ASC236 SOCIOLOGY OF THE MEDIA AND POPULAR CULTURE
Name: Megan McCormack
Student ID: 99472116
Tutorial: Monday 4pm
1. Briefly describe the two ways in which cultural globalisation can be understood.
Cultural globalisation can be understood as the culture emerging as a result of globalisation. Throughout history cultures have grown from a group of people sharing common experiences. In contrast cultural globalisation is the outcome of one culture who has a privileged history imposing its culture across the world onto other cultures. Cultural globalisation can also be understood as an extension of Western culture.
2. What does Tomlinson mean when he states that there are various ways of ‘entering and leaving modernity’?
When Tomlinson states there are various ways of ‘entering and leaving modernity’ he is referring to the adoption of western culture by non Western cultures. He uses the word ‘modernity’ to represent the western culture. In this passage, Tomlinson is indicating that while the western culture is largely exposed and to a point enforced upon non Western cultures, it doesn’t necessarily mean that these non western cultures adopt all of what is being exposed. For example there appears to be acceptance of the technological culture of the west, while there is a clear rejection of the sexual permissiveness that is portrayed as part of the western culture. The adoption of attributes from the western culture are dependent upon a variety of factors including age, gender, class, urban/rural groups. Therefore, there is not one specific route of entering and leaving modernity.
3. In what ways do non-Western cultures resist the process of westernisation?
Non-Western cultures resist the process of westernisation through indigenising Western cultural imports by instilling them with dissimilar culture connotations and appropriate them assertively rather than submissively.
4. Does Tomlinson agree with the thesis that globalisation equals westernisation? Give your reasons for your answer.
Tomlinson does not deliver a black and white response to this question in terms of agreeing that globalisation equals westernisation. In this article Tomlinson emphasises the fact that Western cultural practices and institutions are the powerful force and the leader of global cultural development. He highlights examples of where the high level of power in Western cultures is seen throughout global cultural industries e.g Times Warner and CNN and in general cultural configuration e.g. the commodification of everyday experience. Although, Tomlinson does not directly say that globalisation equals westernisation he does suggest there is a strong link between cultural globalisation and the ‘power geometry’ involved. Tomlinson continues in his response to make the analogy between the westernised cultures relentless advance comparable to the imperial expansion of Europe powers from the seventeenth century onwards. Tomlinson supports the suggestion that westernisation has a great influence over the world as he agrees that the west is culturally powerful and aligned with technological, industrial and economic power, however, Tomlinson does not agree that westernisation equals globalisation. While he agrees that the western culture has a great impact of the ‘way of life’ across the globe, which is being installed via globalisation, he does not think that the western culture is that powerful that is the unchallengeable cultural model for all humanity. Therefore if globalisation is considered as a concept that is so fervent and cannot be challenged by another culture, then the western culture does not amount to globalisation.
5. Tomlinson views ‘Globalisation as the decline of the west’. What does he mean by this?
Tomlinson means that while the Western institutions such as capitalism, industrialism and the nation state system have developed and spread across the world into many countries and cultures, the result has been that the West have relinquished their unique social/cultural edge. This spread of western culture has led to the advancement of what were once known as ‘third world countries’. In some instances these countries have advanced technologically, economically and industrially more than some areas of the west. An example of this is a comparison of the rise of the so-called ‘Asian Tiger’ economies and some areas of Europe and the United States. The decline of the west can be related to the suggestion that capitalism has no loyalty to its origination thus, provides no assurances that what was known as geographical patterns of dominance that was established in early modernity will continue. Tomlinson also suggests that there is an increasingly uneasy relation between the international capitalist markets and the governments of Western nation states
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