East vs. West

Posted on Nov 16, 2008 in Misc. | 0 comments

I saw this on XKCD today:

(XKCD is a great web comic, but probably won’t interest you if you’re not a 1) programmer, 2) mathematician, or 3) a generalized geek of some kind.)

This comic struck a chord with me because I’ve often wondered this exact same thing. Calling Asian countries “the East” and Europe and North America are “the West” never made sense to me. First, it shoehorns some countries, like Iceland and Australia—not to mention entire continents like Africa and South America—into groups to which they might not belong. Second, cardinal directions are completely a matter of perspective, as shown so clearly in the comic.

I know that “East” and “West,” in their capitalized senses, have more to do with ideological divisions than longitudinal ones. The concept of “Eastern” vs. “Western” philosophies is interesting, whether it be in medicine, diet, religion, art, or any of a dozen areas. But couldn’t there be a better way to draw a distinction than overloading these geographical terms? I don’t pretend to be smart enough to suggest any, but I will note that these sorts of labels can change. Remember the term “third world country” (which I always thought meant countries founded after World War II, but maybe not)? It’s now better to call them “developing nations.” So it’s possible to change these labels. If we did, maybe XKCD can get back to really incredible comics, like this map of the universe on a logarithmic scale).

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