Abstract
The Globalization and the Mass Media are inseparable phenomena’s. As the role of Media around the world expanded, the transformation of people and knowledge is expanding as well, thus creating a global village as described by scholars and authors of globalization. The world is a global village, and several aspects of life are integrated because of this phenomenon.
The role of both globalization and media affects several aspects such as politics, international relations, economics, and cultures. Culture is the essence of any society, and it is a big part of the identity and nationality. As the role of globalization managed to shape the world as a global village, the media helped in transmitting and transferring knowledge, traditions and norms around the world. Since the world is dominated by the western supreme power, the media is as well. Thus, the culture that is being transformed around the world is the dominant culture characterized by the western culture and tradition.
- Introduction
Culture imperialism is a situation where a more powerful culture tries to win over the people with a less powerful culture for political and economic reasons. Imperialism has been a common phenomenon from the colonial times where western nations occupied other countries in quest for economic and political might. In colonial times, a western country that was unable to fix its culture in the colonies was considered a lame duck. In the Middle East the west has tried to spread imperialism through waging war on independent countries and in some situations war mongering to threaten political setting of some countries. Western media has been used to spread the virtues of the western culture in the Middles East through the media instruments (Gregg 2010). History shows that nearly all the planet, except china has fallen into political and economic imperialism of the western nations. Studies have shown that the west utilize all means possible to control the Middle East partly due to the resources endowment in the region. To effectively control these resources, the western nations need to brainwash the people in their favor. This is because some Middle East governments are hostile to the west.
This research paper aims to uncover the reasons as to why the citizens of the Middle East choose to follow the new culture and how this affects their lives. In order to have effective control in the Middle East, the west needs to situation the people in such a way that they appreciate their efforts and their ideologies. In many situations, left wing politicians have tried to object the idea of imperialism; however, it has been eased by the media that spread the word according to the wants of their political governments. Most imperial minds argue that the Middle East has faced many problems and human rights violations due to their culture and therefore they consider reforms as necessary. Cultures such as; wife battering, early marriages, not educating females and forced marriages are factors that make some western countries intervene. In addition, religious cultures such as jihad are considered dangerous.
- Role of Media in Shaping and Producing New Culture
In enhancing democracy, media has greatly played an important role in the Middle East and especially Arab states. Social media that is a result of globalized has effected changes in economic, political and more so cultural practices in the Middle East. The latest technology is always invented from the developed countries and in an effort transferring it to other countries it carries on some aspects of culture and sets them in the receiving countries. This has been the situation in the Middle East as social networks such as twitter, Facebook, online blogs among many others inculcating the western culture in their country. Although politically many virtues are not implemented, the youth have adopted the western culture in accordance to what they see and learn from the so called civilized people.
- Middle East culture
The Middle East countries are dominated by Arab nations of the Muslim religion. According to their tradition, basic information on writing and reading skills that can enable them read, understand as well as share what they have learned from the Koran is not only necessary but also sufficient for their lifestyle. To facilitate this, they have been offering religious classes. However with the invention of the globalized media system the flow of information about professional education entered the Middle East. Media did not only create awareness about college information but also provided the accrued benefits of having a professional degree (Munteanu 2011). Television shows as well as printed media about college attendance created a picture that college attendance is a norm as well as necessity encouraging many families in the Middle East to support their children’s education.
The information that is displayed in the media is set in way to show that the culture of the Middle East is primitive. Social media plays a very important role in lowering the dignity of Middle East culture and praises the western culture that makes the Middle East think that their social class improves by adopting the new culture. Since information almost flows in one direction that is from the western region to Middle East, internet media, movies and television, as well as press and other media resources will display the same cultural practices. Therefore the recipient of the information will be convinced that this is the modern is the modernized version of life and forget that they have their culture. The media displays the image of college their payments and how to join them has been sent through the internet to the Middle East with the aim of making money but these acts as a link to the Middle East citizens.
- Arab uprising
The Arab spring, witnessed in North Africa, Middle East and European countries is a clear demonstration of the power of media in creating a new culture. With a single opinion about Mohamed Bouazizi, social media expounded it to a very large scenario that resulted to revolution. The start of the matter wasn’t linked to any political power but with decentralized management, that is opinions from different people the media managed to start riots and demonstrations in Syria and Bahrain among many other North African countries. The culture that a powerful military or political leader who by the Muslim religion is chosen by Allah, should come up with the change was eroded and people now believed in making their own decisions that can influence the government. The media was a tool that was used to form social groups, hold social meetings and set plans and goals to achieve their mission.
- The Influence of the Media in the Spreading of the Middle Eastern Culture
- The internet and the culture
The features of the Arabic culture are participated in the modern world and have been spreading over the globe with the help of the internet. It is evident that internet has promoted cultural traditions through the diversified communications and accessibility of information. Indeed, the growth of the internet has resulted to a fundamental component in the value and life of people living in the Middle East (Khaja 2012). This is due to the fact that the internet has allowed people to communicate and interact freely. However, the role of the internet in the region is faced by different challenges since some of the countries, such as Syria and Iraq, do not allow public to access World Wide Web.
There are various websites and search engines that portray the cultural quality in the Middle East. The established Arabic such engine involves www.arabist.com, www.arabbay.com and www.cafearabica.com. These search engines provides links to websites that deals with Arab women, lifestyle, religion, Arab history and the people. In addition, many media channels such as television, such as Aljazeera, newspaper and radios are also available on the internet. This has enabled people in different part of the world to share the diversified information regarding the Middle East Culture.
- The Middle East in Literature and the Arts
The dominant culture in the Middle East is also spread through movies, arts and literature. At different time of history, Beirut and Baghdad has been the world major hubs off the arts and culture. In the modern days, there have been vibrant emergency of the world art and literature indicating the lifestyle and culture of the Arabs. Literature and art have been in the front line of spreading the Middle East culture. Through these media sources, people from various regions in the world have been able to explore the diversity and vastness of the culture in the Middle East.
The Arabic culture, being highly associated with the Muslim religion, is influenced by the movies and television series that are based on Islam. This has resulted to a great influence especially in the Turkish and Persian, to their writing systems, language architecture, art literature, lifestyle among other media sources. These devices have been used to spread the culture traits that are exercised by the Arab culture. Through, media Iran has influenced the countries that are closer, such as turkey and Iraq, by developing language that is closer to that of Iraq.
- The role of TV and Film series in the Middle Eastern culture
The impact of the media, specifically TV, has derived not only from the exposure to commercials and visual images that creating dominant consumer culture, but from what people is not familiar with. Monitenue (2010) claims that media controllers can regulate all the information and select what to broadcast in regard to the complex set of the circumstances. This circumstance includes the structure and the ideology of the media institution. In this case, the news materials are in most cases presented in a way that they represent and conform to the dominant culture. Since the dominant culture makes up the element of the economy, the media houses tends to present what is valued by this cultures. As a result, this tendency favors the spread of the dominant culture in the Middle East region and some parts of the world. .
- Anti-imperialism
In the current era, people have started appreciating their own cultures. It has come to their light that no culture is strong than the other since the culture is strong and important to the community in which it is applicable. They have refused to be dominated by the western culture which the west insists that it better and advanced while the other cultures barbaric and backward. This is what is referred as anti-imperialism. Anti-imperialism is therefore the opposition to imperialism (GREGG, 2010). It is the resistance to adopt a culture that someone else is trying to make you to adopt. Anti-imperialism movements are increasingly coming up so as to fight cultural imperialism.
There has been culture imperialism that has majorly been brought about by the media. Imperialism is a scenario in which two cultures; one considering itself to be strong and well advanced than the other, and the strong culture tries to dominate the weak culture. Globalization is a scenario in which nations share cultures ideas, products and views. Technological advancement has brought about globalization since transport and communication infrastructure has been developed thus reducing the world to a global village. These enable the sharing of cultural, political and even economic activities. The communities that perceive their cultures to be strong have continuously used the media to spread the culture and dominate the weak cultures. They spread their culture through sources such as the internet hence other communities get aware of the culture and adopt it. For instance, the developed countries continuously use the internet to spread their culture and dominate the developing countries
- Cultural rooted norms and anti- imperialism
Some norms of a community are strongly rooted in the culture of that particular community. Cultural aspects such religion, language mode of dressing, beliefs and values are strongly rooted in the culture. Both imperialists and Ant-imperialists use the media to spread their influence. Anti-imperialized use the media to spread their original culture and tell the people to appreciate their own cultures rather than adopting other people’s culture at the expense of their own culture.
They also use the media to inform the cultural imperialists that the cultures which are considered to be weak or barbaric are actually not. This counters the influence of the imperialists (Said, 2003). Since globalization has made the sharing of information easier, the media can therefore play a crucial role in spreading or protecting the societal norms that are deeply rooted in the culture of a particular community. Globalization has therefore converted the world to a global village hence people can use the media to protect or spread their cultures (Sinclair, 2010).
- Conclusion
The media is represented by instruments such as radio, television and the internet which are very effective in spreading a new culture. A good example is that in cases of jihadist attacks, the media assist in showing people the negative effects of the vice and why it should be avoided. The research paper will try to uncover if there is collective motive to mislead the people so that they adopt the western culture. It is worth noting that the west uses culture imperialism to control areas that are not ready to play their tune. Media is instrumental in addressing various issues such as education for the girl child. This has turned out positively since good numbers of women are now able to attend school like their male counterparts. This is a point where western culture succeeded in assisting the Middle East.
The media also advises the people on the consequences of acts of terror or jihad against innocent people which was a common culture in Middle East. Though the cases are still there, there has been meaningful reduction on unwanted attacks on innocent people. Islamist militias claim that they are practicing holy war while at the same time killing people. This is unacceptable. The western media has spread word to youths through set programs to advise them on dangers and social effects of war. The media has been instrumental in quest for democratic c rule in the Middle East. Media was widely used to alert people on their rights and why they should change the administrations. This effectively assisted some countries such as Bahrain, Yemen and currently Syria.
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