Globalising culture: a non-starter?

By Mohamed Sid-Ahmed

The first is to assume, a priori, that culture cannot be globalised and that any allegation to the contrary is merely an attempt to legitimise the domination by one culture over the others, a domination that is due, moreover, not to its intrinsic cultural value but to extra-cultural factors, whether technological, economic or political. But whatever the clout of a specific culture or of the nation its represents, that culture cannot aspire to eradicate all others, making the assumption of one hegemonic culture a non-starter.

The second is to assume that culture can be globalised thanks to the powerful instruments of the information age: computers, satellites, television, video, etc. However, this second assumption comes up against the very nature of culture, which derives its diversity from the differences between different human communities and the distinctions between their respective geographical roots and historical experiences. This calls for a third approach, one that is based neither on the inevitability of cultural pluralism, nor on cultural uniformity.

While the field of culture is obviously not the field of information, the achievements of the information age are now determining the parameters of culture. The globalisation of information provides channels of communication and interaction between cultures. The latest such channel is the Internet, the global network of electronic communication which, by cancelling distances of time and space, has contracted the planet and accelerated history, with all the implications this carries for culture.

One implication is the need for a universal idiom that can overcome language barriers, whether by adopting an existing language (English) or by inventing a new language for this purpose (an option that, if the failure of Esperanto to take off in the '30s is anything to go by, is unlikely to succeed). In the meantime, research is underway to devise techniques of instant, automatic translation. So far, however, electronic translation has proved unable to capture the richness of language. All the more so with the growing dependence on digital programming which, to one extent or another, limits the ability to reproduce the underlying nuances of language. By reducing the connotations of words to their apparent meaning, electronic translation has only superficially and artificially bridged the differences between cultures.

It would thus be true to say that the tools now available to bring cultures closer together also impoverish culture. For culture is organically linked to groups of human beings embedded in specific geographical and historical settings and having their own distinct narratives, memories and aspirations, before being a product of a given world order. At the same time, however, globalisation means that contemporary man is constantly exposed to external cultural stimuli in addition to his own inherited cultural identity. This begs the question of which of the two factors is ultimately more decisive in shaping his future cultural orientations.

Technological superiority is a definite asset when it comes to endowing a specific culture with universal appeal. But while it is a necessary condition, it is by no means a sufficient one. In the case of the United States, for example, the undeniable edge of American media techniques has played a decisive role in the apparently unchecked expansion of American culture to all parts of the world. Indeed, there appears to be negligible resistance to what is virtually an American cultural invasion. On the other hand, Japanese culture remains very circumscribed despite Japan's overwhelming technological prowess. Nor can it be said that political and economic success are any guarantee of cultural excellence. Culture is very much a function of human suffering. A case in point is the prominent position that Blacks, drawing on centuries of suffering under slavery, have come to occupy in American music. So technology alone does not ensure cultural excellence, and neither does wealth or economic advantage.

Although the United States, a nation the size of a continent, is the most powerful state on earth, it is far from being the most sophisticated culturally. Often described as a melting pot, the specific identities of its different ethnic groups (Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian, Irish, Italian, Hispanic, Jewish, Asian, African American, Native American, etc) remain pronounced. The market laws of supply and demand seem to prevail, not only in the field of economic exchange, but also in the field of inter-ethnic relations and politics in general. Organised lobbies use democratically elected bodies, from local councils all the way up to Congress, to promote the interests of the various ethnic/cultural groups they represent.

However, America's relative cultural uniformity, encapsulated in the expression, the American way of life, is in clear contrast to the European cultural landscape, which is marked by a diversity that is not expected to disappear with the emergence of the European Union and its political, economic and monetary integration. Euro-Disney, near Paris, is a model of American entertainment wizardry, but has not had the cultural appeal it was expected to have for French and, more generally, European audiences. Still, however deep the cultural discrepancies between Americans and Europeans, they are as nothing compared to those marking trans-Mediterranean relations between Europeans and Arabs, who have no shared cultural heritage. An inherent paradox in the phenomenon of globalisation is that it is as likely to lead to marginalisation as to integration. Nowhere is this more evident than in the field of culture.