The Influence of Globalization on the Cultural Elements of Human Beings - Essay Example

This paper illustrates that according to social anthropologists, globalization significantly causes the phenomena of cultural contact, cultural clash or cultural conflict. Globality, which is an offshoot of globalization, has become one of the virtually unavoidable problems of contemporary life and it brings dangers as well as hopes for the human cultures. Globalization of the cultures has been the recent focus of cultural anthropology and the impact of modern, western institutions of globalization have an enormous impact on the local ways, norms and values, customs and mores, religious creeds, patterns of family life, modes of production and consumption, and every element of culture.

Significantly, the vast majority of us live local lives and globalization has a devastating impact on the culture of people, changing the very texture of locality and the nature of cultural experience in general. As John Tomlinson purports, "No longer is culture 'tied' to the constraints of local circumstances. What this implies is not that globalization destroys localities but that cultural experience is in various ways 'lifted out' of its traditional 'anchoring' in particular localities' This 'deterritorialising' aspect of globalization - felt in very ordinary everyday practices like shopping, watching television, phoning our friends, visiting a restaurant - is ' cultural impact of globalization that we must begin both theoretically and empirically to understand.

" Therefore, the impact of globalization on cultural change has been far-reaching and various modern global issues such as globalization, global warming, and the shortage of cheap, easily accessed oil will bring about fundamental changes in the socio-cultural aspects of humanity. Significantly, there are two opposing ideological responses to the recent influence of globalization on the cultural elements of human beings. The anthropologists who embrace 'cultural relativism' consider this as a case of 'cultural imperialism' which can result in catastrophic consequences such as the elimination of indigenous cultures, the loss of cultural autonomy of independent societies, and overall impoverishment of the cultures.

On the contrary, the anthropologists who profess 'ethnocentrism' as the consequence of globalization praise the mission of the west to civilize the world. "The processes of globalization embracing all aspects of contemporary social life, economic, political, cultural, become reflected in the social consciousness. The manner in which people conceive of the world, both their local world and the world as a whole, undergoes considerable change. Various new images of the world appear' All of them acquire reflexive casual importance, become independent casual variables co-shaping globalizing tendencies.

" In other words, it is incontestable that globalization has been and will be assuming a great role in cultural change and various aspects of human culture will undergo a transformation in the immediate future. In a profound exploration of the impact of globalization on cultural change, one recognizes that it is an essential factor in the change of culture, global identity etc and it influences cultural changes locally, nationally, and personally.