"The media are not the holders of power, but they constitute by and large the space where power is decided"
- Manuel Castells
Abstract // Thesis
There is a complex relationship between dominant international media flows and subaltern, contra-flows today that a large majority of people around the world do not realize, such as the major impact of these interlacing flows on nationhood and cultural identity. Dominant international media flows are large, rich and powerful with global capitalism on their side, that allow them to spread a biased, one-way flow of information. In contrast, contra-flows in international media are other flows, some alternative flows of information, ideas/ideologies, media, and communication that participate in a two-way flow of discourse about news, information, politics, culture, etc. They are “contra-“ in that they counter the dominant media flows who control the majority of the news and media outlets today and continue to shape the global media order. One big fear with this process of globalization is that the values and images of the dominant international media flows are threatening to choke out the world’s “native flora,” as Appiah (2006) describes it, of other flows of information. In this paper, I give an example of a billion dollar entertainment contra-flow, the Hindi film Industry called Bollywood, which is the world’s largest (even bigger than Hollywood), however, its influence is largely confined to the Indian subcontinent and among the South Asian diaspora. In 2004, Bollywood accounted for just 0.2% of the $200 billion global film industry.
The issue I address is that although these other “contra-flows” exist in the mediascape of the world, they are still not big enough, powerful enough, nor developed enough to put a dent in the dominant transnational mainstream media today. In fact, just by having such contra-flows dedicated to specific regions actually reinforces the dominance of international media flows given the limitability of global access. In order to understand further the impact overlapping narratives of global, national and local identities have on the world, and how the imbalance between dominant and contra-flows today is still real, I look to Daya Kishan Thussu’s (2006) case study, “Mapping Global Media Flow and Contra-flow,” to critically examine the complex relationship between global media flows. In addition, I ask for further research on implications for a new global media order with respect to advancements in digital technology and growth of broadband, equal reach advantages, and reformed news and entertainment regulations in order to increase global access in all media flows.