Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization (Public Worlds, V. 1)

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Summary: One of the best explanations
Review: Dr. Appadurai's explanation on how fast things are changing is amazing. When he uses the concept of scapes he gives a new and profound explanation to the social and cultural phenomena that have been happening. By explaining Modernity, he states that time and space is contracting and giving us the idea on how things were and will be. Modernity is at large 'cause now exceeds the national frontiers.

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Summary: A waste of time
Review: Obtuse and without meaning in the real world. Appaduarai needs to set foot on real soil and realize the world is not created, nor can it be defined behind ivy walls.

Use your time to read something of importance and let Appadurai die on the vine, he may impress other sycophantic scholars with his labeling and vocabulary but you don't need him.

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Summary: A new, refreshing, and essential approach
Review: Professor Appadurai writes with an understanding, clarity, and erudition that is rare among scholars in any discipline. In a small, densely packed, smoothly written text, he provides anthropology and sociology with a powerful set of theoretical tools and concepts with which to grasp modernity and globalization. Like de Certeau, Appadurai examines aspects of intimate, everyday life in minute detail, but like Giddens and Lash, his reach is global. This book provides the integration of perspectives that anthropology desperately needs in order to finally become relevant in the twenty-first century. It is a wake-up call, a gift, and a masterpiece. No one seriously practicing anthropology in the high-modern era should fail to acquaint themselves with this rare gem of a book.

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Summary: an academic antidote to academia
Review: The great strength behind Appadurai's book Modernity at Large is that he breaks out of the binary thinking that many new historians engage in. Instead, he offers what he coins landscapes, five different threads that weave together and influence one another to form our communities, imagined or otherwise. His ideas of how the imagination and imagined communities affect us build on the established works of others, especially Benedict Anderson, but his approach is very down to earth and accessible without pandering to a lowest common denominator. The book is dense, and not something to absorb in one sitting; it savours like a fine wine.

An excellent book, especially for students wanting to research deterritorialization and the transnational public sphere but are intimidated or frustrated with assigned texts.

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Summary: Appadurai is a great social writer...
Review: This book is one of maximum expresion in the social field. I recommend to all social scientist read it

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Summary: Required Reading
Review: This brilliant book makes a fundamental contribution to how globalization works. It is required reading not just for anthropologists but for economists, political scientists and others trying to grapple with the rapidity of cross-national economic, cultural and demographic flows in the contemporary world.