In The News

Globalization Unchecked: How Alien Media is Suffocating Real Culture

Ramzy Baroud November 23, 2009
Globalization is creating “cultural schizophrenia” in developing nations, which lack the ability to protect their traditional ways of life against the constant bombardment of a dazzling and well-packaged Western culture. The author, reflecting on his travels in the Muslim world − a Muslim family watching a barely-clad Beyonce on MTV or Turkish youths playing an American video game that involves...

Obama Backs Non-Censorship; Beijing, Apparently, Does Not

Keith B. Richburg November 17, 2009
President Obama's arrival in Shanghai featured a town hall forum with students watched by the foreign media. During the question and answer period, Obama stated his support for internet freedom of expression in response to a question on Beijing’s blocking of social media sites like Facebook. Meanwhile, Beijing did its best to make the event a non-story within China by carefully choosing the...

Forest Clearances Sealed Ancient Civilisation's Downfall

November 17, 2009
New evidence involving plant remains and pollen samples from areas in Peru formerly inhabited by the Nasca civilization has led a team of archaeologists to conclude that the fall of the Nasca society was triggered by human intervention in the delicate ecosystem on which it depended. The evidence collected suggests that as the Nasca intensified maize and cotton cultivation around 1,500 years ago,...

A New Mosque in Nicaragua Fires Up the Rumor Mill

Steve Stecklow November 16, 2009
A new mosque in Managua is sparking suspicions in the Nicaraguan capital, as citizens come to terms with the religion of the small Muslim community there. A variety of rumors are circulating about the mosque – that it was built by Iran, that all Muslims there are Taliban, and that all Muslims are actually Turks. None of these claims are true, assert leaders of the small Islamic community in...

Swiss Referendum Stirs a Debate About Islam

Deborah Ball, Anita Greil November 10, 2009
Switzerland has long been defined by its neutrality, a quality that has allowed its diverse population (of which one-fifth are immigrants) to avoid serious strife along ethnic or religious lines. Now, however, the rightist Swiss People's Party has initiated a referendum on the banning of minaret construction on mosques, raising questions about the status of Muslims in Switzerland. The issue...

South Koreans Struggle With Race

Choe Sang-Hun November 3, 2009
South Korea's development in the past half-century is a testament to the opportunities for prosperity globalization affords. Yet, despite South Korea’s export-led growth and its populace's near-obsession with learning English (particularly from foreign-born, white speakers), many South Korean’s are hostile to foreigners living and seeking work among them. Such reactions are likely...

The Cosmopolitan Tongue: The Universality of English

John McWhorter November 2, 2009
Today, languages are becoming extinct faster than species. One estimate predicts 90% of the 6,000 languages will cease to be spoken in the next century. Though lamenting such a loss, linguist and Columbia University Professor John McWhorter challenges the notion that language death equates to cultural loss. Languages show the diverse ways humans conceptualize the world. But, McWhorter notes, the...