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What it means to be Caribbean? What effects did Globalization have on the Caribbean identity?

   An apt description of the typical Caribbean is that he or she is part-African, part-European, part-Asian, part Native American but totally Caribbean; to understand this is to understand creative diversity”.

   We speak of this region of some 30 million inhabitants as Hispanic Caribbean, Anglophone Caribbean, Francophone Caribbean, Dutch-speaking Caribbean, emphasizing by this hyphenation, a fragmentation which is the legacy of a heritage of separation and shattered identities. Yet, this has not posed any limitations on us as we go through that “awesome process of becoming”. We have survived the traumas of separation from the mother country as part of the slave trade and the indignity of the dehumanization of slavery through the use of that creative imagination resulting ‘in the germ of a culture which shares more in common than many would care to believe”. (Nettleford).

   Our political systems may differ but this is part of the dilemma of difference which is a manifestation of the complex process of diversity demanding of all of us in the region the capacity to build bridges across not only classes and races of people within countries of the region but also between zones of former imperial influences represented in the region through centuries of migration and continuing interaction through tourism, commercial transactions and professional contacts.

   Having struggled for centuries with mastery of our diversity, we in the Caribbean have learnt to live together rather than merely side- by- side; but the communications technology revolution and tremendous improvement in travel facilities now dictate the urgent need for people to learn to live together, to deal with the dilemma of difference in ways that will serve to enhance the quality of life for the people of the region.

  In spite of differences, what we all seem to have in common is a full grasp of the power of cultural action in affording a sense of place and of purpose. Although many Caribbean countries achieved political independence in the decade of the 60s, issues of economic and cultural dependency have been acknowledged and written about extensively by Caribbean writers. Communication is seen as a significant locus of struggle in which the people of the Caribbean seek to assert independent cultural identities within the context of external domination. The struggle is played out in the arenas of popular culture in which individuals and communities seek to make legitimate, local cultural practices within the context of domination by imported cultural forms, and mass communications, in which individuals, communities and nation states strive for access to media technologies and channels.

   The Caribbean, forms part of the developing world, commonly referred to as the Third World, and therefore, according to Rex Nettleford, ‘makes it the actual victim and /or potential beneficiary of the new style globalization’.

   This phenomenon called Globalization, is in fact a combination of the free exchange of goods, services and capital and is characterized by three essential factors: the extent of the economic freedom phenomenon sweeping across the whole world, the increase in technological innovation, especially in the communications field and the interdependence between the different factors. While the countries of the world are indeed separated by clearly defined boundaries thus emphasizing their territoriality, identity and nationality, in reality these frontiers are becoming less significant with globalization. This overwhelming process has led to standardized approaches to production processes thus bringing homogenization so far that even customs and habits are affected

   Technological progress in the communications field has produced the most spectacular and visible features of globalization. It is all about an integrated communications network which affects ideological living and the political and cultural conditions of all societies, an aspect of the phenomenon often overlooked as we focus on the economic process.

   In the cultural sphere globalization produces two contradictory phenomena: standardization and diversification. We have standardization of eating habits, dress and cultural products resulting in growing similarities in the living conditions of societies. On the other hand, diversification strives to preserve the multiple facets of society by promoting access to the diverse features of world heritage. Moreover, faced with the wave of homogenization of lifestyles, communications, language and cultures there is resistance in the economic and political field, as in the cultural field, to preserve identities and defend the rights of minorities.

   Nettleford is of the view that like imperialism before, globalization in its cultural dimension is likely to fail, for the natural antidote to the poison of homogenization, which is what cultural globalization threatens, is the retreat to areas of specificity where people feel secure because they control the processes that make them viable. This is in reference to such areas as religion, the arts and private philosophies about self and society. Caribbean society, he writes, retreated to these areas with rich results in religious expressions and the creative arts (visual and performing) as well as home-spun philosophy to be found in their oral literature which houses the collective wisdom of the ordinary people. Carolyn Cooper (1995), specifically locates reggae music within the framework of cultural resistance because of its longtime association with the Jamaican underclass and history of suppression by bourgeois cultural institutions. Resistance, it must be highlighted, is a recurring theme in a number of reggae songs.

   But it is to the technological dimension of globalization and its effect on Caribbean culture/identity that I want to return. Global society and international politics have been transformed by developments in telecommunications technology which have revolutionized the speed and conduct of all aspects of global interaction, political, social, and economic with the potential to change irrevocably, all aspects of human life.

   It is culture that binds societies together and ensures that social interaction is practised on the basis of commonly accepted norms and behaviour patterns. The accompanying homogenization of ideas and behaviour patterns reduce cultural diversity particularly evident in the youth who are the most exposed to global media, and who consequently exhibit a remarkable sameness in taste and consumption patterns. We cannot insulate ourselves against the media and further integration into a global culture but we do not have to succumb to an homogenous global culture.

   The Caribbean region has been continuously exposed to international media in the form of books, magazines, periodicals, radio broadcasts and in more recent times, a bombardment of television channels, particularly those originating from the USA and transmitted by satellite technology. Indeed, we find that events in distant locations are often more readily available on television in the Caribbean than information originating in our own rural areas or neighbouring regional capitals.

   This has had a profound effect on Caribbean lifestyles, consumer habits with a corresponding threat to Caribbean identity, as by osmosis, external influences begin to permeate all aspects of life and threaten the uniqueness of Caribbean identity. The danger posed is that of a society even more fragmented by externally acquired behaviour patterns and cultures.

   The vast majority of electronically transmitted material, writes Aggrey Brown of CARIMAC, is made up of entertainment- the vehicle for advertising messages- the bulk of it originating in the USA. Studies conducted in the Caribbean by Hosein and Brown respectively in the mid 70s and 80s revealed that an average of over 70% of television programmes transmitted in the region originate from outside the region; as of the early 90s Latin America and the Caribbean together were found to account for approximately 10% of the world’s television audience.

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