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Introduction
 


by Dr David Gerstner

All Rights Reserved © David Gerstner and Deep South
Deepsouth v.6.n.3 (Spring 2000)

 

The Transforming Globe

 

There is a popular and longstanding myth in New Zealand by New Zealanders that because of their geographical and isolated position on the map, New Zealanders' enthusiasm for the latest media technology is unparalleled in the Western world. The movies, radio, and, now, the internet connect the small country to the outermost earthly limits (and purportedly beyond). But this is surely not a burning desire simply for New Zealanders.

 

The age(s) of mechanically and mass produced information has historically fascinated many for centuries. One might argue that indeed since the introduction of the movies to a world-wide audience in 1895 the diversity of traditional cultural differences were radically transformed. The simultaneous sharing and embracing of mechanically reproduced images and (ultimately) sound set in motion what some have signaled as the moment for celebrating the joining together of global cultures-something Marshall McLuhan and Hillary Rodham Clinton have referred to in different registers as the "global village." At the other end of this globalized spectrum, however, are those that see the linking of cultures as the loss of cultural difference in the service of free-market enterprises. What emerges instead is a global culture of functional efficiency that successfully manages and homogenizes capitalist markets. As Andy Warhol so perversely reminds us - and not without pleasure - a coke is a coke is a coke.

 

Is this all there is? Are the effects (or certainly affects) of globalization so easily fixed between celebration and homogenization? Is it possible in this managerial model of culture to identify different ideological stakes through the filter of nation? gender? race? sexuality? class? What are the risks when plotting large theoretical generalizations of "global economics" onto cultural arenas where the technologies of the West are not even part of the social fabric? To the extent that the critical discourse of globalization (whether one celebrates or denigrates it) is a privileged one in Western society, what mediated experiences might be eked from such conditions that enable an exploration that, on the one hand, does not glorify the strategies of capitalism and, on the other, does not reduce cultural practices to abject obsequiousness? This collection of essays seeks to indulge itself an endeavor to address these concerns.

 

To begin, it is useful to put these writings in context. The eight student essays that follow derive from a third year upper division seminar, Film and Media Theory. The course was taught in the first semester 2000 in the Film and Media Studies Programme of the Department of Communications Studies. The course was designed as a "pilot course" in that it operated as both an "on-line" and "on-site" class. That is, with the support of a University of Otago curriculum development grant, the Film and Media course took its shape in both the electronic and traditional lecture forms. As a new initiative, the course was met with some hesitation by both student and faculty. What became quickly apparent, at least to my students and myself, was that form followed content. In other words, our intense use of the electronic teaching medium not only challenged and advanced (a troubled term to be sure) pedagogical formats. Rather, the electronic tool became prima facie for engaging the theoretical questions about media and the learning experience. The ideas exchanged and debated here yielded some tremendous re-thinking of our intellectual and corporeal relationship to the mediated world. Those ideas returned some very fruitful and provocative points of departure for the works included here. The questions and contexts of the Film and Media Theory course are sketched below to give the reader a point of theoretical reference.

 

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