Linguistic Imperialism and Pop Culture

Linguistic imperialism is the idea that a certain dominant language is being transferred onto other people due to current world demands that center around that language. From education to business to pop culture, the English language is rising to be the most dominant language on the world. Pop culture is currently known today to be in “English”. When someone is named an “international celebrity”, it is generally known that they are either from and English speaking country or they have been able to make international relations because they are proficient in the English language. For example, Lady Gaga is very well known in both English and non-English speaking countries. Ailee is an international Korean star but was actually born in Colorado and studied in the states her whole life. In that sense, the face of pop culture are English speaking stars, English songs, and English television. These are the celebrities and shows that children will grow up watching and admiring. In today’s society, the spread of pop culture is extremely quick and accessible. Children in India can watch an American movie online easily. The movie industry is generally known to be American and most movie theaters in the world carry English movies. For many foreign singers, incorporating English words and sentences into their songs is a very good way to appeal to a larger and more international audience. For a star to be able to be international and successful, they must have connections from other countries. The only way they can get these connections is by being able to speak English because they will not learn every single language in the world in order to have to reach out to a wider audience. Shakira, for example, began singing only Spanish songs in the beginning of her career. As she broadened her horizons, she found that in order to make it into the business, her songs must be in English. She is the international sensation that she is today because she was able to learn and communicate in English. By making pop culture dominated by English, it excludes many potential singers, movie stars, and directors. There could be a little boy who lives in Malaysia that has the potential to be the most influential and brilliant director, but without the English language, he could never put himself on an international scale.  With that being said, there are always rare occasions of barriers being broken. The most watched video on YouTube and the only video to ever be viewed 2 billion times is Gangam Style, a Korean song that only has 2 English words. The appeal of this song comes from the rather unique singer, catchy tune, and the exotic music video. But as I said before, that is a rare occasion. Pop culture is continually being dominated by the English language and as for now, it does not seem like that could change. While there are consequences, pop culture is meant to be taken lightly and so the fact that there is linguistic imperialism in pop culture does not pose any real threat on the world today. 

Paper 1 Text 2 Analysis

           This paper one text can be interpreted to be a lot of things but I believe that it is an advertisement disguised as an informative article. The text starts off with an introductory paragraph that explains what the article will be about – something that many articles have. It starts off with facts and numbers and so the reader automatically knows that it is meant to be informative and factual. The article is split into three different parts and each part has its own subtitle, also another quality for an article. The last part explains the entire organization and everything they do and convey it in a positive light – something that might lead people to believe that it is an advertisement. The company helps areas with deep poverty and the article continues to explain how the company achieves this and is also very interactive with the audience and that is a good quality of an advertisement. The purpose of the article is to persuade and encourage the audience to donate and help the organization. The target audience seems to be people that are looking for ways to help and are considering organizations to donate to because this article recalls every possible way to shed a good and positive light on the organization. 

            The article is written from the point of view of a worker in an organization called “Oxfam”, an organization dedicated to address issues of poverty in extremely poor countries. The article is taken directly off of the Oxfam website. The target audience seems to be people who are interested and worried about growing epidemics and are looking for ways to help. In general, the text is meant to do two things: to inform and to persuade. Firstly, many facts and numbers are brought up. People tend to believe a number and tend to be more affected by such things. The article explains the problem very effectively. Secondly, as stated before, there is a hidden advertisement in this article. Firstly, the article is placed on the website and so it must aim for something specific. The organization is portrayed in a very positive light. Often, things like “we can help” are often said. By using pronouns like “we”, the article becomes very interactive and personal with the audience. The audience therefore is more encouraged to donate because it becomes more of a personal task. It very subtly persuades people to donate to the cause and do something about the problem. It offers a problem - solution scenario because it states all of the growing issues and then goes on to explain how Oxfam is the solution. 

            The article goes on to explain about the hunger epidemic that is present in West and Central Africa. The problem seems to be a result of poor food harvests and water shortages. A study shows that around 12 million people are facing the possibility of a serious food crisis like the one that occurred in 2005 and 2008. Oxfam is sending humanitarian aid to millions of people in this area and working closely with families to help set up a foundation in order to prevent further such epidemics. 

          The tone and mood of the article are sad yet hopeful. The article is structured in a way that it begins very sadly and explains this crisis and how many people are involved in this epidemic but then continues on to explain that there is hope and that many communities are hard at work to fix these problems. The reader would begin reading the article and would feel very affected and upset but by the end of the article, they would feel as if they can help and as if there is hope. It has a certain sad mood because it gives us facts about poverty and hunger and when people have numbers in front of them, it is difficult to not be effected by it. By setting a depressing atmosphere, the audience is immediately snapped into reality and it encourages them to want to help and do something about the problem. This article very efficiently informs and persuades the target audience in a way that this problem can be solved but the company can also benefit from it. 

          By disguising the advertisement as an informative article, it uses ethos because the audience would not look at it as something that is trying to get money out of them but rather something that wants to inform them. Oxfam places themselves on a high pedestal and very effectively persuades the audience.