Globalisation and Culture (Dong Ying)
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Culture:
"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." ~ Webster's Third New International Dictionary
Indeed, globalisation signifies a very substantial change in culture, but whether this change is good or bad is determined by how we accept change itself. For so long we have dealt with cultural animosity, arising out of cultural differences which can be further differentiated into three broad categories, which include religious conflict, ethnicity conflict, and conflict between between cultures that are similar in a respect but have some significant differences. Some examples of these conflicts include that of the Christian and Muslim, between Anglo-Saxon Americans and the African Americans, and between the territorial conquest of Britain and France respectively. Thus, this absence in cultural differences leaves one little to argue over, in effect eradicating such potential probl
Although one might argue that the disappearance of culture as a whole eliminates the possibilities of such dangerous problems, one will lose his/her identity in the process of eradicating culture by blending ourselves into this homogeneous global culture as everyone is now has a similar culture. Thus as we adopt trends of the global culture, by learning the English language, using sophisticated (current day) technology, replacing our forms of entertainment with that of which technology provides, we would necessarily be displacing old culture, of course unless our old culture is coherent in nature to that of the global culture (American culture) . This happens because our global culture chooses that of the most efficient and effective and adopts it into its culture, thus for us to keep with the most updated and modern, we would have to lose whatever our current culture is and implement the new, superior global culture.
Also, while one might argue that the loss of our current culture is a bad thing, we must weigh the advantages with that of adopting a global culture. When we do so, issues of efficiency and effectiveness come out as a factor yet again, and technology does it, better communication between countries result in better relationships, improvement in standards of living make people feel more secure are examples of such. While this lessens our guilt of ultilising cheap labour in sweat shops by claiming that we are making the best use of resources, this blinds us when we fail to morally uphold our decisions when we only see the goodness of the advantageous rewards behind the whole process.
Thus in conclusion, globalising all cultures actually tends towards the greater good, for those for feel that this good represents effectiveness and efficiency in all aspects of our daily lives, which in fact has quite a few opponents to the idea.