Peoples in the Scandinavian and German (German-language) culture areas, by contrast, are much more aware of belonging to broader regional civilizations.
Growing up in Trinidad, Naipaul came to appreciate that beyond his rooted-in-the-past family and his little island, there was something broader, a "universal civilization" based on individualism, personal responsibility and the right to pursue one's own vocation.
Although the broad zone of civilization spread steadily, so that by the reign of the Roman emperor Trajan (98 117 ce) there was a continuous band of civilized societies from Britain to the China Sea, it was always at risk from the barbarian nomads who roamed the great steppelands of central Eurasia.
And from that, the broad lines of their civilization can only be deduced.
Mr. Lewis often seems to treat the Ottoman Empire as a template for the entire Muslim civilization, drawing broad conclusions about all Muslims from Turkish examples even as he writes elsewhere of the ancient differences and great rivalries among Turks, Persians, Arabs and other Islamic nations.
According to the currently available data, the intake of a balanced diet is strongly recommended for maintaining health and for the prevention of a broad spectrum of "Western civilization" diseases like cancer.
Whether a broad spectrum of civilizations from many places in the galaxy would even be able to cooperate is disputed by Michaud, who states that civilizations with huge differences in the technologies and resources at their command "may not consider themselves even remotely equal".
"Parade's End" tells the story of a bad marriage, set in a much broader context of a rotting civilization.
Both "fizzled," because, no matter how horrible, this war must go on until broad principles of security and civilization are re-established.
Thanks to a subsequent increase in the number of civilizations known to Western students of cultural morphology, Oswald Spengler, a German philosopher of history, was able, in the early 20th century, to make a comparative study of civilizations over a much broader spectrum than that of Vico.
