Western World in the context of "Eastern world"

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⭐ Core Definition: Western World

The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to various nations and states in Western Europe, Northern America, and Australasia; with some debate as to whether those in Eastern Europe and Latin America also constitute the West. The Western world likewise is called the Occident (from Latin occidens 'setting down, sunset, west') in contrast to the Eastern world known as the Orient (from Latin oriens 'origin, sunrise, east'). Definitions of the "Western world" vary according to context and perspectives; the West is an evolving concept made up of cultural, political, and economic synergy among diverse groups of people, and not a rigid region with fixed borders and members.

Some historians contend that a linear development of the West can be traced from Ancient Greece and Rome, while others argue that such a projection constructs a false genealogy. A geographical concept of the West started to take shape in the 4th century CE when Constantine, the first Christian Roman emperor, divided the Roman Empire between the Greek East and Latin West. The East Roman Empire, later called the Byzantine Empire, continued for a millennium, while the West Roman Empire lasted for only about a century and a half. Significant theological and ecclesiastical differences led Western Europeans to consider the Christians in the Byzantine Empire as heretics. In 1054 CE, when the church in Rome excommunicated the patriarch of Byzantium, the politico-religious division between the Western church and Eastern church culminated in the Great Schism or the East–West Schism. Even though friendly relations continued between the two parts of Christendom for some time, the crusades made the schism definitive with hostility. The West during these crusades tried to capture trade routes to the East and failed, it instead discovered the Americas. In the aftermath of the European colonization of the Americas, primarily involving Western European powers, an idea of the "Western" world, as an inheritor of Latin Christendom emerged. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the earliest reference to the term "Western world" was from 1586, found in the writings of William Warner.

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Western World in the context of Urban anthropology

Urban anthropology is a subset of anthropology concerned with issues of urbanization, poverty, urban space, social relations, and neoliberalism. The field has become consolidated in the 1960s and 1970s.

Ulf Hannerz quotes a 1960s remark that traditional anthropologists were "a notoriously agoraphobic lot, anti-urban by definition". Various social processes in the Western World as well as in the "Third World" (the latter being the habitual focus of attention of anthropologists) brought the attention of "specialists in 'other cultures'" closer to their homes.

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Western World in the context of Socioeconomic

Economic sociology is the study of the social cause and effect of various economic phenomena. The field can be broadly divided into a classical period and a contemporary one, known as "new economic sociology".

The classical period was concerned particularly with modernity and its constituent aspects, including rationalisation, secularisation, urbanisation, and social stratification. As sociology arose primarily as a reaction to capitalist modernity, economics played a role in much classic sociological inquiry. The specific term "economic sociology" was first coined by William Stanley Jevons in 1879, later to be used in the works of Émile Durkheim, Max Weber and Georg Simmel between 1890 and 1920. Weber's work regarding the relationship between economics and religion and the cultural "disenchantment" of the modern West is perhaps most representative of the approach set forth in the classic period of economic sociology.

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Western World in the context of Tamils

The Tamils (/ˈtæmɪlz, ˈtɑː-/ TAM-ilz, TAHM-), also known by their demonym Tamilar, are a Dravidian ethnic group who natively speak the Tamil language and trace their ancestry mainly to the southern part of the Indian subcontinent. Tamil is one of the longest-surviving languages, with over two thousand years of written history, dating back to the Sangam period (between 300 BCE and 300 CE).

Tamils constitute about 5.7% of the Indian population and form the majority in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. They also form significant proportions of the populations in Sri Lanka (15.3%), Malaysia (7%) and Singapore (5%). Tamils have migrated world-wide since the 19th century CE and a significant population exists in South Africa, Mauritius, Fiji, as well as other regions such as the Southeast Asia, Middle East, Caribbean and parts of the Western World.

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Western World in the context of National personification

A national personification is an anthropomorphic personification of a state or the people(s) it inhabits. It may appear in political cartoons and propaganda. In the first personifications in the Western World, warrior deities or figures symbolizing wisdom were used (for example the goddess Athena in ancient Greece), to indicate the strength and power of the nation. Some personifications in the Western world often took the Latin name of the ancient Roman province. Examples of this type include Britannia, Germania, Hibernia, Hispania, Lusitania, Helvetia and Polonia.

Examples of personifications of the Goddess of Liberty include Marianne, the Statue of Liberty (Liberty Enlightening the World), and many examples of United States coinage. Another ancient model was Roma, a female deity who personified the city of Rome and her dominion over the territories of the Roman Empire. Roma was probably favoured by Rome's high-status Imperial representatives abroad, rather than the Roman populace at large. In Rome, the Emperor Hadrian built and dedicated a gigantic temple to her as Roma Aeterna ("Eternal Rome"), and to Venus Felix, ("Venus the Bringer of Good Fortune"), emphasising the sacred, universal and eternal nature of the empire. Examples of representations of the everyman or citizenry in addition to the nation itself are Deutscher Michel, John Bull and Uncle Sam.

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Western World in the context of Trans-Atlantic trade

Trans-Atlantic trade refers to trade that involves African, Asian and Latin American economies' mercantile interactions with the Western World. It is typically distinct from the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, which is generally understood to be of a different era and range of goods sold.

Transnational corporations of the 19th and 20th century feature prominently in this trade, and in many parts of the world it has considerably weakened many historic long-distance trade systems, like the famous Silk Road trade in Asia or the Trans-Sahara trade route systems in Africa. Most of the products traded in Trans-Atlantic trade were and are made in Europe. The transnational corporations, many based in developing countries, created distribution channels of finished products and flooded their markets. Trans-Atlantic trade also includes exports of raw materials to Europe for manufacturing purposes.

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Western World in the context of Tamil people

The Tamils (/ˈtæmɪlz, ˈtɑː-/ TAM-ilz, TAHM-), also known by their demonym Tamilar, are a Dravidian ethnic group who natively speak the Tamil language and trace their ancestry mainly to the southern part of the Indian subcontinent. Tamil is one of the longest-surviving languages, with over two thousand years of written history, dating back to the Sangam period (between 300 BCE and 300 CE). Tamils constitute about 5.7% of the Indian population and form the majority in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. They also form significant proportions of the populations in Sri Lanka (15.3%), Malaysia (7%) and Singapore (5%). Tamils have migrated world-wide since the 19th century CE and a significant population exists in South Africa, Mauritius, Fiji, as well as other regions such as the Southeast Asia, Middle East, Caribbean and parts of the Western World.

Archaeological evidence from Tamil Nadu indicates a continuous history of human occupation for more than 3,800 years. In the Sangam period, Tamilakam was ruled by the Three Crowned Kings of the Cheras, Cholas and Pandyas. Smaller Velir kings and chieftains ruled certain territories and maintained relationship with the larger kingdoms. Urbanisation and mercantile activity developed along the coasts during the later Sangam period with the Tamils influencing the regional trade in the Indian Ocean region. Artifacts obtained from excavations indicate the presence of early trade relations with the Romans. The major kingdoms to rule the region later were the Pallavas (3rd–9th century CE), and the Vijayanagara Empire (14th–17th century CE).

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Western World in the context of Russian Naval Infantry

The Russian Naval Infantry (Russian: Морская пехота России, romanized: Morskaya pekhota Rossii, lit.'Russian sea infantry'), often referred to as Russian Marines in the West, operate as the naval infantry of the Russian Navy. Established in 1705, they are capable of conducting amphibious operations as well as operating as more traditional light infantry.

The Naval Infantry also fields the Russian Navy's only special operations unit, known as the ‘commando frogmen’. Frogmen are typically drawn from the Naval Infantry's ranks, and they are capable of a wide range of special operations tasks and missions. Colloquially, Russian-speakers may refer to Naval Infantrymen using the abbreviation морпехи (morpekhi (plural), singular form: морпех (morpekh)).

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