Final Paper proposal

I used to work at a bank. For a little more than a year I accepted deposits, made withdrawals, and helped clients with their money. At first, the idea of handling so much money can be exciting, but the excitement wears thin fast, and all that remains is the dirt and grime from so many bills and coins. I think a final paper on how currency is a cultural text would be interesting, both because of my past experience but also because we see money everywhere, but rarely give it critical thought.

I am not certain where such a paper would fall between research and argumentative. The body of work available will no doubt be large enough to allow both. For now, I will work towards the latter, with the underlying argument that currency, as a text, within a culture is given power not through its importance but through its availability. As technology allows for objects such a debit/credit cards and electronic transactions, the pieces of paper we call money lose their power as a text.

To write this paper I will need to look into how cultures treat money. Not just as a physical object (such as spending and saving through different means) but also an abstract idea. Do companies with runaway inflation have better awareness of the culture printed on their currency, due to more money exchanging hands? Do countries without debit or credit card technology spend or save more? What did money mean to people years ago, when there was no technology to use?

Questions about culture are difficult to answer definitively. In most cases, such as with literature, we create the universe we explore; we say Shakespeare is good because because we say he is. With currency, our ability to express ourselves is limited. Because we do not fully define the text of currency it may be difficult to argue about its power.