Blog 1 - Globalization

What is globalization?

Globalization is very broad. It has to do with the evolution that our world and the world population have made with the influence of culture, politics, and the economy.

Cultural globalization

In recent works, we mainly focused on cultural globalization. Cultural globalization is the most visual part of globalization. You see this everywhere, just look at the clothes you wear or the music you listen to.

Westernization

An important term in globalization is westernization, westernization means countries from the east, taking over the culture of the west. This is due to the history where western countries had a lot of power, these countries started to colonize much weaker countries for raw materials, goods, and services. Since western countries were further developed, they could obtain raw materials and goods from these less developed countries. They eventually turned these raw materials into actual products and distributed them all over the world. This gave them even more power and developed even more as a western society building western principles and values. Western society is luxurious, and many people also see westernization as modernization. Well-developed countries want to keep it like this. Countries that have developed further want to ensure that the difference between these countries and the other countries remains large as they can benefit from them.

In addition to westernization, you also have the term Americanization. This is the same as westernization but then the culture of America is taken over.

Orientalism

Nowadays it is no longer that only Eastern countries take over things from Western countries, but it is also the other way around. For example, look at K-POP, K-Drama, anime, or sushi. These are all things that originated in the east and what have been adopted in the west. The term for this is Orientalism.

How do I see Cultural Globalization?

Because we currently live in a society where we all have easy access to the internet, we are very connected to each other. The internet gives us so much information that we can immediately see what is happening on the other side of the world. This makes it feel like we are all connected and are one society. However, there is a cultural difference because people have different values and norms. I don't think this is something that can change easily.

I think we are on our way to becoming one big society, but it will take some time. People change and show more understanding for each other, and the environment and this evolution is what globalization stands for in my opinion.