Globalization And Homogenization Of Cultures

Globalization And Homogenization Of Cultures

Evidence of globalization can be seen everywhere these days. Be it eating at a fast food outlet, or just browsing a book at a bookstore, it is infiltrating our lives like a shadow in the dark, and homogenizing culture in ways we have never thought possible. According to Tomlinson (1999), the homogenization is the standardization of culture, which in turn threatens to obliterate the many unique and different cultures possessed by people from different parts of the world (Holton 1998: 166). As such, local food, culture and even fashion will slowly be integrated and acculturated with the Western culture that is brought over, and soon there will no longer be distinctive differences between different cultures and people (Robertson 1992: 34), as they have all been dominated and displaced by Western culture, causing loss of cultural uniqueness.

This loss of culture is felt especially deep in culturally rich countries. For example, based on Watson’s (2004) article, the infiltration of McDonald’s in to Hong Kong is slowly obliterating traditional practice, particularly during mealtimes. The younger generation especially, refuse to eat with their elders in traditional styled restaurants or dim sam teahouses, some even going so far as to say they patronize McDonald’s because it was not associated with Hong Kong and its past (Watson 2004 : 126). It has been argued that despite McDonald’s being an American consumer culture, their menu and offerings are unique to the country they are in. This difference gives it a sense of ‘hybridization’, a mix of cultures due to globalization, giving rise to new cultural realities (Ritzer 2009 : 255). However, if we hybridized all the cultures around the world, wouldn’t we just end up with everyone having the exact same culture in the future?

There has also been argument that there is a two-way flow of cultural influence, and culture does not only transfer in a linear way (Tomlinson 1999: 168). Although that may be true, but countries...