Globalization and Culture: the Chinese Cultural and Intellectual Strategy

Abstract

The essay first traces the origin of globalization before offering some positive and practical strategy toward its challenge. To the author, globalization in culture is stubbornly resisted by the other strong force: localization and various types of ethnicism or nationalism. In the face of the current strong impact of economic globalization, consumer culture has become one of the hot topics confronting scholars of both literary and cultural studies. Through some analyses of various phenomena in contemporary Chinese culture, the author tries to offer some practical strategy: China does not prevent economic globalization from coming into the country, for it might well help stimulate the rapid development of Chinese economy; but culturally, it does try to prevent its culture from being “globalized” or “homogenized”. Actually the globalization in culture does not merely lie in the “homogenization” of culture but also in the “pluralization” of different cultures and literatures as well. Globalization has also influenced the establishment of China"s national and cultural identity. Although cultural globalization might easily blur the cultural identity of an individual national culture, it could also bring about something positive. It has actually brought people of the Third World with both positive and negative effects: If we face the challenge in a critical way and make full use of the opportunity to develop our national culture in a broad international context, we will most probably highlight the Chinese national and cultural identity and make the essence of Chinese culture and literature known to the world. In doing literary and cultural studies, we should take neither the attitude of the (imperialist) global nor the (nationalistic) local. A sort of “glocal” transcendental attitude might well prevent literary and cultural studies from falling in another crisis.