The Importance of Experiencing Pop Culture Abroad

Shin Shin may be a bigger celeb than Carrie in Tokyo, but can she pull off that jacket?

It is Thursday afternoon in Tokyo and Shin Shin welcomes into the world her new baby panda. Televisions across the city are interrupting their normal news to bring you clips of her eating lunch and Twitter is all abuzz. Normally this kind of baby coverage is reserved for the Angelinas of the world, but it got me thinking… what makes a celebrity big and what makes Big a celebrity?

Meanwhile, on the upper East side, most New Yorkers are settling in for their morning meetings and having a cup of coffee while reading the Times and trying to decide if they like Romney or Obama. Shin Shin’s birth was suggested to be the most celebrated birthing since the last prince who was born in 2006.

If you’re not familiar with Asian culture, this might not resonate… but it’s also a great example of why you should go to experience the mindset of something completely different to what you and I consider news.

There’s plenty of reasons to experience another culture; humor, music, art, cinema, food… the list is endless. What you’ve taken for granted, the way in which you communicate with people in your native country, is likely to be radically different across the globe. Having done a considerable amount of media studies in my degrees, I can point you to the obvious examples of television shows that have to be adapted to suit other markets. 

Networks do this for various reasons, but you have to remember that shows like The Office was a smash hit in the UK and never saw the light of day in America until they re-casted and changed the tone of the show. The world you’ve grown up in has been adapted to you and the set of norms, ideals, jokes and references that media think you’ll like.

Expanding your horizons by studying abroad doesn’t just mean you’ll be learning about things relevant to your degree in another country, it’s your chance to soak up an understanding for what really makes another group of people tick. This, is arguably more important to your ability to adapt to new jobs, coworkers, cultures and is what will sell you for internationally-minded jobs.

A few years ago, I would have been able to say “… if you plan on working for an internationally-minded company…” But the reality is now, most companies deal with international stakeholders so you’ll be expected to understand the nuance of communicating with other cultures no matter where you end up.

The best way of understanding why Shin Shin is making the news is by going to Japan and watching how people consume popular culture/media. For example, did you know the level of censorship on broadcast media is different across the globe? You can’t say sh*t, literally, on TV in America… and a long laundry list of other words, body parts and scenarios.

What is considered appropriate will shift dramatically once you’ve landed in Europe and Australia where you can swear and have nudity (with caveats, AU for example will pull the plug once you get too explicitly aroused on screen.)… but if you try to do this in China… you’d have people blushing as they even had to change the name on DVD boxes for Sex and the City to Desire City to make it more modest.

It’s important then to consider how a culture accepts or alters different notions of social norms when having to enter the working world. If you can walk into a company and tell them why not adapting an advertisement for airing in Latin America is the biggest mistake and waste of money they will make all year… and be able to prove why… well then you’ve secured your bonus for the end of the year!

Congrats Shin Shin (yes, I’ve congratulated a panda)! And to you, why not go somewhere in the world that will challenge your notion of celebrity culture…