First Globalization - (World Social Change) by Geoffrey C Gunn (Paperback)

About the Book

First Globalization presents an original and sweeping conceptualization of the grand cultural-civilizational encounter between Asia and Europe. With his "metageography" of the vast Eurasian zone, Gunn shows how between 1500 and 1800, a lively two-way flow in ideas, philosophies, and cultural products brought competing civilizations into serious dialogue and mostly peaceful exchange. Ranging from discussions of the natural world, livelihoods, and religious and intellectual encounters to language, play, crime and punishment, gender, and governance, this book replays the themes of enduring hybridity and "creolization" of cultures.

Book Synopsis

First Globalization presents an original and sweeping conceptualization of the grand cultural-civilizational encounter between Asia and Europe. Now largely taken for granted, the exchange resonates in multiple ways even today. Offering a 'metageography' of the vast Eurasian zone, Geoffrey C. Gunn shows how between 1500 and 1800, a lively two-way flow in ideas, philosophies, and cultural products brought competing civilizations into serious dialogue and mostly peaceful exchange. In Europe, the interaction was reflected in missionary reporting, cartographic representations, literary productions, and intellectual fashions, alongside the business of commerce and plunder (when it reached the Americas and peripheries). In Asia--notably China, India, and particularly Japan--European ideas and their bearers received a remarkably positive hearing when they did not challenge reigning orthodoxies. Ranging from discussions of the natural world, livelihoods, and religious and intellectual encounters to language, play, crime and punishment, gender, and governance, this book replays the themes of enduring hybridity and 'creolization' of cultures dating from the first great encounter between Europe and Asia.

Review Quotes

"As an introduction to the cultural exchanges in Eurasia, Gunn's book is highly useful." --The Journal Of Economic History

"Geoffrey Gunn gives us a grand tour of three centuries of civilizational exchanges between Asia and Europe that have shaped the world we live in. First Globalization is a valuable corrective to the simplistic notion of globalization as Westernization." --Nayan Chanda, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization

"A masterpiece. . . . Original, superbly edited, readable." --Lettre De L'afrase

"This ambitious work examines the interaction of Europe with Asia. . . . [A] useful global study from a non-ethnocentric basis." --Choice Reviews

"Fills a gap in the field of cultural history. . . . Few writers have so systematically explored the diverse aspects of globalization. Nine richly illustrated chapters meticulously recall the flows of knowledge, languages, images, technologies, and beliefs, linking Europe and Asia. . . . Gunn draws inspiration from a large number of original sources . . . to draw a highly vivid picture of the first encounters." --François Gipouloux, Chinese Cross Currents

"Gunn's book is a fresh look at the ways in which cultural interactions across Eurasia constituted the aptly named First Globalization." --Pacific Historical Review

"This volume is a major contribution to the literature on cross-cultural interactions in maritime Asia during the Age of Discovery. It offers a nuanced look at Europe's attempt to make sense out of Asia and to a lesser degree Asia's attempt to make sense of these new arrivals and at the coagulation of a unified Eurasian world." --Itinerario

"This is a very important collection of essays for specialists of maritime Asia, who will find it invaluable to their work." --International Journal of Maritime History

"Gunn succeeds in debunking the myth that the first globalization was nothing other than westernization [A]n excellent narrative of cultural geography." --H-Net: Humanities and Social Science Reviews Online

"The scope of this book is breathtaking, and the contents almost consistently fascinating." --Journal of Contemporary Asia

". . . a significant contribution to current debates about the nature and form of globalization today." --South Asia Research

About the Author

Geoffrey C. Gunn is professor of international relations at/in the Faculty of Economics, Nagasaki University.