Vijaya Chalise

The cultural identity is at risk due to adoption and assimilation of some other national cultures.

There is hostility in the world due to cultural domination in which one value system diminishes and degrades other local cultures. A question is being raised in the developing world: Is the West, including the US, trying to impose its culture on the rest of the world? Witnessing the media monopoly, the answer seems positive. Some people say we cannot talk of cultural relations without discussing cultural imperialism and presumption of cultural superiority. Considering this view, many questions were raised in a three-day global conference on cultural relations organised by the British Council in London last November. And many people questioned how cultural relations could survive in this fractured world where cultural polarity has led to many problems, The term culture encompasses all that humans have added to nature, along with every aspect of life and ways of understanding. Therefore, the link between culture and communication is seen to be evident in many ways. Communication plays a major role in promoting and conserving culture, as it is the major carrier of culture. The media is a cultural instrument that functions to promote or influence attitudes, to motivate, to foster the spread of behavioural patterns and also to bring about social integration. Consequently, the influence of conformism threatens national and ethnic cultures.

The phenomenon of mass communication and mass culture took place for the most part in the last two centuries. It was brought by the Industrial Revolution. Because of the enormous production and distribution by various techniques and institutions, constant flows of messages and images have served as stimuli. Thus, there is always the danger of cultural domination in the form of dependence on imported models of alien lifestyles and values. Likewise, the cultural identity is at risk due to the adoption and assimilation of some national cultures.

Some people claim colonialism is coming back now in the guise of language and culture. They argue cultural relations began as an imperialist activity, promoting the culture of one country. ‘We can civilise you, we can teach you to bring democracy, and we can liberate your women from backwardness’ — this was the kind of colonial language often used by them to convince us. They claim that the non-Western societies are traditional, and that tradition has no place in modernity. In this way, modern Western culture does not allow space for Eastern culture to influence it, although there are many instances where it can. While tradition can, and does, transform as well, traditional societies can produce their own modernity.

Media gigantism resulting from deregulation may sound like vague threats. Journalists and social scientists, among others, believe that the Western media has dangerously increased its control over our choices including culture. Some media companies are getting even bigger at the expense of other media companies. Control of the instruments of mass communication has fallen into the hands of IT-rich countries and a relatively small number of entrepreneurs as well. Even in Nepal, only a few industrialists taking control over multi-media — print, broadcast and TV transmission — are establishing a Media Empire. They are reaching an ever-increasing number of people. Regarding multiple ownership, an organisation with such a facility could prove to be too powerful in its functioning. Such a powerful organisation, national or foreign, could influence policies, culture and damage national reputation.

The government has time and again blamed the international media for exaggerating the situation in Nepal, thereby putting the country in a bad light. It is true the Indian as well as the Western media sometimes present misleading accounts of some Nepali issues. The foreign media, easily accessible through cable television network in every household, have immensely influenced the viewing habits of the Nepali population and caused damage to our own lifestyle and culture. So it is essential for policy-makers to understand the seriousness and sensitivity of such issues concerning the media.

Nepal is at a crossroads to preserve its culture and civilisation. We are confused about modernisation of culture and civilisation under heavy pressure of Westernisation. The artists and the poets, the reformers, the agents of change, have all been absorbed by the cult of consumerism. The new generation is trying to escape to foreign lands in search of wealth and comfort. Glamour and charisma of media stars, showbiz personalities and all the other showy representatives of wealth and power have taken over. These are now the icons of the new culture, the models of humanities offered to a new generation by today’s communication media.

Those committed to humanity continue their long and thankless labour trying to prevent the erosion of the very culture, which is an ageless tradition that is under sustained attacks from so many quarters — not only Western values but also equally the dark side of our own caste and creed system. It is not so much that Nepal has changed, as its values have been overturned, and this brings fresh models to emulate. This means that the true defenders of human values have fallen into obscurity, working on a charitable shoestring, without recognition, while the easy money of the new super-rich celebrates itself endlessly, without contest or challenge.

Chalise is executive editor, Gorkhapatra daily