Week 7: 2.3 Entertaining the world: using media across cultural boundaries

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Readings:
Jenkins, H (2006). Pop cosmopolitanism: Mapping cultural flows in an age of media convergence.  In H. Jenkins, Fans, bloggers and gamers: exploring participatory culture (pp 152-172). New York University Press. 
Summary:
  • Pop cosmopolitan is someone whose embrace of global popular media represents an escape route out of the parochialism of one's local community
  • The increased centrality of teens and youth to the global circulation of media in an era where a teen's Web site can become the center of an international controversy
  • Corporate convergence (top-down) - the concentration of media ownership in the hands of a smaller and smaller number of multinational conglomerates who thus have a vested interest in insuring the flow of media content across different platforms and national borders
  • Grassroots convergence (bottom-up) - the increasingly central roles that digitally empowered consumers play in shaping the production, distribution, and reception of media content
  • These two forces intersect to produce what might be called global convergence
  • Global convergence is giving rise to a new pop cosmopolitanism
  • The author use pop cosmopolitan to refer to the ways that the transcultural flows of popular culture inspires new forms of global consciousness and cultural competency
  • Imperialism argument blurs the distinction between at least four forms of power:
    • Economic - the ability to produce and distribute cultural goods
    • Cultural - the ability to produce and circulate forms and meanings 
    • Political - the ability to impose ideologies
    • Psychological - the ability to shape desire, fantasy and identity
  • Western economic dominance over global entertainment both expresses and extends America's status as a superpower nation
  • The rise of broadband communication enables the foreign media producers to distribute media content directly to American consumers without having to pass through U.S. gatekeepers or rely on multinational distributors.
  • Global culture produces local differences in order to gain a competitive advantage within the global marketplace
Am I pop cosmopolitan?
I was slightly affected by the Japanese comic called Nana (Manga).  It is a comic series written and illustrated by Ai Yazawa.  I liked the characters and the story so I started to buy the merchandise products.  After the comics, there are films,anime and video games produced.  



Nana in comic

Nana 2 in film

I think the Japanese punk style in Nana is quite attracting and cool.  That's why I love Nana.