It’s an open air mall, and a boy with his pants sagged and headphones blaring Eric B ‘amp; Rakim stands impatiently waiting for transport to take him home. He is sizing up a young, scantily clad girl wearing a T-shirt with a Madonna picture on it, her white ear phones coming out of her ear as she happily eats her KFC dinner.

This might be a scene at any mall, from Perrysburg to Pretoria, South Africa. It serves as an example of just how pervasive U.S. culture is. It’s not surprising to find kids in Abuja, Nigeria dancing to American hip hop or wearing the latest in urban hip hop attire. The idea that a 10-year-old in Ouagadougou is listening to Jay-Z’s ‘Blueprint 3’ isn’t as farfetched as it might sound.

The diffusion of popular culture across frontiers and boundaries has been taking place for millennia. People shared jokes, music and games along the Silk Road that connected Europe to China. It’s just that in the 20th Century, it is more extensive, more pervasive and more penetrating due to technology.

Yet technology isn’t the only factor. Issues like economic globalization, labor movements, natural resources and systems of production and consumption have all contributed to globalization. Globalization has exposed people to new, different and, at times, conflicting ideas.

It’s easy to say globalization has been good for developed nations and bad for undeveloped countries. Yet this issue is more complicated than it seems on the surface. Globalization of culture harms indigenous cultures, but it also expands people’s cultural horizons.

The proliferation of American youth culture has always been a point of contention in conservative societies. In these societies, the youth are more open-minded to Western popular culture than older generations. In some societies, people feel threatened by this alien culture, while in other societies, people embrace these alien ideas.

The exchange of popular culture isn’t one-way, despite Western control on its direction. At times, cultures from less-developed countries can greatly alter the cultural landscape of a developed nation.

In some parts of the world, the pervasive nature of Western culture threatens indigenous culture. It also threatens domestic industries in these nations.

This is not new for a world power. World powers have always sold their ideals as the best in the world. Thus, in many nations around world, the pervasive nature and influence of western culture is viewed as a direct threat to indigenous cultures and ideas. As a global superpower, America has the capital and the infrastructure needed to sell its culture overseas.

This has alarmed people in conservative societies, who have always viewed this as an attempt at usurping pre-existing social values. This has been used as a ’cause de guerre’ for fundamentalist and separatist movements around the world. These movements view U.S. culture with suspicion and fear; they blame it for corrupting the morals of their people.

Yet, American youth culture has its good side, introducing ideas like freedom of speech. It has opened the youth in many countries to the importance of women’s rights and the value of human rights. It has allowed people to envision a world more accepting of alternative views, regardless of how much people might despise that view.

The idea of democracy has always been America’s greatest selling point, much to the dismay of power-hungry dictators and fundamentalists. It’s these dictators and religious fanatics that don’t want these ideas of democracy, due process and human rights spread to their oppressed masses.

It has also meant that American industry has evolved into the principle gatekeepers of ‘infotainment’ worldwide. Hollywood has obliterated possible competition in indigenous markets around the world. The European Union recently had to subsidize its film industry by giving European film makers a million Euros. The same has happened for the recording industry, dominated by three U.S.-based and owned corporations.

This has a major cultural impact because it favors an Anglophonic view of the world. This view has threatened domestic languages, but has also forced many to pick up English in order to engage in world communication or commerce. It has allowed U.S. brands an easier time breaking into world markets which are already accustomed to trading and functioning in English.

This cultural exchange has also resulted in the creation of unique reinterpretations of American cultural forms. In many nations, people perform American pop music in local dialects or using local forms. Breakdancing is huge in Asia but is almost extinct here. Indian Bollywood movies have taken certain aspects of American film and fused them with their own style and culture and created very interesting, lively films.

Globalization is a process that has existed as long as human cultures have been making contact with each other. It’s a dynamic process of exchange that tends to favor the culture with the political and economic apparatus needed to spread their ideas over a larger area. Like any global cultural movement, we run the risk of losing distinct cultural forms. Yet, we also face the positive prospect of enriching many cultures with positive values.

Globalization is a double-edged sword that will continue to affect our lives whether we like it or not.

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