ISSUE147 Tradition and modernization

柯尊龙UID: 2853190

ISSUE147 - "Tradition and modernization are incompatible. One must choose between them."

From barbarism to civilization, our history witnessed the process in which tradition is gradually supplanted by modernization. It may seem that those two aspects of our society are incompatible and we can and only can preserve one of them. Yet, from a dialectical perspective, tradition and modernization are not mutually exclusive and therefore we can seek the balance between them to guarantee the well-being of our society.

Undeniably, tradition and modernization are not coexistive to some degree. We are familiar with the putting down of some traditional architecture to give way to those more modernized ones. Hot debates are always aroused concerning whether or not old building which contains great cultural values should be preserved while neglecting the modern one. Pop music is enjoying a wild popularity to the extent that many experts or educators became worried that those symphonies and classic music may be lost. Traditional Chinese paintings have been drive into a corner by the variety of entertainments in modern society taking up the leisure time of young people. With such events happening every day, it is unavoidable that our traditions are giving way to modernization.

However, either tradition or modernization is of great significance to the development of our society. Traditions containing the precious ideology, moral values, belief give us the feeling of belonging which is important to the people of modern society who need to find the derivation of them. Moreover, wise sages installed us with their ideology which can still be applied to modern world. Socrates reminds us of what is life, what are love and other insightful thoughts that still capture modern people's attention. Confucius who is a famous Chinese philosopher and educator still teaches us to be charitable and merciful. Even the political system of many countries is derived from the Plate's the republic. Traditions still give us precious wealth, and therefore should be cherish as before. Modernization, the process by which contains the industrialization, urbanization and thus westernization has taken many great significance in our living habit. Automobiles changed our way of travel and transport, internet lead us to the information age and so on. It is hard to imagine what our life will be like with the process of modernization.

Additionally, neglecting either of those two aspects will bring detrimental effects to our society. Thus we should seek the balance between those two aspects in order to guarantee a better development of our society. Without tradition we lost the belonging as well as other precise accumulation of wisdom and good moral values. Without modernization we may still be living in the barbarism and lost the privilege as a modern citizen. It is unreasonable and ridiculous for us to blindly abandon either of them. Furthermore, it is possible to find a reasonable balance between those two elements. Video camera and written words both are wildly used in the capturing and delivering information.
Lijiang, a city in China reaps the benefits of preserving tradition as well as enjoying the modernization. Numerous traditional building still existed there which becomes a tourism attraction. Not only is the income from millions of visitors make the city prosperous but also it becomes the World Cultural Heritage which its preserving of traditions. Illustrated by those facts, we should be aware of the possibility of coexistence of tradition and modernization and it is more reasonable to seek the balance in order to better serve our society.

Traditions and modernization is an inseparable ingredient, which should be cherished as a whole in regard to better prosper our society, we should therefore seek the balance between them.

柯尊龙UID: 2853190

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