MEDIAST 114 Midterm

Pieterse

3 Globalization Research Paradigms:

1. Convergene: homogenization

2. Differentiation: us vs. them, culture wars

3. Hybridity: mixing of cultures, anti-racist/nationalistic

Fraser

Traditional theories of the public sphere are built on "Westphalian" assumptions that link democracy, communication, and legitimacy to the bounded nation-state.

• People coming together to debate/converse in a global public sphere about transnational issues

Castells

Culture and Cosmopolitanism. Media globalization is primarily built on culture in this global networked society.

Digital communication networks makes culture global, interactive and hybrid driven by tension between autonomy and control.

Cosmopolitanism:

• Idea that people are apart of a global community and treat others as equals

  • ‘Global citizen’

Osgood

Osgood emphasizes propaganda as cultural battleground during the Cold War (military ex, Soviet Union vs US fights were fought indirectly thru media, film, radio, and cultural exports.)

Cold War things:

• Classic propaganda, Iron Curtain, signal jamming, dissident media

Ritzer

McDonaldization

McDonalization and the principals behind it (efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control through nonhuman technology) — have spread far beyond fast food into virtually every sector of society and across the globe

Yoon

K-Pop and Canadian-Korean diaspora

Korean youth in Canada feel displaced from their homeland, so they've reaffirming ethnic identity, serving as a global, trendy pop cultural form.

Klein

Cinema of Bong Joon-ho

Bong-Joon-Hos films show Hollywood genres circulate transnationally and are indigenized by local filmmakers. Proving American pop culture is actively appropriated and transformed abroad.

Tyson

Radio Free Dixie

Robert F. Williams’s international exile and radical media projects—especially Radio Free Dixie and Negroes with Guns—were pivotal in shaping the cultural and political foundations of the Black Power movement.

Nye

Soft power, military/hard power

Soft power where the government is able to influence through attraction rather than coercion is the key way to success in global politics.

Boyd-Barret

Media is not neutral and is reflected by power hierarchies

• Media and cultural imperialism

• Nation branding

• Vertical integration

Straubhaar

Audiences are active agents who seek cultural proximity, specific media content reflecting their own language, culture and social experience. Global media powers are best understood as asymmetrical interdependence rather than simple domination by Western powers.

Beyond media imperalism:

• Dependency theory

• Asymmetrical interdependence

• Contraflow

• transnational or dominant flows

Thussu

Contra-flow: smaller media producers merge and become more robust

Center-periphery: media producers of the Global South/less-powerful often mirror Wester-power/center’s media.

• Results in recreating and promoting Western value systems.

Kim and Shin

Korean War and Rok

Emergence of Korean rock (“rok”)

glocalized cultural formation:

U.S. military presence, Cold War geopolitics, and Western pop

Korean musicians and audiences reworked these influences into a hybrid form.

Shim

Hybridity, the antithesis to McDonaldization

Disagrees with the idea that capitalism motivated globalism.

• Theory doesn’t acknowledge human freedom, only productivity/rationalization

Ganti

Indian Film Industry

• Appropriation, Hindianization, adaptation, interpretive communities

Indianization—ess about copying stories and more about how Bombay filmmakers construct differences between themselves and their audiences.

Globalization Research Paradigms

Convergence: homogenization and growing sameness

• Pros: Hope for modernization and democratization

• Cons: Cultures lost in process

Differentiation: conflicting differences (us. vs. them)

• Rejecting/fearing other cultures

• Samuel Huntington “clash: of civilization theories

Hybridity (Shim): the blending and mixing of cultures

• Antithesis to McDonaldization (positive outlook)

• Opposes racist/nationalist doctrines by emphasizing blending of different cultures, experiences, and influences.

convergence

Homogenization and growing sameness

• Pros- Hope for modernization and democratization 

• Cons- Cultures lost in the process

differentiation

• conflicting differences (us vs. them)

• Seeing other cultures and rejecting/fearing them; theories about a “clash” of civilizations (Samuel Huntington)

hybridity

• The blending and mixing of cultures

  • Ex: k-pop, creolization

• antithesis to mcdonaldization (generally positive outlook on mixing of cultures)

• stands against racial and nationalist doctrines via emphasis of blending of different cultures, experiences, and influences

transnational public sphere

(Fraser):

• Citizens coming together to debate/converse.

  • “Normative” political theory of democracy

• Requires political efficacy and normative legitimacy

Fraser’s 6 Pre-suppositions:

1. The addressee is the state

2. Public - national citizenry (demos)

3. Main topic (topos) is national economic matters

4. Public will be challenged thru national communication infastructure

5. A single national language

6. A shared national vernacular literature (we are all on the same page)

Transnational public sphere involves discussions that trascend any one nation.

• Ex. Economic crisis, climate change, human rights

cosmopolitanism

People are apart of a global community and treat each other as equals.

• See themselves more as a ‘global citizen” than their own national/ethnic identity

Cosmopolitan globalization: an elite with shared values and info (Castells)

global imagination

A collective way of seeing, understanding, and feeling (at a global level) who we are, how we fit together, how we got here, and what we might expect from each other in carrying out our collective practices (our own ways of life) - Gaonkar

• Enabled/cultivated/emerged by ongoing symbolic construction of the real and possible in image and narrative (Orgad)

• Symbolic process of representation is the ongoing production and circulation of images and stories.

Symbolic Dislocation: symbolic process of representation

• Capacity to relate distant events and distant others in locales and contexts away from our own.

new visibility

1. Representation is a contest.

2. Battle over mediated intimacy at a distance.

3. Visibility has real world consequences.

3 Key Features Distinguish Mediated Environment of Visibility from the Past:

1. More intensive quality of information flow

2. More organizations and communication networks

3. Bigger range of individuals who can receive media output

4. Information flows quicker on a global scale

5. Information environment is less controlled

   1. Ex. Political actors can’t be as secretive about their activities, hard to predict consequences of images/etc.

appropriation

Taking other cultures for one’s own use

Five Scapes of Globalization (Apparduari)

Ethnoscape: migration of people across political and cultural borders

• Geography and culture

• Think: diaspora

Technoscape: how tech facilities exchange across borders

• How tech knowledge moves across borders.

Ideoscape: movement of political and ideological views across formerly isolated regions

Financescape: global markets for goods and labor

• Capital investments across borders

• Interdependent economies

Mediascape: movement of media around the world

• Representation of other cultures

• Imagined communities shaped via media

• Scripts and narratives develop (Orgad)

media uses (Cold War)

Radio Free Dixie

• Robert F Williams: wanted by CIA on exaggerated charges of kidnappting.

  • Created Radio Free Dixie to advocate for racial equity in the states.

Radio Swan: 

• US-backed radio station established near Cuba.

• Anti-Castro propaganda, coded message for rebels, pop music.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: 

• Broadcasted to Eastern Bloc

• Disguised as private company, but was a US Secret Service project

Iron Curtain: 

• Russian signal blockers prevented anti-Russian propaganda

• Blocks access to global media

propaganda types (Cold War)

White: suppression of harmful ideas and promotion of positive info

Black: strategic transmission of lies to improve propagandistic or damage opposition

Gray: reckless use of info for desired public response with uncertain producers

• Think, tabloids

public diplomacy (Cold War)

Using mass media to communicate the intent and/or character of a group/nation

Ex. US gov worked with Civil Rights activist b/c discrimination makes America look “unfree”, which was common cirticism levied by Soviets.

• News as diplomacy (news is not objective + story selection)

  • Ex. Russia pays 2 mil for 3 years to broadcast to DC radios, Sputnik News Program

soft/smart power

3 Pillars: Culture, political values, foreign politics

• Soft power relies on cultural ideological, and instiutional appeal of a nation

  • Credibility → actions/policies matter, not just messaging

“If a state can make its power seem legitimate in the eyes of others, it will encounter less resistance to its wishes” - Nye

Attraction (Nye & power)

Soft power, or getting others to want what you want.

• Economic Inducements: economic incentives, payments

military power (Nye)

• Coercion: hard power/military or economic force

Soft power/public diplomacy is ineffective if our words don’t align with our policis/actions.

• Nye says USA soft power diminished since we invaded Iraq

  • Lost credibility in eyes of foreign countries, our actions in Iraq contradicted our values

• US exaggerated Hussein’s WMD claims to justify Iraq war & mistreated prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison

cultural attraction (Nye)

Attraction: soft power

• Ex. Soviets prohibited Western products, denim, etc.

  • Black market for Levis exploded in Soviet territories as a symbol of American wealth, freedom, opposition to totalitarianism.

one-way flow

An aspect of Media Imperialism Theory:

• Cultural influence via media flows from dominant power to less powerful.

asymmetrical interdependence

Local culture (and media systems) regain independence

• Varying degrees of dependence

• Audiences have indpendent inerpretations

Cultural Proximity matters:

• Ex. Adaptation of The Simpson for Saudi Arabia was a bust

cultural proximity

What culture a media product is closest to or trying to appeal to.

• Ex. Simpsons converted into Saudia Arabia Al Shamshoons

contra-flow (Thussu)

the movement of culture running counter to the traditional dominant-to-dominated ("West to rest") cultural adaptation patterns

• Ex. Korea’s movement of culture from global South to North through migration and ‘reversed’ media flows

Center-periphery

center-periphery

Center-periphery: ‘institutions in the center of the periphery often mirror those of the developed world, and thus recreate and promote the latter’s value systems.

• Suggests global media flows have been historically dominated by the West

• ‘Periphery’ are less powerful regions that usually consume western content rather than exporting their own.

‘Global cities function as command and control centers for ciruclation/distribution of transnational encomic/tech flows.’

dominant flow, transnational flow, geo-cultural flows

Dominant Flow: U.S-led Western media availible across the globe

Transnational Flows: strong region preference but also courting foreign audiences

Geo-Cultural Flows: caters to specific cultural/linguistic audience that is dispersed (diaspora)

diaspora

The dispersion of any people from their og homeland to other parts of the world.

free flow of information

An open exchange of info across borders where info is unrestricted and open to all.

• Circulated the idea that all info is “good” and hides underlying imbalances of power within global media

McDonaldization

Rationalization: (Weber) historical drive towards a world where one can master everything by calculation

• Commercial production/industries adopt fast food model, emphasizing 5 elements.

5 Elements:

1. Efficiency → the optimal method for achieving a goal with minimal effort or cost

Trades efficiency and quality, increased role of tech, people adopt “fast life” mentality.

2. Calculability → emphasis on quantifiable object

prefers metrics, employee performance measured, de-emphasis on qualitative experiences.

3. Predictability → standardization products and services across locations, uniform experiences.

4. Control → use of tech and automation to regulate behavior.

Use of non-human tech to replace humans, overpowering the working industry.

models of multiculturalism

Monoculture: homogenous society

• Low immigration, cultural exclusion

Melting Pot: heterogeneous societies

• Assimilation/convergence, common ideology

Cultural Mosaic: Culturally diverse groups co-exists yet are distinct

• Culture matters, counters melting pot.

Cultural Stratification: heterogeneous + homogenous

• Cultural diversity exists, but its suppressed, cultural superiority

Korean film

• 1980s: Korean film companies were struggling while the US dominated the film industry

• SK film takes inspo from US film ecosystems (vertical integration) while incorporating aspects of Korean cultural signifiers and genres.

  • Us takes inspo from Old Boy

transnational genre

A genre which uses subtexts that span across many different nations

monoculture

Homogeneity in nation and identity:

Societies are racially and culturally homogenous.

multicultural assimilation

“Melting Pot'“ Model:

Expects immigrants to adopt a dominant national culture while shedding aspects of their ethnic background

cultural mosaic

Coexistence of multiple ethnic identities:

Model encourages coexistence of diverse cultures within a national framework.,

Removes barriers for immigrants and helps them integrate while maintaining their heritage.

hierarchical stratification

suppression of minority cultures:

Dominant ethnic groups marginalize or suppress minority cultures

Hybridization of K-Pop

Incorporates Western-pop music structures (hip-hop, EDM, R&B) with distinctly Korean production systems (ex. cultural branding).

glocalization

The practice of conducting business according to both local and global considerations. (adapting to cultural contexts)

• Ex. Coke Ad, McDonalds local menus

Symbolic Dislocation

the capacity to relate to distant events and others in locations that are remote from the contexts in which we live

Radio Free Dixie

• Robert F Williams: wanted by CIA on exaggerated charges of kidnappting.

  • Created Radio Free Dixie to advocate for racial equity in the states.

Radio Swan

• US-backed radio station established near Cuba.

• Anti-Castro propaganda, coded message for rebels, pop music.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty

• Broadcasted to Eastern Bloc

• Disguised as private company, but was a US Secret Service project

cultural/media imperalism

Commerical media consolidation homogenizes other media, and thus culturalsystems

• One-way-flow

Korean War

• Cold war ‘proxy’ conflict, US-backed South Korean

• During the war musicians played for Army bases and catered to American audiences.

Korean Rok

• Rok illustrates the mixing that occurs in music subcultures

• Developed through having to play for American audiences

Believes Media Imperialism is a weak thesis, and believes in the hybridity thesis instead.

Korean Media History

Liberalization

Modernization

Sytem Interdependence 

Liberalization (Korean Hist)

Removal of state ownership of government control of content

• Political change towards public sphere

Shift to private commercial ownership of media outlets

• Economic change in commercialization

Opening to foreign direct investment & ownership

• Economic change towards transnational corp power

Modernization (Korean Hist)

The belief that capitalism has motivated globalization.

• Shimm disagrees: this thesis relies on capitalism, but doesn’t acknowledge that modernity also involves human freedom (not just productivity and rationalization)

Connects back to the McDonaldization concept

• Uses Hollywood as its structure, vertical integration

System Interdependence (Korean Hist)

Media liberalization and modernization increased in 1994 as Korean gov learn industry tactics from Hollywood

• Ex. vertical integration

• Increased larger corps

• Systems changed how cultural products are created, K-Gov and business capitalized off popularity and commercialized interests.

Armed Forces Network

Entertainment network for armed forces in Korea.

• Ex. The Add 4