Hall Johnson, an American composer in the 20th century, is praised for bringing African American spirituals into the concert halls. It is interesting that this transition was not brought about by a wealthy financier, or changing cultural trends. It was Johnson’s arrangements that provided the ability for these spirituals to extend beyond their original community. But one has to wonder, would I have ever heard powerful pieces such as Lord, I Don’t Feel No Ways Tired, had it not been for Johnson? And if you consider his arrangements as more or less cultural translations, have I ever heard the song at all?

In Friedman’s book, The World is Flat, he describes an interconnected world that has emerged as a by product of “The Ten Forces That Flattened the World.” The list is comprised of technological and business innovations and the cultural implications of their adoption. Windows, the Internet, Out/In-sourcing, and even Blogs are covered by the wide net cast with each item on his list. The items on his list, however, serve less to isolate particular phenomena, and instead seem to capture an innovative trend or period. Each item captures a solution to some hurdle in production, and specifically, production of the self.

Friedman hails the word processor as ushering in a new era in which individuals are the primary source of media. He follows with the development of interoperable systems that allow for the easy exchange of information, and then interoperable corporations that can levy these benefits (I am particularly fond of his section on Insourcing). Self-publication on the web finishes up his list, lumped with others in a catch-all item that encompasses the ambiguous chimera of Web 2.0.

Two messages seem to lurk in Friedman’s list:

1. The world has flattened in direct response to innovation that eliminates barriers between the flow of information, frequently by normalizing the content.
2. Friedman’s flat world is one in which the principle commodity is our identity, an identity that the flat economy seems to simultaneously produce and consume.

How does Friedman’s view blend with the Tunis Commitment? Both are incredibly optimistic, but reveal some contradictions when placed in conversation with each other. If we embrace Friedman’s worldview, how realistic is Tunis’ commitment to the “special situation of indigenous peoples” (Section 22), and can we actually “pay particular attention to the special needs of marginalized and vulnerable groups of society”? (Section 20).

Who is allowed to participate in our Information Society? Starting with Hall Johnson and African American spirituals might have seemed strange, but I think the metaphor is apt. Frequently when discussing standardization, we are talking about a (more-or-less) culturally agnostic normalization of data. But what about art? Culture? Now that we are producing ourselves in our embryonic social web, I am reminded of Spivak’s simple question of western-centric academia in post-colonialism: “Can the subaltern speak?”

Short List:

• Hall Johnson – Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hall_Johnson
• The Machine is Us, Michael Wesch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gmP4nk0EOE
• Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Can the Subaltern Speak?