User:Stevenzhang4949/Cultural imperialism

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My focus will be on the Wikipedia page entitled, ‘Cultural Imperialism,’ that is available through this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_imperialism.This Wikipedia page fails to incorporate the relationship between Globalization and Cultural Imperialism under its section on ‘Contemporary ideas and debates.’ The following serves as a helpful contribution towards that end:

The term globalization has been popularly used in the last two decades, but it may be falling out of fashion. Hesmondhalgh (2008) says that political events are encouraging the alternative use of the term, ‘imperialism.’ As an example of imperialism, the United States (US) is on the limelight for invading Iraq such that is it accused of imposing imperialism. An American newspaper featured the headline, “The American Empire. Get Used to It” in 2002 (p. 1). This way, the US threatens Iraq’s autonomy and exerts influence on its internal operations and international relationships. The modern-day imperialism is largely cultural. Most of the social sciences are recognizing ‘cultural imperialism’ as a gradual shift from ‘globalization.’ In essence, cultural imperialism improves application in both political and economic issues. In an effort to explain the difference, Hesmondhalgh (2008) refers to John Tomlinson’s quote that says,

“The idea of imperialism contains, at least, the notion of a purposeful project: the intended spread of a social system from one centre of power across the globe. The idea of ‘globalization’ suggests interconnection and interdependency of all global areas which happens in a far less purposeful way” (p. 2).

Borrowing from the above excerpt, the interpretation of cultural imperialism is a narrowed focus on the influence of domineering states on other nations. This meaning supersedes the surface meaning achieved by the term globalization. Hesmondhalgh (2008) further likens cultural imperialism to media imperialism and argues that western influence is a complex phenomenon that may lose significance by means of oversimplification during interpretation by social scientists.

Through a commerce perspective, cultural imperialism is mostly understood from the perspective of the west versus the non-western countries. For instance, the US has spread its culture across the globe through trade and even the media. Some of these cultural products include McDonald’s franchising and American television sitcoms, respectively. In comparison to cultural imperialism, Demont-Heinrich (2011) argues that the debates on globalization of culture are fixated on cultural consumption. This way, the conversation lingers on people’s consumption habits. Studies on globalization of culture are likely to feature the power of the people and variation in demand for western products. On the other hand, studies on cultural imperialism are likely to be coined around the producing companies and their domination on the international market. The academia dwelt on writing about the globalization of culture since the 1980s to analyze the consumption habits of American products such as Hollywood films (Demont-Heinrich, 2011). These researchers wanted to determine the level of localization of these American products in other countries of interest. Cultural imperialism started receiving attention through the development of global communication towards the twenty-first century. This ideology showcased the opinion of consumers on the products that were dominantly being produced from America.