How advertising and consumer culture are contributing to the creation of a homogeneous global culture

Essay from the year 2005 in the subject Communications - Mass Media grade: 17 University of Leicester (University of Leicester - Centre for Mass Communication Research) course: Advertising Culture and Communication language: English abstract: Urban dwellers in the Western world have witnessed a change of their cityscapes recently. Small independent stores restaurants and coffee bars have been replaced by stores of multinational companies such as Tesco McDonald's Burgerking Starbucks H&M and The Gap. No matter if you are exploring the city centre of Leicester London or Hamburg you find more and more branches of large-scale business companies attempting to attract consumers with their big bright logos. The same process can be found in the media - global brands such as Hewlett-Packard and Coca Cola advertise all around the globe or in terms of Barnet et al (1995: p. 164): Marlboro country is everywhere. While the unification of city centres has been much-discussed further questions need to be elaborated on: In how far are these phenomena results of globalisation? Which consequences do they have for life in Western societies? Is there a global homogenisation of culture and if so to what extent? Which role does advertising play in this process? These and other questions are discussed in this paper.