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As human beings, we think, believe, and behave through our culture, and in the process, we create it. It is through this interactive relationship between the human mind and culture that both ourselves and society have evolved. Cultural values are essential components of society because they hold a society together by creating common understanding and practices. Every culture possesses its own unique set of values that guide its member’s actions and interactions and help them understand their surrounding environment.
Our cultural identity is a critical piece of our personal identity and worldview that develops as we absorb, interpret, and adapt or reject the beliefs, values, behaviours, and norms of the communities in our lives. Our cultural identities can evolve, as culture is ever-evolving and dynamic. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, British cultural practices were adopted by many of its colonies, including Ghana. This can be seen through the widespread adaptation of the English language, the legal system, and particularly sports, so the sociocultural values of any ethnic group in Ghana have been influenced by British culture since colonial times and have been a major cause of cultural globalization.
Globalization has become an inevitable part of our lives, although it is usually regarded as having an economic and political impact on the lives of most people. Great ideas can be transmitted from one culture to another, including scientific discoveries that are shared.
Since ancient times, humans have sought distant places to settle, produce, and exchange goods, enabled by improvements in technology and transportation. But in the nineteenth century, global integration took off. Globalization was propelled by steamships, railroads, the telegraph, and other breakthroughs, as well as by increasing economic cooperation among countries.
The globalisation trend eventually waned and crashed in the catastrophe of World War One, followed by postwar protectionism, the Great Depression, and World War Two. After World War II in the mid-1940s, the United States led efforts to revive international trade and investment under negotiated ground rules, starting a second wave of globalization that remains ongoing through periodic downturns and mounting political scrutiny.
After the Second World War, the United States helped build a global economic system governed by mutually accepted rules and overseen by multilateral institutions. The idea was to create a better world with countries seeking to cooperate with one another to promote prosperity and peace. Free trade and the rule of law were the mainstays of the system, helping to prevent most economic disputes from escalating into larger conflicts.
The institutions established include the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 1944, the United Nations (UN) in 1945, the World Bank in 1945, and the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1948. The new set of global values could possibly be the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, which is universal and to be enjoyed by all people, no matter who they are or where they live.
Cultural globalisation is a phenomenon in which the experience of everyday life, influenced by the diffusion of commodities and ideas, reflects a standardisation of cultural expressions around the world. Propelled by the efficiency or appeal of wireless communications, electronic commerce, popular culture, and international travel, globalisation has been seen as a trend towards homogeneity that will make the human experience everywhere essentially the same.
This appears, however, to be an overstatement of the phenomenon. Although homogenising influences do indeed exist, they are far from creating anything akin to a single-world culture. Increased cultural flows across the world lead to cultural globalisation. The cultural dimension of globalisation focuses on the tension between cultural sameness and cultural difference, broadly defining culture as the ideas, customs, and social behaviour of people or society.
The globalisation of culture is often primarily attributed to international mass media. New technologies such as satellite television and the internet have created a steady flow of images and messages that have had a strong impact on cultures and communities, profoundly altering the way people experience their everyday lives. As the world becomes more connected, language diversity is decreasing as more languages become obsolete.
Cultural globalisation has allowed for uniformity of standards in measuring time and space. For instance, historically, different cultures had different calendars based on different determinants, such as solar, lunar, etc. The very sense of time once differed across cultures, but now we all follow the same time norms and calendars.
Similarly, different units used to be used for measuring distance, mass, volume, etc., but today, the Gregorian calendar and its months are followed in most of the world, while the metric system is used for measuring space all over the world. This has allowed not just for ease of communication but for greater scientific progress. It led to freeing up Human Resources from the cumbersome task of having to convert from one system to another.
Cultural globalisation allows for the spread of positive political and social values such as democracy, which happens both through the use of mass communication as well as the physical movement of people across boundaries and the exchanges between diasporas and their homelands. For example, the spread of ideas such as freedom, democracy, secularism, and feminism has led to political movements in many parts of the world demanding greater rights for their people.
Twenty-first century revolutionary movements such as the Arab Spring, the Orange Revolution, and others were fuelled by ideas born out of a culture of globalisation that allowed liberal values to be widely disseminated and accepted in societies with traditionally autocratic political structures. These ideas spread sporadically through cultures, and there is clear evidence of cultural lag.
Cultural globalisation creates greater opportunities for wealth creation as it allows businesses and people to move and operate across different geographies with greater ease. For instance, the widespread use of the English language and American corporate culture in much of the world allows businesses to expand virtually to any geography without having to worry about linguistic and cultural barriers.
Similarly, familiarity with the English language allows people from poor third-world countries such as India to migrate to Pakistan, Ghana, Nigeria, and Bangladesh to migrate to rich countries that are first-world Anglo-Saxon nations, such as the United States, Canada, and Australia, and afford a better standard of living. Critics argue that while bringing people together, cultural globalisation can also be a threat to local cultures. For example, languages and traditions can be replaced with a transnational culture.
The widespread use of the English language is good for creating economic opportunities for third-world countries, but it also threatens their indigenous languages. The medium of instruction in many countries has been English, replacing local languages, thereby hampering the development of local languages. The disappearance of ancient cultures and customs due to technological changes brought about by globalisation is another example of the erosion of local cultures.
An alternative perspective on cultural globalisation emphasises the transfiguration of worldwide diversity into a uniform westernised consumer culture. Some critics argue that the dominance of American culture over the entire world will ultimately result in the end of cultural diversity. The process has been interpreted as cultural imperialism and is associated with the destruction of cultural identities dominated by a homogenised and westernised consumer culture.
The global influence of American products, businesses, and culture in other countries around the world has been referred to as Americanization. Major American companies, such as McDonald’s and Coca-Cola, have played a major role in the spread of American culture around the world.
The World Cup and the Olympics, which bind millions together in a shared, truly global experience, can be viewed as cultural globalisation. Migration has been going on for centuries, with languages, religious beliefs, and values being spread by military conquest, missionary work, and trade, making cultural globalisation a catalyst for positive change. The process of cultural globalisation has dramatically intensified due to technological advances in both transportation and communications technology.
Events of the past have unfolded quickly in front of a global audience, which means that many people have a more global outlook and increasingly identify with a global audience. For example, television reporting of natural disasters in developing countries has led to people in rich nations donating money to charities such as Oxfam to assist with relief efforts. Anthony Giddens developed the concept of “cosmopolitanism “to describe this process of an emerging global identity.
Criticisms of Giddens are that some people see increasing globalisation as a threat to their ways of life and retreat into fundamentalism and nationalism as a defensive response, suggesting that globalisation could go in reverse. The argument of Anthony Giddens in his 1999 text, Runaway World, is that one consequence of globalisation is detraditionalization, where people question their traditional beliefs about marriage and gender roles.
Many people are aware of the fact that there are alternative ways of doing things and that they can change traditions. The development of a global risk consciousness that emerges due to shared global problems that threaten people in many countries is a fundamental feature of globalization, as argued by Ulrich Beck. Examples include the threat of terrorism, international nuclear war, the threat of global pandemics, the rise of organised crime funded primarily through international drug trafficking, and the threat of planetary meltdown due to global warming.
Negatively, the constant media focus on such global problems has led to a widespread culture of fear and increasing anxiety across the globe, which has arguably contributed to things such as paranoid parenting. But on the positive side, new global international movements and agencies have emerged through which people come together across borders to tackle such problems.
A global convergence around a set of universal values—freedom, equality, personal dignity, pluralism, and human rights—is what globalization is about. It was, first of all, an economic and technological process. It was about growing trade and investment between nations and the spread of technologies, but globalisation is also a political, social, and moral process.
As the British sociologist Anthony Giddens argued in the 1990s, globalisation is a shift in our life circumstances. It is the way we now live. It involves the intensification of worldwide social relations. Globalization is about the integration of worldviews, products, ideas, and cultures. There is the idea of modernization that, as nations develop, they will become more like the developed ones that have already modernised.
The assumption was that as societies modernized, they would become more secular, just as in Europe and parts of the United States, and more driven by the desire to make money than to conquer others. They would be more driven by the desire to settle down into suburban homes than by fanatical ideologies or the sort of hunger for prestige and conquest that had doomed humanity to centuries of war.
Our optimistic vision is how history would evolve and a vision of progress and convergence. Unfortunately, this vision does not describe the world we live in today. Economic rivalries have now emerged, along with political, moral, and other rivalries, into one global contest for dominance. Globalization is being replaced by something that looks like a global culture war. Over the past few decades, global politics has functioned as a massive social inequality machine. Groups of educated urban elites have arisen to dominate media, universities, culture, and often political power.
People feel looked down upon and ignored. Populist leaders have arisen to exploit these resentments. In many countries, nationalistic movements have arisen to insist on national sovereignty and restore national pride. They say to hell with cosmopolitanism. People are driven by moral longings, by their attachment to their own cultural values, and by their desire to fiercely defend their values when they seem to be under assault.
The ideas about gender roles in the United States have been described as foreign or repellent by many people around the world. They find the United States' fervent defence of LGBTQ rights off-putting. The idea that it’s up to each person to choose one’s own identity and values seems ridiculous to many. The idea that the purpose of education is to inculcate critical thinking skills so students can liberate themselves from the ideas they receive from their parents and communities seems foolish to many.
What is happening now is a conflict about politics, economics, culture, status, psychology, morality, and religion all at once, not just a political or economic conflict. Specifically, it is a rejection by many people of how Western countries do things in their own ways. Defining this conflict, one would say it is the difference between the Western countries' emphasis on personal dignity and most of the rest of the world’s emphasis on communal cohesion.
But most important is the way these longstanding and cultural differences are being whipped up by autocrats who want to expand their power and sow chaos in the democratic world. Authoritarian rulers now routinely weaponize cultural differences, religious tensions, and status resentments to mobilise supporters, attract allies, and expand their own power. This is a cultural difference transformed by status resentment into a culture war.
How do you win a global culture war in which differing views on secularism and gay rights are intertwined with global trade flows, status resentments, toxic masculinity, and authoritarian power grabs? That’s the problem we find ourselves with today. The moral accomplishment is to aspire to extend dignity, human rights, and self-determination to all.
The importance of global culture is exposure to different languages, religions, and interactions, which can create connections and show diversity. The development of global culture can give opportunities to marginalised and disadvantaged groups. Examples include worldwide exposure to the broadcasting of the Paralympics, sexual discrimination cases, and gay pride celebrations that raise awareness and help face prejudices in emerging or developing countries.
But how people negotiate meaning differently in specific contexts is highlighted as the key critique of cultural imperialism. If people are going to be persuaded in Africa, Latin America, and the rest of the world that they should throw their lot in with the democracies and not with the authoritarians who speak to their resentments and their pride, a better way of life can be achieved. For those authoritarians, their followers are just instruments in their own search for self-aggrandizement.
Underlying the visions of globalisation is a reluctance to define exactly what is meant by the term culture. During most of the twentieth century, anthropologists defined culture as a shared set of beliefs, customs, and ideas that held people together in recognisable, self-identified groups. Scholars in many disciplines challenged this notion of cultural coherence, especially as it became apparent that members of close-knit groups held radically different visions of their social worlds. Culture is no longer perceived as a knowledge system inherited from our ancestors.
Cultural values and norms influence the development of moral emotions such as guilt, shame, and empathy. Cultural identities, conveyed by larger groups, contribute to individuals’ understanding of morality and fair treatment. Understanding other cultures helps us understand the diversity of human creation. And it’s important for dispelling miscommunication as well as misinterpretation. Besides creating meaningful and valuable relationships with others, we learn to respect and appreciate their differences.
Different religious beliefs and practices emerge in different social and historical contexts because context frames the meaning of religious beliefs. It is important to explain how the same religion can be interpreted differently by different groups or at different times throughout history. Thus, different people or groups may interpret the Bible in different ways.
In Ghana, a small segment of the population adheres to the traditional indigenous religions, while Christianity is the largest, followed by Islam. Though indigenous religions are based in general on belief in the existence of a Supreme Being, a number of lesser deities associated with various natural phenomena are recognised. More prominence is given to dead ancestors, who are considered to be ever-present, capable of influencing the course of events for the living, and capable of serving as intermediaries between the living and the divine beings.
The arrival of the Europeans in the fifteenth century on the then-Gold Coast brought Christianity to the land. Christian missions of all denominations open schools and disseminate education in an attempt to spread the Christian faith, win converts, and transform Ghanaian societies. Much of the recent Christian growth in Ghana is due to indigenous Ghanaian missionary work and evangelism rather than European missionaries.
The growth of a form of Christianity that emphasises the work of the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts as an everyday part of a believer’s life, called the Charismatic Movement, has been dominating Christianity in Ghana. Members of the charismatic movement are non-Pentecostal denominations, but they hold at least some spiritual practices associated with Pentecostalism, including divine healing, prophecy, and speaking in tongues known as glossolalia, which is the most celebrated aspect of charismatic prayer.
Charismatic leaders, with their potential dark side traits of narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy, can thus take advantage of the complex social exchanges they conduct with their followers, which may have consequences for both parties. One of the maladies of the Christian community is ignorance because they may be members of a cult group that is typically led by a charismatic and self-appointed leader who tightly controls its members, requiring unwavering devotion to a set of beliefs and practices that are considered deviant.
Christian nationalism is another growing force in Ghana. Pentecostals or charismatics who seek changes in public policy to build God’s kingdom on earth, which is a Christianized state, have an influence on politics, which is affecting how people view national cohesion and economic performance. Christian nationalism is often a vehicle for those who espouse dominion theology. The overall goal of Christian nationalists in Ghana is to exercise Christian authority over society and politics.
There is a threat to national cohesion because Muslims and traditional Ghanaian religions have different religious and cultural beliefs. Ghana’s LGBTQ+ community has been verbally and physically attacked because there is biblical justification, according to the dominion theologist. The Bible is believed to laud family values and assert the superiority of Christianity over Islam and Ghanaian traditional religions, which are seen as false religions, keeping Ghana in the dark.
Ideas about a Christian nation are powerful in Ghana. Christian nationalist beliefs draw on what are widely believed to be traditional markers of Ghanaian identity, including Christianity, social conservatism, and antagonism to progressive Western ideas such as equality for LGBTQ+. Prominent Christian nationalists have close personal relationships with members of Ghana’s political elite, including the current president, which facilitates access to policymakers.
Ghana’s constitution does not allow political parties based on religious or ethnic considerations. This, however, does not stop Christian nationalists in Ghana from seeking to influence individual politicians. The separation of religion and state is documented in the Constitution. While people are allowed to practice whatever they believe in as their religion, the government must not allow that to influence public policy.
Christian nationalists are fundamentalists who tend to have conservative political opinions, which means that women should occupy traditional gender roles and are opposed to the LGBTQIA community. People in the democratic nations of the world are lucky enough to live in societies that have rule-based orders in which individual rights are protected and in which they get to choose their own leaders. Ghana is one of those democratic nations, and as such, all its citizens are protected by human rights, irrespective of their sexual orientation.
It is time for us to envision a strong bird in our mind’s eye, whose body is moving in one direction and whose head is turned backward. The bird’s head is turned backward because it is gazing at the ground it has already covered. This powerful, majestic bird is moving forward, looking back, and gathering the seeds of wisdom in its mouth. These seeds will give hope and direction for the future. This powerful bird is the "Sankofa."
The meaning of Sankofa is simply that we cannot move forward into the future without first going back to our past, understanding it, and embodying all of the joy and struggles of the past as seeds of wisdom for the future. Our memories of the past, even the most recent past, must be separated from living wisdom for the living of these days—the kind of wisdom that will usher in new hope and new possibilities.
We must place a stone along the political path of the nation, the same way that our Hebrew Bible text tells us that Samuel placed a stone in the path and called it Ebenezer, whereby the Lord helped us. We must also carve into the stone the image of “Sankofa “and vow to remember our history and what happens if we do not stand against xenophobia, Islamophobia, misogyny, racism, sexism, genderism, and every other ism that seeks to separate, divide, and wall off our community. While we are moving forward, we are also looking back, carrying the seeds of wisdom from the past that will open us to a powerful future with God.
