Asian cuisine
- Culture of Asia
- Culture of China
- Culture of Korea
- Culture of Japan
- Cultures of Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and East Timor
- Culture of Taiwan
- Culture of Vietnam
- Cultures of Thailand & Laos
- Culture of Israel
- Arab culture
- Culture of Lebanon
- Culture of Iran
- Culture of Turkey
- Culture of Azerbaijan
- Culture of India
- Culture of Pakistan
- Culture of Sri Lanka
- Oriental medicine
See also
- Westernization
- Continental union
- East-West dichotomy
- Greater Middle East
- Greater India
- Greater Persia
- Muslim world
- Asia-Pacific
- Global North
- Global South
- Hippie trail