GLOBAL MEDIA CULTURES

Week 10
LEARNING OUTCOME
 Analyze how various media drive various forms
of global integration.
 Explain the dynamic between local and global
cultural production.
GLOBALIZATION AND MEDIA

Globalization- a set of multiple, uneven

and sometimes overlapping historical processes,
including economics, politics, and culture, that
have combined with the evolution of media
technology to create the conditions under which
the globe itself can now be understood as “an
imagined community”.
 The two concepts have been partners throughout
the whole of human history.
 “Globalization and media have created the
conditions through which many people can now
imagine themselves as part of one world.”
EVOLUTION OF MEDIA AND
GLOBALIZATION
 To understand further the study of globalization
and media, it is important to appreciate five
periods of the evolution of media and
globalization.
1. ORAL COMMUNICATION
 Language allowed human to cooperate.
 It allowed sharing of information.

 Language became the most important tool as

human being explored the world and experience
different cultures.
 It helped them move and settle down.

 It led to markets, trade and cross-continental

trade.
2. SCRIPT
 Language was important but imperfect, distance
became a strain for oral communication.
 Script allowed human to communicate over a
larger space and much longer times.
 It allowed for the written and permanent
codification of economic, cultural, religious, and
political practice.
3. THE PRINTING PRESS
 It started the “information revolution”.
 It transformed social institutions such as schools,
churches, governments and more.
 Elizabeth Eisenstein (1979) surveyed the
influences of the printing press.
1. It changed the nature of knowledge. It
preserved and standardized knowledge.
2. It encouraged the challenge of political and
religious authority because of its ability to
circulate competing views.
4. ELECTRONIC MEDIA
 The vast reach of these media continues to open up new
vistas in the economic, political, and cultural processes of
globalization.
 Radio- quickly became a global medium, reaching distant
regions.
 Television- considered as the most powerful and pervasive
mass medium. It brought together the visual and aural
power of the film with the accessibility of radio.
 The electronic media and communication sector, which
ranges from telecommunication networks and the Internet,
through to radio, television and film, is itself among the most
active in the current drive for the globalization of
production, markets and trade
5. DIGITAL MEDIA
 Digital Media are often electronic media that rely
on digital code.
 Many of our earlier media such as phones and
tv’s are now considered digital media.
 In the realm of computer it allowed citizens to
access information from around the world.
ROLE OF MEDIA IN GLOBALIZATION
 Mass media plays a key role in extension
of globalization process.
The media components such as television,
Internet, computers etc. are considered to
have a paramount influence on
globalization. ... Radio is one of the
easiest and cheapest media sources.
“Is it possible for
globalization to
occur without
media?”
GLOBAL IMAGINARY AND GLOBAL
VILLAGE
 Media have linked the globe with stories, images,
myths and metaphors.
 Global Imaginary- the globe itself as imagined
community.
 Global Village
 Marshall McLuhan
 Media have connected the world in ways that create a
global village.
 As McLuhan predicted media and globalization have
connected the world. However, the “global village
have brought no collective harmony or peace. Why do
think so?
GLOBAL VILLAGE

 The world viewed as a community in which

distance and isolation have been dramatically
reduced by electronic media (such as television
and the Internet)
DID YOU KNOW?
 The term global village is closely associated with
Herbert Marshall McLuhan, the Canadian
communications theorist and literature professor
hailed by many as a prophet for the 20th century.
McLuhan's mantra, "the medium is the message,"
summarized his view of the influence of television,
computers, and other electronic information sources in
shaping society and modern life. By 1960, he had
delineated his concept of the "global village," and by
1970, the public had embraced the term and recognized
the idea as both exhilarating and frightening. As a
1970 Saturday Review article noted, "There are no
boundaries in a global village. All problems will become
so intimate as to be one's own...."
MEDIA AND ECONOMIC GLOBALIZATION
 Media fosters the conditions for global capitalism.
 “Economic and cultural globalization arguably
would be impossible without a global commercial
media system to promote global markets and to
encourage consumer values” – Robert Mc
Chesney
MEDIA AND POLITICAL GLOBALIZATION
 Though media corporations are themselves
powerful political actors, individual journalists
are subject to intimidations as more actors
contend for power.
 In the age of political globalization: government
shape and manipulate the news. Is this also true
for Philippines?
 Media complicate politics…how?
MEDIA AND CULTURAL GLOBALIZATION
 Media on one level are the carriers of culture.
 It generates numerous and on-going interactions

 Globalization will bring about and increasing

blending or mixture of cultures. What is the role
of media in the blending or mixture of culture?
POPULAR MUSIC AND GLOBALIZATION
 Technologies of transport, of information and
mediation, including social media platforms, have
made possible the circulation of cultural
commodities such as music.
 Circulation of cultural commodities are consumed
to gain cultural capital and social status.
 Goods and commodities became a catalyst that
set globalization.
MATERIALS TO BE READ
 Chapter 22…. The Sage Handbook of
Globalization
 Globalization of Culture Through Media by:
Marwan M. Kraidy
 Rethinking Globalization through Music by Bob
W. White
GUIDE QUESTIONS FOR GROUP
DISCUSSION

 Has McLuhan’s ideal of “global village” become a

reality? Are there any consequences of
McLuhan’s concept of “global village”?
 To what extent do global media serves guardians
of free speech, democracy and justice?
 How did popular music facilitated the circulation
of cultural commodities around the world?
Thank you!
GLOBALISATION AND THE MASS
MEDIA.

Learning intention: Understand the different

interpretations of the role of the mass media in
globalisation.
Learning outcome: Produce a definition of
globalisation.
Discuss and define key concepts relating to the
mass media and globalisation.
Produce a poster outlining the arguments viewing
the mass media as either a positive or negative
driver of globalisation.
WHAT DO WE UNDERSTAND
GLOBALISATION TO BE?

 In your groups come up with a definition of

globalisation. 5 mins.
CONSIDER THIS DEFINITION.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oTLyPPrZE4&list=L
PiJ6FFxBthwc&index=1&feature=plcp
(0 – 2:43 mins. Then 5mins)

Does this match up with our idea of globalisation?

HOW DOES GLOBALISATION AFFECT OUR LIVES?
 GLOBALISATION - DEFINITION
Globalisation is the process by which the world is becoming increasingly
interconnected as a result of massively increased trade and cultural exchange.

Globalisation has increased the production of goods and services. The biggest
companies are no longer national firms but multinational corporations with
subsidiaries in many countries.

Globalisation has been taking place for hundreds of years, but has speeded up
enormously over the last half-century.

Globalisation has resulted in:

• increased international trade
• a company operating in more than one country
• greater dependence on the global economy
• freer movement of capital, goods, and services
• recognition of companies such as McDonalds and Starbucks in LEDCs
Although globalisation is probably helping to create more wealth in developing
countries - it is not helping to close the gap between the world's poorest
countries and the world's richest.
SO WHERE DOES THE MEDIA FIT INTO
THIS?

Many people have argued that

globalisation and the mass
media go hand in hand. How can
we account for the mass media
in the process of globalisation?
Discuss in your groups.

Boyle (2007) argues that the mass

media has changed the way young
people see themselves. Young people
spend more and more time online on
social networks with a global reach.
IS THE MASS MEDIA A POSITIVE FORCE IN
GLOBALISATION?

• McLuhan (1962) used the term global village. What

does this mean?

The argument for….

• Mass media is a force for positive change in the world.

• Mass media breaks down barriers of understanding.

• Can we now have ‘real world’ conversations in the

digital sphere that would have otherwise not taken
place?
IS THE MASS MEDIA A POSITIVE FORCE IN
GLOBALISATION?

• Flew (2002) suggests the media, through

globalisation, has created a global popular culture.
What is this? Flew (2002)

• Through TV, satellite, advertising and the internet,

global corporations such as Starbucks, have spread a
globally identifiable culture.

• Global culture or mass culture is everyday mass

media designed for mass consumption e.g. tabloid
newspapers, MTV, Hollywood films.

• ACTIVITY BRANDS SHEET - In your groups discuss

how these products and brands generate a global
culture.
IS THE MASS MEDIA A POSITIVE FORCE IN
GLOBALISATION?

• The Pluralist approach to the mass media. What is

this?
PLURALIST

• Argue that the media, like society, has become more

diverse; it offers greater variety and choice than ever
before.

• Consumers are in control and have the benefit of

huge choice in their media consumption – widening
their cultural horizons and giving them access to
high culture. What is this?
High culture is set apart from mass culture, often
aimed at middle and upper-class audiences. E.g.
Intellectual literature, opera, documentaries.
IS THE MASS MEDIA A NEGATIVE FORCE IN
GLOBALISATION?

• How could we be critical of the mass media’s role in

globalisation? Why does this matter?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ho6DCYggFKo

MARXIST CRITIQUE, CULTURAL IMPERIALISM?

or
MEDIA IMPERIALISM? What is this?

• Fenton (1999) argues that global culture has led to

the westernisation of other cultures. The mass media
forces western cultural values (especially American)
on non-western countries.

• The mass media is damaging other cultures and

promoting cultural homogenisation, where
everything is the same.
 IS THE MASS MEDIA A NEGATIVE FORCE IN
GLOBALISATION?

OTHER CRITICISMS OF THE MASS MEDIA AND

GLOBALISATION

• Corporate entities a threat to democracy.

• Lack of regulation – the internet is the wild west of

information.

• Mass audiences has led to the ‘dumbing down’ of content,

there is actually less consumer choice.

• Increased social isolation. Virtuality and a loss of social

capital (real human networks of support in communities).

• Digital divide whereby those who don’t have access to the

mass media miss out, creating global inequalities.