In the 1960s, modernization theory was very popular. Essentially what modernization theory argued is that all societies go through similar processes in becoming “modern,” and that it is therefore possible to identify what is not modern in certain countries and to “straighten out” those non-modern aspects.
I say “straighten out” because the idea behind modernization theory is that modern societies are rational and orderly, and that societies that have yet to fully modernize are not. The task for any government or agency that wanted to help a country modernize in the 1960s was therefore to help that country rationalize itself or to “get things straight.”
One country that tried to help do this in the 1960s was Australia under the auspices of the Colombo Plan. I recently came across some booklets of photographs from the 1960s in the Australian National Archives that were meant to highlight the success of Australia’s efforts to help Southeast Asian nations modernize (these booklets can be found by searching for “Contact print album for VIP visits” at the above site).
What struck me in looking at these pictures was the degree to which they showed straight lines, which seems to me to be a good illustration of what people thought they were doing – “straightening out” societies. So, for instance, there were pictures like the following:
Working in lines at a machine shop in a technical high school in Rangoon, Burma.
Fixing cars parked in a line in Rangoon.
Studying in lines in Mandalay.
Growing rice in lines in Chainat, Thailand.
Driving down a strait road in Khon Kaen
Standing up straight on TV in Khon Kaen.
Learning Languages in straight lines in Laos.
Sitting in lines typing straight lines of text in Cambodia.
Testing the quality of lines of eggs in South Vietnam.
Plowing in straight lines in the Philippines.
Constructing buildings in lines in Singapore.
Teaching children in lines in Sarawak, Malaysia.
Building straight-lined bridges in Sarawak.
Setting up straight communication lines in Denpasar, Indonesia.
And. . . Oh no! A curved-lined rice field on Java!!
That needs to be straightened out.
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Very nice! The Eastern bloc undoubtedly had its own version of straightening things as well. And of course many Southeast Asians wanted to get straightened very badly.
Another form of straightening came through the five straight lines of western staff musical notation. I would argue that by reshaping the interior consciousness of nearly everyone in the region it has had the clearest and most far-reaching effects.
Great point!! Yea, as I was thinking about this, it did occur to me that this is a topic that one could really run with. I still haven’t read Walter Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (shame on me!!!), but I need to. And I had Rudolf Mrazek’s The Engineers of Happy Land in the back of my head when I wrote this, as I think that he has pioneered this way of looking at the past – i.e., seeing the importance of straight lines, etc.
I think Pham Duy in the 50s already talked about the five straight lines of western staff musical notation and its influence on Vietnamese music. I remember reading this in his autobiography many years ago. Perhaps Dustofthewest knows more about this.
I can’t remember the instance you mention Kuching. The drastic change came in terms of pedagogy – the five straight lines are a powerful tool for teaching uniformity and of assuring the longevity of a work for as long as there are people who can read the notation. Traditionally Vietnamese would learn their music by observing and imitating the fingering of their teachers. There were notational methods that would provide note names but much less in terms of rhythm and nuance. I think this change was also dictated by keyboards, and guitar fret boards tuned to the equal tempered 12 note chromatic scale.
Benjamin’s article does not take very long to read and has some powerful ideas. He is looking primarily at duplicating technologies like film and photography, but sound recording is very similar. His concern was for the possible persistence of “aura” of an original that was endangered through the ready availability of identical copies through mass reproduction.