Question

Most aspects of foreign culture, like language, religion, gender roles, and problem-solving strategies, are hard for the casual observer to understand. In what ways do Hollywood movies affect national culture outside the United States? What aspects of U.S. culture do Hollywood films promote around the world? Can you observe any positive effects of Hollywood movies on world cultures?

Answer 1

With the exposure of cultural metaphors, stereotypes, and idioms, Hollywood films have affected national culture outside the United States. Cultural metaphor is an activity or institution that emotionally or cognitively attaches members of a particular society, such as American soccer or Japanese garden. Stereotyping categorizes all people with the same trait and may or may not be true. Idioms are a collection of two or more words that mean something other than the literal meanings of their individual words; for instance, the meaning of the news of yesterday is no longer interesting.

These insights of U.S. culture are portrayed in Hollywood films and are left to create a judgment on U.S. culture without explanation. The conversational patterns, language, and religion in the United States are views of the other cultures. Then there is the Americanization of universal values and beliefs that the Hollywood films depict.

Hollywood films portray many facets of U.S. society, including political philosophy, economic philosophy, social culture, education, faith, language and culture. Movies supporting the political philosophy aspect: All the King’s Men – the rise and fall of a corrupt politician who makes his friends richer and retains power through populist appeal; The Candidate – a Senate candidate with no hope of winning actually wins; The War Room – a look inside Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign and the people who ran it