The medium of payment typically is defined as that which is generally accepted in payment for goods and services or in the settlement of debt. Perhaps because modern monetary systems function so well in providing media of payment, we seldom consider the question of why they enjoy the general acceptability by which they are identified. Yet, because monetary systems evolve and change, such basic questions warrant occasional re-examination to ensure that contemporary analysis does not, unwittingly, embody and foster the errors of an earlier time.

Culture is a pillow-word; it shapes itself according to the head resting upon it. In 1968, a group of experts convened by UNESCO defined it as the means by which all goals are articulated, or as the sum of the means created by man to ensure his existence or communicate with his fellows. Another meeting in 1970 took up this definition again, and posited culture as the sum total of knowledge and modes of thought and action which allow man to order his own behavior, his relationships with other men and nature.

In the course of the last few centuries the evolution of literature has been marked by the entry of Eastern countries into the system of social and spiritual relationships which came into being in the West at the beginning of the 17th century. This evolution is linked with the changes which have been grouped together as “modernization.” The content of this modernization coincides, more or less, with what Marx and Engels described, in the first chapter of the Communist Manifesto, as the expansion of the bourgeoisie. However, in the 20th century, the possibility of a non-capitalist path has become apparent, and therefore the theory of modernization gives a wider sense to the character of the ruling class (which, in the 19th century, was the European bourgeoisie), and emphasizes changes of a general nature: the differentiation of the social structure, the birth of new institutions and new roles, economic differentiation, industrialization, urbanization, increased vertical and horizontal mobility, cultural differentiation, the birth of a science independent of religion, the substitution of a businesslike, rational attitude to life for a religious one, the development of civic awareness and of civil rights. The cradle of modernization (England, Holland, France) is conventionally called “the West.” Other countries, including those situated to the west of France (e.g. Spain, Portugal) are considered as “the non-West.”

A primary image suggests itself to anyone who wishes to assert that every society exfoliates in several ways, such as in technics, organization, the sacred, the recreational, the beautiful, etc. all in one movement which is simultaneously both differentiated and integral. This image is of a fan, whose stems diverge from a center and are linked in the one unfolding; but another assertion immediately intervenes, claiming that this picture is over-optimistic: it is the assertion of the disparities between these ways, or domains, which disrupt the pattern of the whole by modifying its aspect and which can alter its meaning. If one wishes, one may call these the contradictions.

Structuralism, Robert Scholes tells us, embodies “a ‘scientific’ view of the world as both real in itself and intelligible to man.” In order to achieve objectivity and descriptive adequacy in the human sciences, structuralists have generally adopted the linguistic model of Ferdinand de Saussure via Prague school structural linguistics. The common assumption has it that structural linguistics, given its method of abstracting language into an autonomous object for empirical analysis, now constitutes itself as a true science, worthy of emulation by other disciplines in the social sciences and in the humanities. However, there has been sparse inquiry into the validity of the general “scientific” foundations upon which the structuralist methodology rests. In response to this critical deficiency the present commentary will aim: (1) to subject the underlying presuppositions of structuralism to close scrutiny in the light of past and present scientific paradigms, and (2) to suggest, as a consequence of the first objective, that structuralism is based on premises which are not consistent with current scientific and epistemological lines of reasoning.

Communications research and theory has its origins in the development of the media of communication, particularly mass media. In the beginning, starting around the turn of the century, studies of mass communication were occasional exercises carried out from the traditional bases of history, law, etc. But as the social importance of mass communication increased with mass-circulated commercial press and particularly after the introduction of radio broadcasting in the twenties, this field of social communications research began to grow and take shape. First it was usually associated with particular media, like German Zeitungswissenschaft (‘Newspaper science’) or American ‘radio research.’ The latter was strongly stimulated by the market needs of rapidly expanding commercial broadcasting which in this form of audience research at the same time served as the main force to develop general public opinion surveys. Gradually, however, media-bound approaches were replaced by a more general view of the mass media; in the German area this development led between the wars to the emergence of Publizistik (‘Science of public communication’) while the concept of ‘communication research’ broke through in the American arena towards the end of the forties (significantly enough, Paul Lazarsfeld and his colleagues even changed the title of their series ‘Radio Research’ into ‘Communication Research’).

The League of Arab States, concerned by the diverse reactions caused in the Arab world by the publication of Antoine С. Mattar's article, “The Arabic Language and Present Conditions and Prospects for the Future of the Arabic-Speaking World” in Diogenes No. 83 (Fall 1973), pages 64-76, has sent to the editors of the magazine their response, published below, which was prepared at their request by Dr. Abdel Sabbour Chahine and which represents their point of view. The editors of Diogenes are very pleased to publish their answer and remind its readers that the opinions published are the sole responsibility of the author and the League of Arab States.