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The Rise Of Mass Media And The Global Domination Of Western Values Essay

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The word ‘literature’ has evolved through various meanings over its time in the English lexicon. According to Raymond Williams literature “came into English, from C14 [the fourteenth century], in the sense of polite learning through reading” (Williams 182) and in Marx’s time usually “referred to the whole body of books and writing; or if distinction was made it was in terms of falling below the level of polite learning” (Williams 183). These definitions, specifically regarding the distinction of polite learning, are likely those Marx used when he wrote about the rise of a world literature in The Communist Manifesto. Yet somehow Marx was able to predict the negative impact a world literature would have on the working class decades before the rise of mass media and the global domination of western values. In this paper I will demonstrate how a world literature, or globally dominant set of values, is presently used by the ruling class to exert control over the working class by ensuring opposition can only occur from within existing ideological and repressive state apparatus.
Currently, in the schools throughout the western world, children are taught democracy – and by extension capitalism – is the only system of government in which a free and just society can exist. Furthermore, students are taught that democratic values are unquestionable, universal truths and it is the duty of all democratic nations to stand up for the basic human rights of every human being living in our

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