Culture Diversity and Homogenization through Globalization.pptx

Subject Requirement

1. Cultural Diversity and Homogenization through Globalization

2. Cultural Diversity Is ethnic, gender, racial, and socioeconomic variety.

3. With the unparalleled acceleration of labor, capital, and information mobility in the age of globalization, local cultures, languages and national identities either influence or become influenced by other worldviews and expressive forms, resulting in massive cultural homogenization.

4. Cultural Homogenization Is an aspect of cultural globalization, listed as one of it’s main characteristics, and refers to the reduction in cultural diversity through the popularization and diffusion of a wide array of cultural symbols – not only physical objects but customs, ideas and values.

5. Developing countries that are at the receiving end of these global transactions yield to cultural erosion.

6. The discourse regarding the effects of globalization on cultural diversity is a challenging debate. The advancement of technology dissolves international boundaries and opens cultures to a whole new arena (Smith, 2000), enabling globalization to occur.

7. There is a paradoxical dichotomy, a tangible undercurrent, when it comes to globalization and cultural diversity. On one hand, globalization has the potential to mobilize and empower people, provide a means for self-representation, support a collective identity through socialization and provide employment opportunities.

8. Negative Influences There are a number of negative impacts globalization has had on cultural diversity, including the influence multinational corporations have on promoting a consumer culture, exploitation of workers and markets and influencing societal values.

9. Loss of individualism and group identity occur when globalization encourages a ‘Western ideal of individualism’.

10. The adoption of Western Culture and ideologies is seen as many computer-mediated technologies are developed, marketed and processed via western markets.

11. Not having access to technologies that are present in the classroom, combined with an education system geared toward the dominant society can be a lethal combination for non-dominant cultures. The present education, legal and power structures reflect western ideas and philosophies.

12. Globalization allows further colonization which impacts intellectual property and cultural rights.

13. Positive Influences The technological global mecca can be empowering for various cultures as it allows self-representation and information sharing on a whole new level.

14. Instead of destroying some cultures, as others predicted, mass media assists in the revitalizing and restoring of cultural preservation of nations (Ginsburg, 2002).

15. Global technology has provided the opportunity to redefine collective identity along with identifying a place for distinctive cultures. Global social, political and economic networks, combined with common goals, will no doubt enable the emerging empowerment among cultural peoples (Smith, 2000).

16. According to The Endangered Languages project, 40 percent of the world’s approximate 7,000 languages are at risk of disappearing, and this threat to language can belinked to economic globalization.

17. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary defines culture as the “total pattern of human behavior and its products embodied in speech, action, and artifacts and dependent upon man’s capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations”. Globalization raises the fear that this definition will have only one pattern to define; that the resulting absence of cultural diversity will, without intervention, leave succeeding generations with nothing but a homogenized, Westernized culture to inherit.

18. Cultural diversity can be strengthened through globalization by providing the means and wherewithal to support cultural groups attempting to make a difference in society while still maintaining their distinctive set of beliefs, practices and values.