Identity and Alterity in the Primitive Era of Globalization

Abstract

The globalization process, in its incipient stage, can be analysed from a dual perspective. On the one hand, as ongoing reality. In this respect, any researcher‟s efforts should be directed to discovering the nature of this phenomenon, its causes and the context in which it evolves. One the other hand, whoever inquiries this reality, must ask themselves why has humanity become so late aware of it. In investigating the phenomenon of globalization, the relationship between identity and alterity is a key to fathoming its essence. Uprootedness, dislocation and uniformity erode, at the state, ethnic and individual level, the old boundary between identity and alterity, blow up differences, so that they become an indicator, a barometer of the globalization process. In the present study, we will approach the primitive phase of globalization, highlighting the pre-existing relations and oppositions between identity and alterity, as well as their mutations that have arisen and are ongoing on a world scale.