Cosmopolitanism

Cosmopolitanism is the view that all human beings are world citizens (Greek, kosmopolitês) with responsibilities that extend beyond national borders. Given the diverse nature of the global village, tolerance and understanding are the bywords. Supporters of cosmopolitanism, dating back to the Stoics and Cynics of classical antiquity as well as to Judaism and Christianity, insist that they advocate building bridges of understanding and do not support cultural, social or religious homogenization. Cosmopolitanism has implications for the economic, moral and political spheres. Along with multiculturalism, it has been at the center of an often contentious debate about the place of Western civilization in the K-12 school curriculum. On one side of the debate are conservatives who argue that cosmopolitanism should be part and parcel of a civic education that places a high value on Western civilization and its views on such topics as human rights and democracy. On the other side of the debate are liberals who view cosmopolitanism as synonymous with multiculturalism, the view that there is a de facto moral equivalence between different cultures, meaning in turn that Western civilization should not be privileged in the educational system.

Multicultural & Diversity Education > Cosmopolitanism

Keywords Civic Education; Conservatism; Cosmopolitanism; Cynicism; Homogenization; Liberalism; Multiculturalism; Stoicism; Tolerance; Western Civilization

Overview

Cosmopolitanism, like democracy, had deep roots in Western philosophy and civilization before it came to the shores of America through British colonization. Once in America, it exerted a profound influence on the collective unconscious of America's Founding Fathers. Perhaps the most quintessentially American restatement of cosmopolitan principles is found in Jefferson's lines near the beginning of the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

This cosmopolitan ideal -- though variously interpreted by the nation's writers, politicians and educators -- has not only been the standard by which Americans judge how they treat their fellow Americans, but it is also the standard by which Americans themselves are judged in and through their dealings with peoples of other nations. In essence, cosmopolitanism has much to say about what it means to be an American living in a country and a world marked by profound diversity.

What is Cosmopolitanism?

As used in this essay, cosmopolitanism is the idea that all human beings are world citizens with responsibilities that extend beyond national borders, as well as to those in what Charusheela (2007) has called the diaspora at home. The emphasis is on an ongoing dialogue, or conversation, between those of different races, cultures and religions to arrive at an ever-deepening level of tolerance born of mutual understanding and respect.

As sociologist Ulrich Beck (2007) argues, "Cosmopolitanism, then, absolutely does not mean uniformity or homogenization. Individuals, groups, communities, political organizations, cultures, and civilizations wish to and should remain diverse, perhaps even unique. But to put it metaphorically: the walls between them must be replaced by bridges" (Beck, 2007, Conclusion).

Behind cosmopolitanism is the conviction that there are certain values - democracy, respect for human rights, freedom of the press, freedom of speech and so forth - that are the common inheritance of humankind and are worthy of preservation. These values are not "Western" or "Eastern," but universal:

What cosmopolitanism does not permit, however, is a kind of flaccid relativism; it insists that there are some universals-basic human rights, for instance-which are non-negotiable. Otherwise, it says, difference and disagreement are so much grist for mutually enriching dialogue (Brookes, 2006, Introduction).

As these values spread around the globe, a truly transcultural, cosmopolitan human society will become a reality, and that society will be far more peaceful than one ravaged by religious wars, ethnic hatreds and nationalist fervor.

Cosmopolitanism in the Real World

How does cosmopolitanism work in practice? Pogge (2002) makes an important distinction between weak and strong cosmopolitanism. Weak cosmopolitanism, which is predominately passive, considers all humans as having equal worth. Strong cosmopolitanism, which is more active, treats all human beings as equally worthy. Pogge considers weak cosmopolitanism to be a truism, while he believes strong cosmopolitanism to be self-evidently false. Indeed, it seems perfectly true - and this is supported by many evolutionary psychologists - that we are, as a rule, more obliging or altruistic toward genetic kin than perfect strangers (Wilson, 1975; Foster, Wenseleers & Ratnieks, 2006; cf. Wilson, 2005). Seeking to steer a path between the two extremes, Pogge suggests an "intermediate cosmopolitanism" wherein "all persons have a negative duty of very high stringency toward every human being not to collaborate in imposing an unjust institutional order upon him or her" (Pogge, 2002, p. 89). That is, human beings must not be active participants in building, supporting or imposing institutions of oppression upon their fellows.

Despite these clarifications, the meaning of cosmopolitanism remains somewhat nebulous. For some scholars, cosmopolitanism must be contrasted with multiculturalism, while in the context of education the two terms are sometimes used almost interchangeably (cf. Nussbaum, 1994). In a recent interview, Kwame Anthony Appiah (cited in Brookes, 2006) noted that the term still carries considerable negative baggage for some:

[Cosmopolitanism has] been attacked from both the left and the right. From the right … it was used as a term of anti-Semitic abuse, and their point was that people who had a sense of responsibility to the human community as a whole were going to be bad nationalists, bad patriots. The other direction of attack, from the left, was that cosmopolitanism was something very elitist. It came to mean a kind of free-floating attitude of the rich person who can afford to travel all over the world tasting a little bit of this culture and that one and not being very responsible about any of it (Appiah, cited in Brookes, 2006).

Further Insights

The Birth of the Cosmopolitan Idea

Cosmopolitanism is the anglicized version of a term first popularized by the Greek philosopher Diogenes of Sinope (412/404 B.C. - 323 B.C.). As a later philosopher recorded, "when [Diogenes of Sinope] was asked where he came from, he replied, 'I am a citizen of the world [kosmopolitês]' (Diogenes Laertius VI 63)." (cited in Kleingeld & Brown, 2006). The idea of cosmopolitanism was in the air in ancient Athens, the most liberal city-state in ancient Greece, where Socrates and his student Plato spoke of universal truths applicable to all humanity. The idea of a common humanity was further popularized by the philosophical school known as Stoicism in the 3rd century B.C. (Berges, 2005). Political events also conspired to foster the cosmopolitan idea:

Stoic cosmopolitanism in its various guises was enormously persuasive throughout the Greco-Roman world. In part, this success can be explained by noting how cosmopolitan the world at that time was. Alexander the Great's conquests and the subsequent division of his empire into successor kingdoms sapped local cities of much of their traditional authority and fostered increased contacts between cities, and later, the rise of the Roman Empire united the whole of the Mediterranean under one political power (Kleingeld & Brown, 2006, par. 8).

Still, the cosmopolitan idea in the Greco-Roman world was most often advocated by those who were not the power brokers in society, but the outcasts and those of the lower classes, which helps to explain why cosmopolitanism has had, to say the least, a spotty record of progress. On those rare occasions when cosmopolitanism has been spread by the powerful, such as Alexander, it has been primarily through force of arms, not reasoned argument (Vertovec & Cohen, 2002, p. 139).

Today there continues to be general agreement in the West, though perhaps not based any longer on religious presuppositions, that some form of cosmopolitanism, whether interpreted radically or not, is correct. Indeed, cosmopolitanism in our time has been buttressed most notably by all of the scientific breakthroughs in the 20th and 21st centuries. For example, evolutionary biology, as documented in the results of the Human Genome Project, has shown that all human beings (homo sapiens sapiens) share a common ancestor who lived in Africa in the remote past, between 150,000 and 200,000 years ago (cf. Oppenheimer, 2003; Mellars, 2006, p. 9381). As evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins puts it, "All your ancestors are mine, whoever you are, and all mine are yours. Not just approximately, but literally" (Dawkins, 2004, p. 39). We are one genetically, if not metaphysically.

Intellectual assent to our common humanity is not the same as cosmopolitanism, of course. While many throughout the centuries have paid lip service to the idea that what united human beings as a species is far more profound than the superficial differences in skin color, language or religion that divide us, the bloody history of humanity shows that peaceful coexistence through mutual understanding has been more the ideal than the reality.

Educating Citizens of the World

While some scholars note that the three main areas in which cosmopolitanism comes into play are politics, economics and morality (Kleingeld & Brown, 2006), one should certainly add education to the list. Indeed, it would seem that cosmopolitanism is a viewpoint that is best taught, or at least reinforced, through education, though it is expressed in one's later life through politics, economics and morality.

The role of education in promoting the cosmopolitan ideal is to encourage precisely the sort of mutual respect and understanding among people and cultures that is crucial to the effective functioning of a pluralistic society and a stable geopolitical order. As Todd (n.d.) puts it:

Within education, there is a growing pressure to redefine citizenship in light of the challenges brought on by increasingly multicultural, multiethnic, and multinational societies, particularly as these challenges are coupled to such global concerns as free-market capital, labour, the environment, and human rights (e.g., Burbules and Torres, 2000; McDonough and Feinberg, 2003; Peters, M. Roth and Gur Ze'ev, forthcoming) (Todd, n.d., p. 1).

Plainly stated, the goal of cosmopolitan education in the present is bringing about a better world through greater mutual understanding:

Cosmopolitanism is an ideal of equality, compassion, democracy and care. A cosmopolitan society envisages power rotating in a merry-go-round of colours, sounds, motion, scents and laughter. A cosmopolitan education undertakes to impart this ideal to the young so as to prepare the advent of such a society. Like all visions that regulate actions, the educational ideal of cosmopolitanism is necessarily and centrally oriented towards the future. The description of the ideal, however, operates in the present, deals with current concerns and reflects the `here and now' of everyday experience (Papastephanou, 2002, p. 69).

In the American context, there is a connection between cosmopolitanism and the role of the citizen in democratic societies. There has been a longstanding trend in American education to educate students to be productive members of society who are educated in the ideals of Western Civilization and uphold the democratic and liberal principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. Some supporters of cosmopolitanism, arguing that we share a human nature and common yearnings for "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," argue that these same values should be supported around the world, whether militarily or otherwise. For this reason some American cultural critics have argued that cosmopolitanism at its best is the same as the highest form of patriotism, which simultaneously serves American national interests and the true longings and interests of other nations and cultures (Harris, 2003).

Cosmopolitanism & Patriotism

This connection between cosmopolitanism and patriotism, particularly in the post-September 11 era, has lead some postmodernist thinkers to argue that cosmopolitanism is nothing more than an intellectual pretext for colonialism and oppression of other nations. Sharing the postmodernist view that such an interpretation of cosmopolitanism will stoke the smoldering embers of American imperialism, some advocates of cosmopolitanism argue that cosmopolitanism really is tantamount to a declaration of moral equivalence - in practice if not in principle -- between different societies, or at least the view that no society is better than any other, for all societies and cultures have important contributions to make to the common pool of knowledge and understanding of the world. They argue that failing to respect other cultures in this way, by treating them as inferior, can have disastrous consequences. As a case in point, they would argue that American misfortunes in the Middle East stem from an arrogance born of economic and military power.

There are indications that this latter view of cosmopolitanism, which blurs any distinction with the canons of multiculturalism, has won pride of place in the public school curriculum. Few would doubt that it also holds sway in America's colleges and universities. The perceived anti-Americanism implicit in this strong form of cosmopolitanism has outraged American conservatives, some of whom accuse the public school system of undermining the patriotism and moral resolve of young people in the face of evil. Indeed, conservative scholar Victory Davis Hanson (2002) argued shortly after the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, that a change in educational philosophy is sorely needed:

America used to welcome the contest of ideas against such closed autocracies-fighting not with their forced demonstrations and coerced sloganeering, but by teaching each generation the nature of elected government, the singularity of Western freedom, and the importance of consensual law. The idea of civic education was that to survive in an often hostile world as well as to keep our democracy vibrant, free Americans had not only to be materially successful but also had to learn in the very first years of school those self-evident truths on which our unique country rests-unlike almost all other nations, which are founded on a shared race, religion, or birthplace (Hanson, 2002, par. 1).Restoring civic education-from the daily practice of its rituals to real mastery of the elements of Americanism-will not be easy, but such a shared sense of values is critical in such a vast nation that is otherwise not defined by a shared religion, common race, or dominant ethnic affiliation (Hanson, 2002, par. 33).

Whether one sees this as a plea for a true cosmopolitanism or a retreat to an uncritical nationalism lies at the heart of the debate over the role of education in American society. To wit: is the purpose of education to reinforce patriotic ideals, challenge those ideals, or present all the facts so that the students themselves can decide?

Cosmopolitanism & the Western Tradition

Few would dispute that the history of Western civilization demonstrates an ongoing willingness to engage with, and often absorb aspects of, other cultures. It is also the case that the West believed that certain values were universally applicable to all humans at all times and places, and since the Age of Exploration starting in the 15th century, actively sought to spread those values to the far corners of the globe (Headley, 2007).

Certainly there has been cultural imperialism on the part of the West as well as on the part of other non-Western cultures (Sowell, 1998). But a persistent, though at times quite thin, thread running through the centuries is that of cross-cultural interchange and the corresponding need to inculcate the cosmopolitan ideal through the educational system. In our species' saner moments, we have recognized that what unites us is more profound and worthy of mutual admiration than what divides us.

In an important sense, the history of the world is the story of human migration. Our human ancestors left Africa about 60,000 years ago, thereafter migrating to the furthest reaches of the globe (Mellars, 2006). In the process, they created cultural practices, belief systems, group dynamics and even economies. As the human population grew, especially after the Neolithic Revolution of 10,000 years ago that introduced agriculture and a more sedentary lifestyle, trade routes were established that brought hitherto separate cultures and races into contact. The result was often warfare, but just as often the meetings brought about a cultural and economic exchange that benefited all involved. One mundane example is the blue stone Lapis lazuli, which was mined in Afghanistan but mentioned in the Gilgamesh Epic and used in a crushed form as Egyptian Queen Cleopatra's eyeshadow (Bowersox & Chamberlin, 1995).

The United States is often dubbed a nation of immigrants. Perhaps excepting the Native Americans, who themselves were descended from migrants, the present United States is an ethnic, cultural and religious patchwork quilt. Today, for example, parents of students in New York City's public schools speak at least 24 different languages, including Russian and Chinese ("From translation to participation," 2004, p. 2). The metaphor of the global village is not far from the truth when surveying the landscape of American education.

Viewpoints

Cosmopolitanism & Multiculturalism

In an important and illuminating article, McDonough (1997) contrasts multicultural and cosmopolitan philosophies of education. Multiculturalism, as McDonough explicates it, betrays an essentialist view of culture and race. Summarized more directly, it holds that individuals live within closely prescribed racial and cultural frameworks and structures that need to be preserved and even given precedence within education. This view has given birth to an ongoing multicultural project within public schools to at least balance the teaching of Western civilization with that of other civilizations. To fail to do so is, ipso facto, to oppress students from racial, ethnic or religious minority groups by denying the intrinsic value of who they are as individuals emerging from within a given sociocultural context.

By contrast, cosmopolitanism does not accept this essentialist view of culture and race. Rather, it begins with the assumption that culture and race are fluid concepts that diverge and converge within individuals living in heterogeneous, modern societies. Most of us, like the Anglo-Indian novelist Salman Rushdie are cultural 'mongrels':

The Indian writer, looking back at India, does so through guilt-tinted spectacles. (I am of course, once more talking about myself.) I am speaking now of those of us who emigrated…and I suspect that there are times when the move seems wrong to us all, when we seem, to ourselves, post-lapsarian men and women. We are Hindus who have crossed the black water; we are Muslims who eat pork. And as a result - as my use of the Christian notion of the Fall indicates - we are now partly of the West. Our identity is at once plural and partial. Sometimes we feel that we straddle two cultures; at other times, that we fall between two stools (Rushdie, 1991, p. 15; cited in McDonough, 1997).

McDonough affirms "that individual identity should not be conceived in terms of its relationship to a single, distinct cultural structure as the cultural recognition thesis assumes; rather, it should be conceived in cosmopolitan terms as a kind of 'melange' of commitments, affiliations and roles that reflect disparate cultural influences" (McDonough, 1997, Cosmopolitanism and Multicultural Education). For McDonough, in effect, multiculturalism is engaging in oversimplification:

According to the cosmopolitan view, individuals who at first glance appear to belong to a single cultural community which confers a shared cultural identity may on closer examination turn out to have very differently constituted, transcultural identities (McDonough, 1997).

In this view diversity is more than skin deep, and thus we have a new angle from which to approach Diogenes' claim to be a citizen of the world.

Terms & Concepts

Civic Education: An education that centers on that which must be known to produce informed citizens who will work for the general welfare.

Conservatism: A cultural and political philosophy that tends to believe in less government involvement in the public lives of citizens.

Cosmopolitanism: A cultural, ethnic and political philosophical view that emphasizes greater understanding between people of differing religious, ethnic, racial and cultural backgrounds and sensibilities from within a framework of universal human values.

Cynicism: A school of ancient philosophy in which living according to nature was emphasized.

Homogenization: In the socio-cultural sense, what happens when hitherto diverse societies and cultures become more and more alike.

Liberalism: A cultural and political philosophy that tends to believe in more government involvement in the public lives of citizens.

Multiculturalism: A cultural, ethnic and political philosophical view that emphasizes greater understanding between people of differing religious, ethnic, racial and cultural backgrounds and sensibilities from within a framework of moral relativism.

Stoicism: A school of ancient philosophy in which the oneness of humanity was emphasized.

Tolerance: A virtue in which one bears with, though does not accept, the religious, cultural, political and social views of others in society.

Western Civilization: An umbrella term meaning either the lands occupied or formerly colonized by European nations, or the ongoing history of the practical outworking of universal human values by such nations.

Bibliography

Babington, C. (1846). The influence of Christianity in promoting the abolition of slavery in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Beck, U. (2007, November 20). A new cosmopolitanism is in the air. Trans. Ian Pepper. Retrieved December 23, 2007 from sightandinsight.com: http://www.signandsight.com/features/1603.html.

Berges, S. (2005). Loneliness and belonging: Is Stoic cosmopolitanism still defensible? Res Publica. 11 , pp. 3-25. Retrieved December 28, 2007 from Sandrine Berges, Bilkent University: http://www.bilkent.edu.tr/~berges/Loneliness%20and%20Belonging.doc

Bowersox, G.W., & Chamberlin, B. E. (1995). Gemstones of Afghanistan. Tucson, AZ: Geoscience Press.

Brookes, J. (2006, February 23). Cosmopolitanism: How to be a citizen of the world - an interview with Kwame Anthony Appiah. Mother Jones. Retrieved December 23, 2007 from MotherJones.com: http://www.motherjones.com/interview/2006/02/anthony_appiah.html

Charusheela, S. (2007). The diaspora at home. Cultural Dynamics, 19 (2/3), 279-299. Retrieved December 29, 2007 from EBSCO online database Academic Search Premier: http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=27823844&site=ehost-live

Dawkins, R. (2004). The ancestor's tale: A pilgrimage to the dawn of evolution. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin.

Foster, K. R., Wenseleers, T. & Ratnieks, F. (2006). Kin selection is the key to altruism. TRENDS in Ecology and Evolution, 21 , pp. 57-60. Retrieved December 30, 2007 from Kevin R. Foster, FAS Center for Systems Biology, Harvard University: http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~kfoster/FosteretalTREE2006.pdf

From translation to participation: A survey of parent coordinators in New York City and their ability to assist non-English speaking parents. (2004, May 24). Advocates for Children of New York, New York Immigration Coalition. Retrieved December 27, 2007 from Advocatesforchildren.org: http://www.advocatesforchildren.org/pubs/ParentCoordinatorLA_05-24.doc

Hanson, V.D. (2002, Summer). The civic education America needs. City Journal. Retrieved December 28, 2007 from City Journal: http://www.city-journal.org/html/12_3_the_civic.html

Harris, L. (2003). The cosmopolitan illusion. Policy Review. Apr/May , p. 45. Retrieved December 28, 2007 from EBSCO online database, Academic Search Premier, http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=9443128&site=ehost-live

Headley, J.M. (2007). The Europeanization of the world: On the origins of human rights and democracy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Kleingold, P., & Brown, E. (2006, November 28). "Cosmopolitanism." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved December 23, 2007 from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmopolitanism/

McDonough, K. (1997). Multicultural recognition, cosmopolitanism and multicultural education. Philosophy of Education. Retrieved December 27, 2007 from University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana: http://www.ed.uiuc.edu/eps/PES-Yearbook/97_docs/mcdonough.html

Mellars, P. (2006). Why did modern human populations disperse from Africa ca. 60,000 years ago? A new model. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 103 , pp. 9381-9386. Retrieved December 27, 2007 from the National Academy of Sciences: http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/103/25/9381

Nussbaum, M. (1994). Patriotism and cosmopolitanism. The Boston Review, 19 . Retrieved December 23, 2007 from Northern Illinois University: http://www.soci.niu.edu/~phildept/Kapitan/nussbaum1.html

Oppenheimer, S. (2003, October). Out of Africa: Human roots. Prospect Magazine, 91. Retrieved December 27, 2007 from Prospect magazine: http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=5732 Papastephanou, M. (2013). Cosmopolitanism discarded: Martha Nussbaum's patriotic education and the inward–outward distinction. Ethics & Education, 8, 166-178.

Papastephanou, M. (2002). Arrows not yet fired: Cultivating cosmopolitanism through education. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 36 , 69. Retrieved December 28, 2007 from EBSCO online database, Education Research Complete: http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ehh&AN=6520602&site=ehost-live

Pogge, T. (2002, Autumn). Cosmopolitanism: A defence. CRISPP. 5, , pp.86-91. Retrieved December 23, 2007 from the conference page for Global Justice (University of Oslo, September 9-13, 2003): http://www.etikk.no/globaljustice/papers/GJ2003_Thomas_Pogge_Cosmopolitanism_-_A_Defence.pdf

Sidhu, R., & Dall'Alba, G. (2012). International education and (dis)embodied cosmopolitanisms. Educational Philosophy & Theory, 44, 413-431. Retrieved December 15, 2013, from EBSCO Online Database Education Research Complete. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ehh&AN=75232636&site=ehost-live

Sowell, T. (1998). Conquests and cultures: An international history. New York: Basic Books.

Starkey, H. (2012). Human rights, cosmopolitanism and utopias: Implications for citizenship education. Cambridge Journal of Education, 42, 21-35. Retrieved December 15, 2013, from EBSCO Online Database Education Research Complete. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ehh&AN=71860860&site=ehost-live

Todd, S. (n.d.). "The other is not elsewhere": The rights of belonging and cosmopolitan education. Retrieved December 27, 2007 from The Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain: http://www.philosophy-of-education.org/pdfs/Saturday/Todd.pdf

Vertovec, S., & Cohen, R. (2002). Conceiving cosmopolitanism: Theory, context and practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Warraq, Ibn (2007). Defending the West: A critique of Edward Said's Orientalism. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.

Wilson, E.O. (2005). Kin selection as the key to altruism: Its rise and fall. Social Research 72 , pp. 159-168. Retrieved December 29, 2007 from EBSCO online database Academic Search Premier: http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=16900842&site=ehost-live

----- (1975) Sociobiology: The new synthesis. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press .

Suggested Reading

Appiah, K.A. (2006, January 1). The case for contamination. The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved December 23, 2007 from the New York Times Magazine: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/01/magazine/01cosmopolitan.html

----- (2006). Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a world of strangers. New York: W.W. Norton. Breckenridge, C.A., Pollock, S., Bhabha, H. K. & Chakrabarty, D. eds. (2002). Cosmopolitanism. Durham: Duke University Press.

Derrida, J. (2001). On cosmopolitanism and forgiveness. Trans. Mark Dooley and Michael Hughes. New York and London: Routledge.

Rizvi, F. (2005). International education and the production of cosmopolitan identities. Paper presented at the March 4th, 2005 Transnational Seminar Series at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. RIHE International Publication Series 9. Retrieved December 28, 2007 from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champagne: http://www.cgs.uiuc.edu/resources/conf_seminars_workshops/TSRizvi.pdf

Rushdie, S. (1991). "Imaginary Homelands," in Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981- 1991. New York: Viking.

Scruton, R. (2002). The West and the rest: Globalization and the terrorist threat. New York: Continuum.

Essay by Matt Donnelly, M.A.

Matt Donnelly received his Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and a graduate degree in theology. Currently a graduate student in history at the University of Massachusetts-Boston, he also is the author of Theodore Roosevelt: Larger than Life, which was included in the New York Public Library's Books for the Teen Age and the Voice of Youth Advocates' Nonfiction Honor List. A Massachusetts native and diehard Boston Red Sox fan, he enjoys reading, writing, computers, sports, and spending time with his wife and two children. He welcomes comments at donnellymp@gmail.com.