The Cultural Imperialism Thesis

The Cultural Imperialism thesisIn contemporary society, atomic number 18nawideization has be settle an inevitable trend of the m oppositement. In 1985, Theodre Levitt first proposes the concept of orbiculateization it is used to describe the changes and training in the spherical thriftiness. Since indeed, the concept of sphericisation gradually blends into former(a) scientific atomic number 18as and it speedily becomes a popular topic in academia. Comp ared to the disputes on economical and political level, the conflicts of close are more subtle and more profound. Tomlison (1997) points out that delinquent to the imbalance of economic fortissimo, accordingly, in hea so domain it is divided into prevalent and vulnerable, that is the reason wherefore heathenish imperialism has been proposed. Therefore, maintaining the independence of their own culture in the exchanges of globalisation has become the reason tidy sum questioned the ethnical globalisation. As Le chner (2012, p. 340) confirms that modernistic media are immune carriers of globalization, global cultures are fiestaing by the media, much(prenominal) as the Internet and satellite boob tube, it is the media which shag turn the planet into a global village and make people feel closer than ever before. With the onward motion of media and pagan globalization dish out, re centimeime ontogenys in this field have light-emitting diode to a renewed intimacy in whether the ethnical imperialism thesis fanny be regarded as a way to agnize media globalization, and it has been a debatable and much disputed subject in present society.This essay begins by tracing back active arguings and the history about media globalization and then it leave alone go on to demonstrate an understanding of the heathen imperialism and the let out elements of it. After explaining some main critiques of the ethnical imperialism thesis, this paper seeks to prove that as an increasing number of c ountries gradually recognize that it is present momentant to protect and develop their local anaesthetic culture, the cultural imperialism thesis seems to be an unsuitable way to understand media globalization in the current international environment.Media GlobalizationMost scholars gestate that globalization must be associated with media and communicatings, the definition of globalization indirectly admit this point. Giddens (1990, p. 64 cited in Sreberny-Mohammadi, 2000, p. 118) defines globalization as the intensification of spherewide social traffic which splice distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away and vice versa. What on the dot links the distant localities? The answer impart be the media. Due to the hand of media engineering, the contact and communication between people from diverse places becomes more convenient, as Jameson (1998, p. 55) points out that globalization is a communicational concept, wh ich alternately masks and transmits cultural or economic meanings. It is McLuhan (1964) who first recognise the role of media, although he proposes the term global village which seems to be a negative way to understand globalization. His chastity is to illustrate the way out of communication technologies in our social life. Referring to media globalization, it seems that the development of it kindlyle be grouped into distinguishable historical periods by cardinal earthshaking pull ins of mean(a)s. To begin with, distances are no longer barriers to transnational communication because of the development of the telegraph. According to Thompson (1995), it was cable networks which connect Europe with China, Australia and South America, making mega survey audiences get in take a leakation around the orb. In the game place, Tomlinson (2004) states that the industrialized countries had been connect by satellite television. It had low-pitched through the time and space limitati ons so that worldwide audiences can sit in front of televisions and watch the same(p) events or easy lay operas at the same time. More exactly, that is the reason why tele philanders like Dallas can be widely spread. Finally, as modern technology is advancing at a rapid speed, as a media carrier the internet has completely changed the way people get knowledge. It brings information from different nations and diverse areas of the world to the individual computers or laptops.The performances of media globalization can be crock upitioned into three aspects. Firstly, as an important representation of the diverse national economy and culture, media products are spreading across the globe. People just need to fix some alonetons on the remote control or happen uponboard and then they will be able to access the media products they want from roughly any country via satellite television or online media, such as news, TV classs and soap operas. As for many Chinese young people, they c oncern about western sandwich technology news to learn about the latest electronic products, their mp3 players are playing the popular songs of Lady Gaga and Adele American TV serial publication are their favourites, such as Vampire Diaries and The Big Bang Theory. Media globalization means not plainly the dissemination of media products, but also the advance of media commercialization which is becoming the universal media form. That is to say besides the media productions themselves the proliferation of Western media form includes the type and form of programs and professional points and convention. orchestrate Chinese TV program as an example, media studio buys overseas manufacture model and then transmute the program to fit the viewing habits of Chinese audiences. Chinas Got Talent is the intimately flourishing case which comes from Britains Got Talent it has recorded audience rating for three times.The second aspect of media globalization is the dominant position of transn ational media family and market. The merger and acquisition of media companies have produced the large-scale media group for instance, the seven main global media giants which are Disney, AOL Time contendner, Sony, News Corporation, Viacom, Vivendi and Bertelsmann (McChesney, 2000). Assisted by the supranational strength and nation-state strength, these media groups sweep across the globe through discordant technologies and agencies. Since the nation is no longer the provider of media service, the restrictions are released in media ownership and broadcast communications domain. Globalization embodied in terms of ownership structure, production, distribution and expenditure of new transnational media systems. Through mergers and acquisitions, the media system which used to have classifiable national characteristics is becoming related to transnational media groups. Similarly, the production and consumption of media, such as drive and advertising production and consumption has been globalized as well. Take Thomson Reuters as an example, since Canadian media giant Thomson Corporation merged with the British Reuters throng it has become the biggest global financial information provider and the new company surpasses the major(ip)ity of former(a) competitors (BBC, 2007).Lastly, transnational media are dominate by global and regional production centres, and the information, productions and representations dod by it are hightail iting through digital communication networks. In the meantime, the counter-flow exist restrictedly, the ruling media assimilates the content and patterns of media from other countries selectively. much(prenominal) as film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, a story from China, but it is do by Hollywood. Similarly, the story of animation film Mulan which created by Disney is found on Chinese history. Although the culture and resources are taken from Chinese, the expression is global, and the producer remains a company of the unite pleads.The essence of cultural imperialismBefore discussing on the essence of cultural imperialism thesis, I attempt to explore some key elements primarily.Media McQuail (1994) claims that the media is a window for people to see the outside world, a take away to help the public understand mass experiences, a platform or a truck to transfer information. However, McLuhan (1964) did not agree with the idea that the media is only regarded as a tool for carrying materials or information, in his view, the medium is the message. for each one emergence of new media, no matter what the specific contents spread, the media form itself brings some information to human society and it may make some kinds of social changes. McLuhan (1964, p. 7) further explains that the personal and social consequences of any medium-that is, of any wing of ourselves-result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology. The aim he raises the pr oposition the medium is the message is to remind people that the impacts caused by any media are more remarkable than their specific contents. In other words, what media can transmit is far- arrive at more than the specific content he tries to draw peoples attention off from the content to the media itself. McLuhan (1964) also highlights that media are the extension of man, users of media also are the contents of media because they are creating contents, in particular the users of the Internet. In his view, Internet users differ from other media consumers no matter what they do on the Internet they always create contents. People are owners who can officiously manage media and give orders. In the cultural imperialism thesis, the media establish connections between developed countries and ontogeny countries, it can be separated into two categories, one is the productions of print media, television, radio and film the other is consumer goods such as Coca Cola, McDonald. Through thes e approaches, Western countries can spread the information which they want to convey around the world.Media culture Since the media play an increasingly important role in peoples daily lives, contemporary society is integrally entering into the media society, media and cultural communication has become a normal and major landscape for general public. In the concept of cultural imperialism, media culture is a culture of consumerism the centre of it is capitalist value. Sklair (2012) proposes that thither is a definite link between consumerism and global capitalist system which controlled by the capitalist multinational corporation in the 20th century. The special mission for global capitalist system in the third world is to promote consumerism and to allow consumers indirectly considering their consumption ability with overlooking their own productive capacity. For instance, developing countries import commercial television and programs from developed countries, transmitting weste rn TV series, repugnance films, detective stories and cowboy movies, making people hardiness a world which may have passed for years or did not exist in their real lives. Such media productions have a detrimental influence upon people in developing countries, eroding the national identities, restraining peoples creativity and spirit of participation.imperialist countries Western developed countries, especially the United States. Nonetheless there are merely few numbers of these countries. After years of capitalist operations, they have the majority of the worlds resources and accumulate enormous wealth which results in the unbalanced development of the world. Schiller (1991) confirms that they own not only hard power in political, economic and soldiers domains but also cultural soft power which is rife as well.Developing countries most of these countries had been independent after World War II they fell behind the western developed countries in political, economic, military and cultural fields. It can be said that they are still depending found on the economy of developed countries. In terms of developed countries, the developing countries are huge consumer markets which they can instil Western culture and values and get benefits from.Control Western countries hard impact developing countries by making use of cultural imperialism it is best characterized by settling differences with other nations and preserving from violation or infraction. Essentially, the core of cultural imperialism is Western countries, the circulation of global media productions shows an unequivocal imbalance-they circulate in one-way flow from western countries to the rest of the world (Varis, 1974). Due to the fact that Western countries control media systems and products, cultural imperialism enables third world countries make their economic, social, and political policies and public values connatural to western standards.As a result, it seems that the five elements of the cult ural imperialism thesis can be merged in a structure chartTransmitter Imperialist countries communicating content Media culture (culture of consumerism) Channels of communication media Audiences Developing countries Communicating effect Cultural globalizationSchiller (1976) stresses that cultural imperialism is not an isolated phenomenon it is a part of the modern imperialism influence. It has several practical characteristics in three aspects. First of all, the reigning countries in the economic domain, based on their powerful economic and capital strength, expand their economic, political and cultural influences to the rest of the world through the market. It results in a dominated and dependent relationship between the developed capitalist countries (especially the United States and Western European countries) and the developing countries (the Third World countries, such as countries in South America, Asia, and Africa). The products and fashion styles of developed countri es propagate to other countries through the market, it may lead to specific patterns of demand and consumption, so that cultural values, attitudes and behaviours of developed countries can be consolidated and supported.Furthermore, cultural imperialism is an expansion of cultural values, that is to say dominating global culture through products or commodities which restrain cultural values. In recent years, the Western national export cultural products to developing countries and make them let their values, this causes the invasions in cultural survival and development areas in developing countries. For example, although China is one of the net exporters of films besides the United States (Morley, 2006), in the film market of Chinese mainland, the interior(prenominal) films are heavily impacted by Hollywood films. Whenever Hollywood blockbusters like Transformers Dark of the slug is showing at major cinemas, the box offices of the Chinese domestic films in the same period are a lways poor. Since Chinese has been aware of the cultural soft power stands for a countrys overall image, one of the departments of authority called State Administration of Radio, Film and Television take several measures to support domestic movies, such as the month of home-made films protection. That means each year, in a relatively settled time, there is only few import films, almost all of the films shown in cinema are domestic. Although this is done to protect the domestic films, this approach still causes controversy. While confronting these impacts, developing countries not only face the threat of industrial colonization form, but also face a lack of creativity of the cultural industry.Finally, cultural imperialism achieves cultural expansion through the dissemination of information products. In contemporary society, the strong cultures of western countries come to pervade peoples daily lives by means of mass media and popular cultural products such as radio, television, adver tising, pop music, popular culture. Take the United States culture as an example it permeates almost every aspect of our daily lives. A new Hollywood blockbuster could always start a ceremony boom around us The pop music of American superstars such as Lady Gaga and Rihanna is playing among most Chinese pubs and shop malls an increasing number of young people become fans of the US TV series and the NBA show is an eternal topic for basketball enthusiasts.Main critiques of the cultural imperialismWith the continuous development of the globalization process and rise of audience studies, as the person who first proposes the cultural imperialism thesis, Schiller meets enormous challenges from other scholars. Especially after the end of the Cold War, the cultural imperialism thesis has caused more controversies.To begin with, there are increasing numbers of theorists recognizing that the international communication process is a mingled structure, the one-way flow explains of cultural imp erialism oversimplifies this interlacing process of information flow. According to Cunningham (1996), media globalization is no longer a one-way flow of media and cultural products from the western countries to the rest of the world. In recent years, India has become to a major out-sourcing exporter, movies made by Bollywood have aroused extensive concerns. For instance, as one of the most popular movies, 3 idiots has evoked worldwide repercussions. BBC (2010) reports that it has broken records for Indian films in the US, Australia, South Africa, Pakistan, Fiji and Kenya. In the American well-known film website IMDB, this film wins a score as high as 8.2 points in Rotten tomatoes, there are 92% of the audiences thinking that it is worth watching. In addition, the rise of Korean popular culture has aroused the widespread interest not only in the Asian countries, but also in the Western countries. In a lecture of the University of Leicester, the professor takes Girls Generation which created by S.M. Entertainment as an example to illustrate popular culture. These examples showed that global media and cultural propagation is a multi-directional flow process.Secondly, the communication process is a complex structure, there is no definite uniformity between encoding and decoding, and the uniform information can be decoded by the different audiences in different ways. That means audiences in the Third World may selectively submit information and values which made by western media corporations. Tomlinson (1997) criticizes that using media imperialism expresses the cultural imperialism thesis is not proven. He believes that the media is neutral and it is just an intermediary of the communication process, it is neither a kind of ideology nor the core of modern culture. He also notes that audiences should not be regarded as passive receptacles of media productions they cannot be dominated by media. Schiller (1991) concurs and further explains that there are a part of active audiences, they understand the information in their own ways, by their own judgment, most importantly, their understanding considered to have significance in cultural hegemony resisting. Above all, it seems that each audience has a different understanding of the same media products, and their attitudes are based on their own cultural background and experiences. They accept information which they mark with and in the meanwhile, excluding those they dislike and disagree with. To some extent, the decoding activities of active, critical and distasteful audiences weaken the effect of cultural imperialism gradually.Lastly, the cultural imperialism thesis seems to overlook the continue significance of national media systems and protectionism. Because of the fact that films of the US occupy 80 per cent of the European film market, While European movies only gets 2 per cent of the American market (Morley, 2006). In order to protect domestic films and television programs from the i mpact of the U.S. like products, some European countries (Canada and France) announce to restrict American imported media products (Tomlinson, 1997). With mention to the Middle East countries, as a typical of the Saudi Arabian national media system, Orbit thinks that a BBC program about criticizing the Saudi Arabian human rights has violated the law and culture of Muslims, then it banned the import and use of satellite dishes in 1994 (Sakr, 2001). To sum up, in the contemporary global environment, since an increasing number of countries realize to defend their cultural security, the force-feed type of the Western media productions spreading is becoming useless. The national media systems and protectionism play an increasingly important role in resisting the instillation of western cultures and values. remainderAs a central topic of the political and academic debate in the present age, different scholars have diverse views and opinions about globalization. Held (1999) provides an ov erview of various perspectives on globalization, he states that all the views can be divided into three classes Hyperglobalizers, Scepyics and Transformationalists. Differing from other two perspectives, transformationalists highlight that firstly there is no genius reason resulting in globalization moreover, as Giddens (1990 cited in Sreberny-Mohammadi, 2000) states that the outcome of the globalization process is uncertain. I agree with this viewpoint and in my opinion globalization is a complicated process, it cannot be easily defined as commanding or negative, it must be understood in more complex ways.Above all, I argue that globalization is a process which is give and full of conflicts, its essence is to establish a system for culture of exchanging and communicating, consequently, it may create a new media pattern. Media globalization is an objective reality which caused by the development of economic globalization, and the emergence of it is an objective historical process of media development. The cultural imperialism thesis is a negative way to understand media globalization, and it oversimplifies this complex process of information flow. In this process, exchange, collision and convergence between different cultures are overall based on maintaining their own independence, it is a two-way process instead of a one-way course which makes majority of countries become similar to the Western style. In the process of media globalization, communication and integration of various cultures will not lead to cultural assimilation in contrast, diversification which emphasizes the differences and diverseness is the expected trend of human culture. Multicultural, not only refers to the cultural diversity, but also means the differences in deep-seated level of culture and these differences can be recognized on a global scale. It is a kind of cultural imperforation when it only assimilates or controls cultures of other nations but does not accept and absorb outst anding achievements from other national cultures. The real media exchange is judge and absorbing the outstanding and advanced cultural elements, it is not only from canonic structure but also the inherent quality and spirit.