The Jenkins reading discusses Pop Cosmopolitanism which embraces global pop medias as a break away from local, parochial cultural medias. It has lessened the effectiveness of geographic boundaries as online medias free consumers from the constraints of time and space leading to a more multicultural online experience as proposed by Gitlin (pg2).
Pop Cosmopolitanism allows for:
1. Rapid Flow of media across national borders which is facilitated by strategies of old media institutions by the syndication of old media over broadcast channels, or via the web 2.0 platforms available to new media.
2. These flows are bi-directional as cultures both consume and produce different cultural products – something which has been heighten without the gate keeping of production and distribution houses in the old media model.
3. Media viewed in a different culture than the culture in which it was created can be both decontextualised and recontextualised by consumers – leading to a participatory remix culture where their cultural understandings are applied to these media.
4. The new media generation can lead to global circulation of online works from media sources such as blogs, images, video clips allowing media to be shred and spread virally across new media platforms.
· Reinforces the idea from the lecture that Media convergence is not an end point, rather it is an ongoing process occurring at various intersections between media technologies, industries, content and audiences which are distributed everywhere thanks to computers and telecommunication networks.
1. CORPORATE CONVERGENCE – Concentration of media ownership resulting in smaller and smaller numbers of media creating and disturbing conglomerates to keep the flow of media alive. Seem to me to be a result of economic rationalism where systems are put in place with cultural and societal structures to allow a concentrated flow of media across many cultures.
2. GRASSROOTS CONVERGENCE – Digitally powered consumers are given the power to shape production techniques, distribution, and reception of media content. This I think can be best applied to the vidding discussions in earlier weeks of MED104 where a community form around common interests and create their own sub-cultural rules regarding to how media is created, distributed and how it is received.
· Theses global convergences, both corporate and grassroots, empower the audience into pop cosmopolitanism which enables consumers of media to experience a wider range of cultural experiences though corporations selling more cultural products on a global market, and grassroots creators sharing more information on web2.0 platforms.
· In the reading there are fears presented about a possible economic imperialism being created due to the economic dominance of western media institutions, and that this power means western cultural goods are being imprinted globally creating a global culture with similar societal ideals. However I think does not consider how these media are read within the context of different cultures and that only those which have some context will succeed and perhaps present an already existing facet of that culture in a slightly different context, or present a new media that the gatekeepers of the that culture had blocked from society despite the societies want for such cultural artifacts. With the ability for grassroots consumers to distribute media freely online these gatekeepers are now largely negated.
· Different cultural media are being remediated within the context of different cultures, and is a two way relationship (not only west to the rest)
§ The Ring (Japanese original to western cinema)
§ Steig Larson novels from Sweden to Hollywood cinema
§ Big Brother across many nations around the world in different contexts
§ Ditto with Pop Idol
§ Iron Chef from Asia being recreated in western markets such as Australia and the USA
These different cultures give birth to different sparks of creativity which are them remediated in some way to different cultural contexts (subtitles, remakes, different formats) – which then enriches these new cultures with different creative viewpoints – although I think some people may also see it as profiteering by strong western economic media institutions bereft of new ideas to hold the audience’s attention, and also being challenged by grassroots media creations for that attention in participatory culture.
· In this reading Jenkins looks a little more deeply at what drives the economic interests behind pop cosmopolitanism:
1. Producers see global circulation as expanding revenue streams and actively promoting their own culture
2. Multinational conglomerates seeking to find entertaining new content that can be pushed into multiple markets (vanilla media)
3. Niche distributors looking definitive points of difference for specific target markets.
An example was given in the reading where Japan has deliberately target manga cartoons such as Pokémon and recontextualised to western children, who then grow up with this media type and introducing them to a different cultural medium which they will take onto their adult lives thus removing any cultural stigmas that would have resisted their cultural products in earlier generations.
It is also presented that westernized media such as Disney seems to be more highly valued and so when sent to different markets is not remediated or recontextualised as much. However in these cultural markets Disney is distinctive to them as not being from their culture; Disney also use traditional narrative structures to ensure media crosses over as well as possible but still not all narratives will crossover effectively.
· Jenkins then moves on to look at grassroots interests in convergence and pop cosmopolitanism. At the grassroots there is a pressure to preserve cultural differences instead of a perceived shift to homogeneity.
1. Grassroots convergence allows for cultural traditions to be maintained and curated to maintain the cultural integrity of the media, whilst allowing access to pop cosmopolitans.
2. Grassroots trends can, and tend to, precede commercial interests and then are remediated for commercial purposes later as they become popular.
3. Grassroots media tends to investigate and interpreted different forms of locally produced media through the lens of a different culture (remix).
4. Allows migrating cultures to retain a link back to their cultural traditions whilst in the midst of their new diasporic culture – although this would lend itself to a different experience for those entering it as they do not have the deep knowledge of the traditional culture and thus diasporic culture could become the dominant culture over a period of time – but at least the traditional culture would be preserved digitally.
· What these cross cultural exchanges generate is not a global culture, but a rather a global perspective which creates a global world view that takes into account the many cultural differences present in society.
This global world view will be required for corporate hybridity to work as it depends on consumers to have certain cultural competencies only impossible through global media convergences. These cultural competencies will hence allow corporations to export and import more cultural products.
My question on this would be one of authenticity of the media as media producers in different cultures may start producing content to fit into different cultural contexts and thus in away be making very westernized non-western films for example.
· Pop cosmopolitans may create a thirst for knowledge that should protect authenticity to maintain global awareness and respect of different cultures thus creating a media marketplace that is more like a local media bazaars rather than global cultural media franchises
Pop Cosmopolitanism allows for:
1. Rapid Flow of media across national borders which is facilitated by strategies of old media institutions by the syndication of old media over broadcast channels, or via the web 2.0 platforms available to new media.
2. These flows are bi-directional as cultures both consume and produce different cultural products – something which has been heighten without the gate keeping of production and distribution houses in the old media model.
3. Media viewed in a different culture than the culture in which it was created can be both decontextualised and recontextualised by consumers – leading to a participatory remix culture where their cultural understandings are applied to these media.
4. The new media generation can lead to global circulation of online works from media sources such as blogs, images, video clips allowing media to be shred and spread virally across new media platforms.
· Reinforces the idea from the lecture that Media convergence is not an end point, rather it is an ongoing process occurring at various intersections between media technologies, industries, content and audiences which are distributed everywhere thanks to computers and telecommunication networks.
1. CORPORATE CONVERGENCE – Concentration of media ownership resulting in smaller and smaller numbers of media creating and disturbing conglomerates to keep the flow of media alive. Seem to me to be a result of economic rationalism where systems are put in place with cultural and societal structures to allow a concentrated flow of media across many cultures.
2. GRASSROOTS CONVERGENCE – Digitally powered consumers are given the power to shape production techniques, distribution, and reception of media content. This I think can be best applied to the vidding discussions in earlier weeks of MED104 where a community form around common interests and create their own sub-cultural rules regarding to how media is created, distributed and how it is received.
· Theses global convergences, both corporate and grassroots, empower the audience into pop cosmopolitanism which enables consumers of media to experience a wider range of cultural experiences though corporations selling more cultural products on a global market, and grassroots creators sharing more information on web2.0 platforms.
· In the reading there are fears presented about a possible economic imperialism being created due to the economic dominance of western media institutions, and that this power means western cultural goods are being imprinted globally creating a global culture with similar societal ideals. However I think does not consider how these media are read within the context of different cultures and that only those which have some context will succeed and perhaps present an already existing facet of that culture in a slightly different context, or present a new media that the gatekeepers of the that culture had blocked from society despite the societies want for such cultural artifacts. With the ability for grassroots consumers to distribute media freely online these gatekeepers are now largely negated.
· Different cultural media are being remediated within the context of different cultures, and is a two way relationship (not only west to the rest)
§ The Ring (Japanese original to western cinema)
§ Steig Larson novels from Sweden to Hollywood cinema
§ Big Brother across many nations around the world in different contexts
§ Ditto with Pop Idol
§ Iron Chef from Asia being recreated in western markets such as Australia and the USA
These different cultures give birth to different sparks of creativity which are them remediated in some way to different cultural contexts (subtitles, remakes, different formats) – which then enriches these new cultures with different creative viewpoints – although I think some people may also see it as profiteering by strong western economic media institutions bereft of new ideas to hold the audience’s attention, and also being challenged by grassroots media creations for that attention in participatory culture.
· In this reading Jenkins looks a little more deeply at what drives the economic interests behind pop cosmopolitanism:
1. Producers see global circulation as expanding revenue streams and actively promoting their own culture
2. Multinational conglomerates seeking to find entertaining new content that can be pushed into multiple markets (vanilla media)
3. Niche distributors looking definitive points of difference for specific target markets.
An example was given in the reading where Japan has deliberately target manga cartoons such as Pokémon and recontextualised to western children, who then grow up with this media type and introducing them to a different cultural medium which they will take onto their adult lives thus removing any cultural stigmas that would have resisted their cultural products in earlier generations.
It is also presented that westernized media such as Disney seems to be more highly valued and so when sent to different markets is not remediated or recontextualised as much. However in these cultural markets Disney is distinctive to them as not being from their culture; Disney also use traditional narrative structures to ensure media crosses over as well as possible but still not all narratives will crossover effectively.
· Jenkins then moves on to look at grassroots interests in convergence and pop cosmopolitanism. At the grassroots there is a pressure to preserve cultural differences instead of a perceived shift to homogeneity.
1. Grassroots convergence allows for cultural traditions to be maintained and curated to maintain the cultural integrity of the media, whilst allowing access to pop cosmopolitans.
2. Grassroots trends can, and tend to, precede commercial interests and then are remediated for commercial purposes later as they become popular.
3. Grassroots media tends to investigate and interpreted different forms of locally produced media through the lens of a different culture (remix).
4. Allows migrating cultures to retain a link back to their cultural traditions whilst in the midst of their new diasporic culture – although this would lend itself to a different experience for those entering it as they do not have the deep knowledge of the traditional culture and thus diasporic culture could become the dominant culture over a period of time – but at least the traditional culture would be preserved digitally.
· What these cross cultural exchanges generate is not a global culture, but a rather a global perspective which creates a global world view that takes into account the many cultural differences present in society.
This global world view will be required for corporate hybridity to work as it depends on consumers to have certain cultural competencies only impossible through global media convergences. These cultural competencies will hence allow corporations to export and import more cultural products.
My question on this would be one of authenticity of the media as media producers in different cultures may start producing content to fit into different cultural contexts and thus in away be making very westernized non-western films for example.
· Pop cosmopolitans may create a thirst for knowledge that should protect authenticity to maintain global awareness and respect of different cultures thus creating a media marketplace that is more like a local media bazaars rather than global cultural media franchises