In Ang's chapter on Culture and Communication, she discusses at length the notion of the nation and the processes by which nations are represented. Ang states, "The desire to keep national identity and national culture wholesome and pristine is not only becoming increasingly unrealistic, but is also, at a more theoretical level, damagingly oblivious to the contradictions that are condensed in the very concept of national identity." Thus, the act of representing a nation is a deliberate attempt at "nation-building." Attempting to do so ignores the many conflicting notions of identity that exist in a nation. Specifically here, I want to pose the questions, WHO is the face of America? Who creates the face of America? And, why?
Ang uses the examples of the Malay government’s attempts to foster a Malaysian identity. The government strictly enforced what type of models would be used to represent the country, and thus “national identity is a matter of selective construction.” The WHO in this case is the models that represent the races of Malaysia (at least according to the government). Which answers the next question; the Malay government is directly involved in constructing this representation. Why? For the explicit purpose of fostering nationalism.
The case with the United States is different for many obvious reasons; one being that the U.S. has a highly heterogeneous population. In fact, this is part of the myth of American multiculturalism - what makes America, America! So the questions I posed above get a bit more complicated, especially when the government is not directly implicated in the creation of a national identity. I've posted a clip here called "The Diverse and Multicultural Face of America: Majority Minority."
It was created by XL Cultural Marketing, whose slogan is "elevate culture to elevate profits!" Clearly in this case, a marketing company is contributing to the creation of a specific type of national identity, for the clear purpose of "elevating profits." However, I think it's important to see how these marketing strategies are more that just ways of increasing profit, but they actually do contribute to images of national identity and a so-called "face of America." How do you think such marketing strategies contributes to nation-building? Browse the "Cultural Intelligence" website and think about the questions of who and maybe more importantly why. (Why THIS face for America? Why is it important for the Face of America to be multicultural?)
