UNIT VIII.

GLOBAL MEDIA CULTURE

Overview
This unit presents how media influences the economic, political, cultural, and social aspects
of people’s lives and how globalization affects economic growth.

Learning Objectives
At the end of the unit, I am able to:
1. analyze how various media drive various forms of global integration; and
2. explain the dynamic between local and global cultural production.

Lesson Proper
MEDIA DEFINED

According to Lule (2014), the world media are tools used to store and deliver information
or data. The term is often used synonymously with mass media, but it can also refer to a single
medium used to communicate any data for any purpose.
Role of Media
Economic, political, cultural, and social changes and needs have contributed to the
development of various forms of media technology. It influenced and shaped human life through
generations.
The mass media are today seen as playing a key role in enhancing globalization, and
facilitating cultural exchange and multiple flows of information and images between countries
through international news broadcasts, television programming, new technologies, film, and music.
Evolution of Media and Globalization
In the study of globalization, there are five time periods that usefully capture the study of
globalization and media such as oral, script, print, electronic, and digital.
Oral Communication
Speech is often the most overlooked medium in the history of globalization. Yet the oral
medium — human speech — is the oldest and most enduring of all media. Despite numerous
changes in hundreds of years, the first and very last humans will share at least one thing — the
ability to speak.
In our primitive lives, language and communication is a very important tool in enriching
knowledge, experiences, and skills in surviving everyday life.
Script
This is the stage that explores the brief transition from the oral form of communication to
printing. As communication travels on distant places and over different periods of time, problems
and difficulties emerge because language relies on the capacity of our memory. There emerged the
script.
It refers to the very first writing that enables human beings to record information across distances
for a much longer time.
The Printing Press
Prior to the printing press, the production of written documents was slow, cumbersome,
and expensive. On the earliest civilizations, only a few powerful and elite have used papyrus,
parchment, and paper for printing documents. The rich controlled information. The printing press,
however, encouraged the literacy of the public and the growth of schools. It helped foster
globalization and knowledge of globalization.Electronic Media
Electronic media is an efficient way to communicate with one another, either by the use of media
devices or social media sources such as radio, television, telephone, and etc. Scholars have come to
call these “electronic media” because they require electromagnetic energy — electricity — to use.
• Radio was developed alongside the telegraph and telephone in the late 1890s. It was first
conceived as a “wireless telegraph”. By the 1920s, broadcast stations were “on the air” transmitting
music and news. Radio quickly became a global medium, reaching distant regions without the
construction of wires or roads.
• Television is the electronic delivery of moving images and sound from a source to a
receiver. By extending the senses of vision and hearing beyond the limits of physical distance,
television has had a considerable influence on society. (britannica.com) With Cable TV, Television
became an even more powerful medium catering to a wide range of global interests such as arts,
adventure, entertainment, education, food, history, nature, politics, travel, and many more.
Digital Media
Digital Media are most often electronic media that rely on digital codes — the long arcane
combinations of 0s and 1s that represent information.
Digital media is commonly used software, websites, and social media but the computer, cellular
phone, and the internet are the usual representations of it. It is currently the most significant media
of influence to globalization. It provides more interactive communication, unlike print and TV
which only provides one-way communication.
MEDIA AND GLOBALIZATION
Economy
E-commerce is becoming a major form of business. Amazon, Lazada, and Zalora are some examples
of start-up companies that have grown into successful global e-commerce platforms. Micro-
Entrepreneurs like farmers, fishermen, and start-ups are now able to access micro-financing using
mobile phones or computers.
The media have been essential to the growth of economic globalization in the world. Indeed, the
media have made it possible by creating the conditions for global capitalism and by promoting the
conceptual foundation of the world’s market economy.
Politics
Globalization has transformed world politics in profound ways. Media is able to spark collective
public opinion and action towards politics. Even during election campaigns, various forms of media
have used by candidates to appeal for public votes and by people to assert their support to
candidates.
Education
The internet is helping democratize access to affordable learning as open universities, online
courses, and webinars are just one click away through phones and computers. Media has made it
easy to search for information on the internet.
Culture
Media is the primary carrier of culture. There is now a wealth of exchange and fusion of culture
including fashion, arts, and music through the use of newspapers, magazines, movies,
advertisements, television, radio, the Internet, and other forms of media.

LOCAL AND GLOBAL CULTURAL PRODUCTION

We use, adopt, and create a culture in different ways in our everyday living, though we may not be
conscious of it.
Examples:
• The way we dress
• The way we communicate
• The way we interact with others
Though, media is a great help to the exchange and fusion of culture around the world. There
are also conflicting views on the impact of globalization on cultural production.

 Negative Effect - it is a threat to the local economy and it has disadvantages for poor
countries and small businesses. It can also destroy traditional culture, beliefs, and value
systems and may result in a loss of cultural identity.
 Positive Effect - it expands global market opportunities and it drives economic growth in
the poor parts of the world. Local culture enriches when exposed to other cultures. It
increases the knowledge and understanding of people around the world.

Globalization has grown due to the advancement of media and technology. With the
increased global interaction comes the growth of international trade, ideas, and culture. There are
positive and negative points of view and these are not opposites but inherently interdependent.

References
Internet
L.P. (2020). What is Digital Media? Retrieved from https://www.digitallogic.co/blog/what-is-
digital-media/
Media and Globalization » Mediapolitics. (2020). Retrieved from
http://mediapolitics.net/overview/media-and-globalization/
television (TV) | History, Technology, & Facts. (2020). Retrieved from
https://www.britannica.com/technology/television-technology
What is Electronic media? – Skillmaker. (2017). Retrieved from
https://www.skillmaker.edu.au/what-is-electronic-media/

Book
Matos, C. (2012). Globalization and the mass media. In: Encyclopedia of Globalization. Oxford:
Wiley-Blackwell
Pieterse, J. N. (2003). Globalization and culture: Three paradigms. In: J. N. Pieters
(Ed.), Globalization and Culture: Global Mélange. (pp.41-58). Lanham, Maryland: Rowman &
Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc..

Steger, M., Battersby, P., & Siracusa, J. (Eds.). (2014). The Sage handbook of globalization. Sage.

Therborn, G. (2000). Globalizations: dimensions, historical waves, regional effects, normative

governance. International sociology, 15(2), 151-179.