media, globalisation and popular culture

Question 1

Crothers - globalisation

Answer 1

• new and increased relationships have been created between people, social networks and ideas go beyond traditional state borders
• new links between people (production of goods, capital & consumption) creates a greater effect on other’s lives
• speed of communication & expectation of instantaneous contact means local issues have become global issues

Question 2

Bell - globalisation

Answer 2

Facebook has 1.2 billion users engaged in constructing and reconstructing their identities through posts

Question 3

media & globalisation

Answer 3

advances have transformed the world’s concept of time and space due to 24hour instantaneous news globally

Question 4

McChesney - media & globalisation

Answer 4

majority of the world’s media is dominated, in terms of revenue generated, by fewer than 10 global corporations

Question 5

globalisation of popular culture

Answer 5

globalisation of media = large section of world’s population engaging in same popular culture = homogenisation of culture

Question 6

globalisation of folk culture

Answer 6

tourists travelling to see traditional dances/songs after seeing them on the internet

Question 7

globalisation of high culture

Answer 7

widened access e.g. see van Gough on tv and internet

Question 8

post-modernist perspective

Answer 8

• mass media & identity
• media saturation, rejection of meta narratives and relativity of knowledge
• participatory culture
• globalisation of media and popular protest
• effect of global media on local cultures

Question 9

Stinati - mass media and identity

Answer 9

distinction between high/low culture blurred = increased consumer choice
media = people more aware of diversity of choices = changes in consumer patterns

Question 10

media saturation, rejection of meta narratives and the relativity of knowledge

Answer 10

media-saturated society produces media-literate audience that is aware there is no single & absolute truth and ways of looking at the world are relative = all povs have some value

Question 11

Shirky - participatory culture

Answer 11

global culture more democratic because users can produce culture themselves

Question 12

Jenkins - participatory culture

Answer 12

audience participation empowers users = can challenge meta-narratives
participatory culture creates new communities as people feel more connected

Question 13

Murthy - globalisation of media and popular protest

Answer 13

Facebook & Twitter increases political awareness of issues = helps coordinate a mass political response

Question 14

Spencer-Thomas - globalisation of media and popular protest

Answer 14

• 1988 mass anti-gov demonstrations in Burma failed to receive much media attention due to military regime banning overseas journalists
• new media allowed 2007 demonstrations to receive global attention = instant global criticism

Question 15

Cohen and Kennedy - global media on local cultures

Answer 15

CPs underestimate strength of local cultures = don’t abandon cultural traditions just hybridise with global culture

Question 16

effect of global media on local cultures

Answer 16

British cultural identity positively influenced by a range of cultures from around the world brought to us by global media

Question 17

Disneyfication/Americanisation

Answer 17

marxist view that local culture is being replaced with global culture which is overwhelmingly American

Question 18

media imperialism/cultural homogenisation

Answer 18

cultures blending into one

Question 19

Kellner

Answer 19

global media erases individuality and difference and global media ‘dumbs down’ real authentic local cultures

Question 20

pomo criticism

Answer 20

• exaggerate degree of social change
• inequalities effect consumption

Question 21

Marcuse - media encourages conformity

Answer 21

• commodity fetishism
• false needs
• conspicuous consumption

Question 22

Turkle - commodity fetishism

Answer 22

people see phones as an extension of themself and feel lost without
products have special powers to enhance life

Question 23

conspicuous consumption

Answer 23

certain products presented as having more status = encourages buying to be seen with the ‘right’ cultural products

Question 24

Flew - globalisation of Americanisation

Answer 24

globalisation just another name for americanisation = use imposes media products, therefore its popular culture on less powerful nations

Question 25

McChesney - globalisation of Americanisation

Answer 25

concentration of media companies by few American TNCs (Disney, Times Warner, Google) results in American cultural imperialism

Question 26

Hannerz - effect of americanisation

Answer 26

‘Coca-colonisation’
- American products penetrating cultures and consciousness of people in less-developed countries
- aim to replace local cultures with dumbed down American culture

Question 27

Barber - effect of americanisation

Answer 27

fundamentalists see American popular culture as a threat that undermines commitment to God = rise of Islamic fundamentalism

Question 28

Turkle - globalisation of media

Answer 28

porto-communities of chat-rooms, blogging and imagined communities of soap operas are replacing real communities

Question 29

Held - criticism of CP

Answer 29

• underestimates strength & richness of local communities
• assumes flow of culture is one way and not whole world becoming hybridised