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Does Globalization Diminish Cultural Differences

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Giorgia Frizzi, 23rd July 2010
''Globalization, Localization, Glocalization''
Research Paper.

Does globalization weaken cultural diversity or does it foster it?
Effects of Globalization in Cultural differentiation

1. Introduction.

As some of us may know, the term “globalize” started being used in the modern times. However globalization as an idea has been brought up since even before the 1500’s when people started forming connections between communities, and therefore creating forms of communication, migration and such between these. And it is probably from these examples that in the modern era we came to call it Globalization which is known for being a process of integration between cultures, societies, economies, etc. Nonetheless, …show more content…

Webster's Third New International Dictionary (Gove, 2000) defines culture as the "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." I believe that nowadays culture is no longer perceived as some sort of knowledge system we got from our ancestors. Indeed many anthropologists and socialists now perceive culture as the ideas, attributes and expectations that change as people react to changing situations. Indeed, in the 21st century , technology has increased the velocity of social change. For instance the internet and fast communication in general are pretty much destroying cultural boundaries and they are creating the possibility of a global culture. In these regards McLuhan (1962: p.31) coined the term "global village" in the 60s referring to the globalization of media. McLuhan shows how the world has turned into a village thanks to electric technology that brings all social functions together and makes us all more aware of our global responsibility. On the other hand it has been considerably argued that globalization might instead foster cultural diversity and give more space to local cultures. Roland Robertson suggests by using the term 'Glocalization', that 'locality' and with it cultural diversity may be strengthened thanks to globalization. More specifically he describes for instance the process of a

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