Media Asia in \"Once Were Peripheral: Creating

Media Asia

In "Once Were Peripheral: Creating Media Capacity in East Asia," Keane argues that it is important to develop new paradigms or models of analysis when addressing emerging media in Asia. Some of the elements that Keane addresses include deterritorialization, isomorphism, cultural technology transfer, niche markets, and local clustering via cultural and industrial milieu. The author focuses specifically on the People's Republic of China, and applies his proposed new framework for a more globally integrated and culturally relative media. According to the author, the new growth models can better account for the current and future state of media as it manifests in East Asia. Prior debates have been concerned mainly with a total critique of Western media hegemony, and in particular with corporate conglomeration. While this critical analysis has been helpful, it might not be as relevant to the East Asian markets. Media plays a unique role in each society, and it cannot be assumed or inferred that media serves the same functions in East Asia as in North America.

The peripheral vision thesis that lends the article its title refers to such things as media exportation via diaspora communities. Whether peripheral media are representative of Western media imperialism remains up for debate. In some cases, media penetrates neighboring markets in an organic, rather than imperialistic fashion. Peripheral vision thesis does, however, taken into account the necessity of language and cultural tropes in media when it is exported. While the peripheral vision thesis applies well when analyzing media in South America, for example, it does not have as much relevance when examining the Asian market. Media capital, and the flow of capital and information exchange has led to different models for success in Asia. In ironic but rather predictable ways, Asian media has engaged in its own colonization of the rest of the world. Changes in the global economy, outsourcing, cloning, and other issues are all pertinent to the discussion.

The strengths of the article include its careful scrutiny of Asian media, its critical analysis of scholarship in the field of media studies and globalization, and the in-depth investigation and application of the theory in China. Reading this article, I learned a lot about the multiple facets of media, and how they manifest throughout any society. For example, there are the ways media impacts the viewer or consumer, and the way the disseminators of media capitalize on consumer demands. The article also raises interesting questions related to the directionality of media. For example, do consumers play an active role in determining content, or are consumers passive? Do factors like these change from place to place? Finally, the author does a good job using examples from Chinese television and cinema to make his case. These examples show how globalization has become a far more complex and organic process than what has been previously assumed by postmodern scholars, who presume Western cultural imperialism. The new model proposed by Keane is not as arrogant or presumptuous in its approach.