The Cultural Globalization - Essay Example

?DOES CULTURAL GLOBALIZATION INEVITABLY RESULT IN CULTURAL HOMOGENIZATION? Introduction “Contemporary globalization is the increasing flow of trade, finance, culture, ideas, and people” (Lewellen 2002: 7-8) across the world. The development of sophisticated technology, communications and travel, as well as the worldwide spread of neoliberal capitalism promote globalization. Thus, cultural globalization is the exchange of cultural elements and concepts among various regions. This occurs both through outflows of cultural products and norms, as well as inflows and incorporation of the cultural aspects of other regions. Globalization includes the local and regional adaptations to these flows, as well as resistances against adopting them. Globalization is an ongoing process, and the term has come into use since around 1990. The spread from one region to another of different symbols, products and concepts of culture across the globe, and their incorporation into new cultures are key to cultural globalization. It is important to understand whether the mutual assimilation of new cultures by different countries leads to their homogenization and uniformity of culture. Thesis Statement: The purpose of this paper is to determine whether cultural globalization inevitably results in cultural homogenization. Cultural Globalization Results in Homogenization and Differentiation Traditional concepts of culture are challenged by globalization. Culture was considered as that which differentiated one group from another, thereby identifying “otherness”. Culture has been one of anthropology’s main means of categorization; however the flexible boundaries today makes the concept of culture even more abstract. Lewellen (2002: 162) states that “globalization tends to break down categories; boundaries dissolve and once-differentiated types overlap, flow into each other, are transformed by contact into new forms, and take on unanticipated meanings in new contexts”. Significantly, globalization produces homogenization as well as differentiation, often within the same person or group. On the other hand, if there is unimpeded or unobstructed globalization, it can result in cultural homogenization of a mostly Western form. While cultural homogenization connects people and places, at the same time it is also likely to polarize, differentiate and exclude people (Stone, Haugerud & Little 2000: 3). Moreover, globalization is almost never unimpeded. Nationalism, ethnicity, nongovernmental organizations, and transnational communities form a defense to prevent economic and political marginalization, cultural disintegration, and anomy or social instability caused by erosion of cultural standards. This is also true for cultural assimilation of transnational communities. Modernization theory predicted increasing cultural homogenization through assimilation of ethnic groups in western cultures over several generations. However, mainly due to global technology it is increasingly possible to maintain one’s ethnic identity through quick visits to home country by air, cheap and instantaneous communication with family that stayed behind, business networks and financial transactions both ways, expatriate participation in home-country politics, and a constant introduction of new immigrants from home country contribute to sustaining migrant ethnicity for long periods of time, and prevents homogenization with host culture. Contemporary anthropologists tend to look for differences and not similarity, resistance not accommodation, transnationalism not assimilation. Friedman (1994) states that there are several examples of cultural devolution which are not represented in evolutionary theories. Examples are cultures such as those of Hawaii, North American and Peruvian Indians, and Congo pygmies that have lost much of their original autonomy and complexity as they are absorbed into the peripery of dominant cultures. Anthropologists agree that no cultural convergence is observable, and it is likely that the “total repertoire of cultural forms in the world has been shrinking for some time (Brumann 1998: 499). The simple principle behind cultural homogenization is that it occurs in some cultures, and it does not in other cultures. Several individuals and groups are being absorbed into a sort of globalized, mostly Western culture. Particular cultures are inevitably transformede by changes in technology, mobility, and more porous and malleable boundaries. However, rather than being absorbed, it is the specific cultures that do most of the absorbing. There appear to be two spheres of culture. At the global level is a superficial Coca-Cola culture composed of comparatively unintegrated characteristics. The most significant and the most promoted trait for achieving global profits is consumerism. Other traits, not all of them Western, are “factory work-time, music videos, women’s fashion, T-shirts, white weddings, television and radio soap operas, Chinese food, bilateral kinship, acceptance of diverse gender roles, and the worship of technological innovation” (Lewellen 2002: 53). Cultural Homogenization is Adapted to Regional Culture Like Congolese Soukouss music for which a demand has been created in the widest possible market, the beauty industry was promoted by India to increase business and tourism, through “intensive advertising campaigns, fashion shows, pervasive television images, and beauty pageants” (Lewellen 2002: 51). This occurred from 1994, when two Indian women won both top international pageants that year. Besides the deeper feminist implications, this was an example of cultural imperialism, of the extension of Western conceptions of commercialized female beauty to India. However, Bhaskaran (2003) states that the current beauty industry reinforces norms of gender identities which are tied into the patriarchal institutions of kinship-making which embody the practices of state-making, nation-building and authenticity. While the beauty contest itself has a Western origin and Western corporate sponsorship, it has a different meaning from similar contests in the United States which promote pageants as vehicles for empowering liberated women who are well educated and aspire to serve humanity. Contrastingly, in India existing patriarchal roles are reinforced with women being represented as symbols of the traditional nation with women’s sexuality still “bounded, taboo, dangerous, something to be owned and managed by men” (Lewellen 2002: 51). A study conducted by Li (1998) of the recent emergence of a similar fashion and beauty industry in communist China complete with professional modeling and beauty contests, has a similar theme. While the outward manifestations are globalized-Western, the underlying conceptualizations are Chinese which can be linked to a long history of cultural attitudes towards evolving female roles. In the long term, Western fashions may help to develop resistance against patriarchy, the immediate outcome is part of a process of disempowerment, or return to a precommunist form of patriarchy, “in which the traditional gender hierarchy has been reinforced” (Lewellen 2002: 51). Conventional delegation of gender roles are thereby recast “into the sexist occupational structure of the new market economy” (Xiaoping Li 1996: 216). Hip-hop music that came out of the American urban Black ghetto was adopted by rebellious young, middle-class people in Japan. There it was combined with karaoke for which Japan is the home-country, from where the music technique had spread to the West. Condry (1999) studied Japanese musical borrowing; he notes that the transnational cultural ‘market’ is different from the local ‘scene’. The global market is based mainly on accruing profits, while the local scene remains rooted to history and culture. These studies have the common thread of cultural homogenization versus fragmentation, which is found to be a complex issue. The old modernization theory similar to neoliberalism stated that traditional society would inevitably be absorbed by development, therefore Western cultural hegemony would inescapably overrun non-Western cultures. This perspective is totally incorrect, with evidence of increasing ethnicities, nationalisms, retribalisms and the like. Further, not all adopted traits are transformative. According to Ong (1999) Asia has its own ancient history of multicultural heritage that constrains global processes that value consumerism, mobility and flexibility. Transnational global processes are underscored by cultural logics ensuring transformations, adaptations and resistances to other cultures in complex ways. For example, China maintains an “authoritative Asian” political model, while on the other hand opening itself to neoliberal globalization. Globalization, Communications Media and Neo-Imperialism According to Tomlinson (1999), the term ‘cultural imperialism’ appeared in the 1960s discourse of intellectual radical criticism. The concept means that a country uses its power to spread its culture which might negatively impact a native culture. An example is China, where cultural imperialism is always conveying a negative meaning that can encounter radical critiques because of the long history of the invasion of imperialist nations. In his critique of the political economy of media communications worldwide, Boyd-Barrett (2006) takes into consideration the conflicting forces applied by globalization and “neo-imperialism”. The former is the dismantling of barriers to trade and cultural exchange, it responds significantly to lobbying of the world’s largest corporations including media corporations. The latter relates to the United States’ pursuit of national security interests as response to “terrorism” on the one side, and to intensifying competition among nations and corporations for global natural resources. According to Castells (2000), the issue of the method of communication has dominated the transfer of information in society until today. Changes have arisen by the introduction of new technologies. The rise of the mass media is considered to be an initial example of the shift away from the written word towards a more visually based process of communication. The advent of television is presented as the primary example of this. This system is unidirectional, the one-way communication system of mass-media conflicts with the actual process of communication which depends on the interaction between the sender and receiver for interpreting the message. The major approaches that McPhail (2006) puts forth are that the large multi-national media corporations, international non-governmental organizations, and transnational broadcasters have blurred not only state borders but also the definition of sovereignty itself. Development of the “new media” caused the collapse of bi-polar hegemony and created a vacuum in world information and communications. This void was filled by the multi-national media corporations, international non-governmental organizations, and transnational broadcasters. McPhail (2006) states that the current media landscape is dominated by the global economy. While transnational and global broadcasting threaten to amalgamize and homogenize the world, and reduce the significance of geo-political boundaries of states, the Internet has had the opposite effect of promoting a strengthening of nationalism and localism, while protecting and reinforcing indigenous cultures, groups and languages. In addition to reducing the importance of formalized media systems, the Internet has empowered individuals around the world to reach out to like-minded individuals with no constraints of geography or time, because the medium is both synchronous and asynchronous, as well as local and global in its reach. On globalization there have conventionally been two approaches. First, that it leads to homogenization of cultures worldwide, and secondly that globalization leads cultures to become rigid in order to protect themselves from external impacts. Pieterse (2004), however, argues that there is a third concept, which states that globalization leads to cultural hybridity. This refers to the spaces between the intermixing of cultures. The historically deep and geographically wide perspective argues that the globalization of culture is not an exclusively modern phenomenon. Striving to separate globalization from the bonds of modernity where it has always been analyzed, a long-term evolutionary perspective is advocated. This gives an alternative to the idea that cultures do not mix, they only overrun or resist. The hybridity arguments show that cultures have been mingling and intermixing since the earliest time of human history. The virtual reconstruction of the field of international communication comes close to reality. Thussu (2006) reveals that the very history of the field has evolved through strong Marxist influences. There is increasing blurring of the national and domestic dimensions in communications. Hence, the domain of the field is extended to what is considered as domestic political communication. The structure of opportunities for political action is not defined by the national or international dualism anymore, but is now located in the global arena. Global politics have changed into global domestic politicss, which deprive national politics of their limits and basic foundations. The very boundaries of international communications need to be resolved. Conclusion This paper has investigated cultural globalization and its impact on cultural homogenization. The evidence indicates that as a result of cultural globalization, there is both cultural homogenization as well as differentiation. Moreover, there is a significant role played by each country’s own culture, due to which cultural homogenization is adapted to regional culture of the place. Further, globalization, communications media and neo-imperialism are interconnected and play powerful roles in cultural homogenization through globalization. It is concluded that globalization brings about cultural homogenization only to some extent, because of the influence of technology in helping to preserve ethnicity, and links with one’s own culture. Bibliography Bhaskaran, M. (2003). China as potential superpower: Regional responses. Germany: Deutsche Bank Research. Boyd-Barrett, O. (Eds). Communications, media, globalization and empire. Eastleigh: John Libbey. Brumann, C. (1998). An anthropological study of globalization: Towards an agenda for the second phase. Anthropos, 93: pp.495-506. Castells, M. (2000). The rise of network society. 2nd Edition. Oxford: Blackwell. Condry, I. (1999). Japanese rap music: An ethnography of globalization in popular culture. The United States of America: Yale University Press. Friedman, J. (1994). Cultural identity and global process. 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