Arjun Appadurai, Theory, Culture & Society: Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy (1990)

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Appadurai proposes a framework of five dimensions of global, cultural flow that because of the complexity of current global economy that has to do with certain fundamental disjunctures between economy, culture and politics. He sets the basis for a tentative formulation about the conditions under which current global flows occur. They occur in and through the growing disjunctures between ethnoscapes. This formulation is the core of his model of global cultural flow and are comprised of five –scapes: 1) ethnoscapes; 2) mediascapes; 3) technoscapes; 4) finanscapes; 5) ideoscapes

Appadurai sure uses the word disjunctures a lot in his article. Since it means disunion and separation, it is well justified to use it as the main descriptor for his theory. His five dimensions are described in detail with the suffix of –scapes. I think this is an apt use of the suffix and really helped to put his argument into context for me. He also talks of gray routes and gray markets. I found this really interesting and in contrast to my negative view of black markets. He makes it seem a bit more acceptable in his –scapes to have these routes and markets. Perhaps he is allowing some justification or explanation of why they exist and hesitates to give them the full label of black market or black routes.