The Promotion of American Culture Through Hollywood Movies to the World Audience: A Threat to National Identity and Sovereignty

Wanwarang Maisuwong

Chapter I Introduction Background and Significance The Americans films are not only viewed in the America, but they are viewed by the massive audience around the world. Additionally, the American film firms dominate the majority of market share in the world film industry. It seems that using films is the best mean for the America to gain recognition and friendship. Films portray a smooth storytelling and attract the people to keep watching from the beginning until the end. To me, the American films are still the most interesting films to watch and the easiest to understand. The promotion of American culture through films is a phenomenon where America subtly wants to dominate the world by spreading out its own culture and tradition through the movies. Americas transferring of culture becomes more relevant while the concept of Americanism is known worldwide since it became the world superpower. America tries to make the American values in the films meaningful to others and it tries to make the films as a new political tactic used in world politics. Film is seen as a global medium that reaches a huge amount of the audience with the same message while the film industry plays the leading role in the global media system. The audiences receive the messages contain in the film at almost the same time, but the interpretation of the films are different in which it depends on personal perception and external environment. America is the only super power in the world, its decision to promote its American culture to international community may affect the relations with other nation states. The movies have a high ability in capturing imagination, shaping, and directing the sense of what was real, true, and preferable, because movie contains both motion picture and sound. The promotion of American culture through Hollywood movies grasps larger populations. The popularity of American culture may make the rest of the world to decide whether to fear or favor the promise of Americanization and a globalized planet. Research Questions 1. How does globalization affect the role of film in international relations? 2. What are possible motivations of America to promote its own culture through Hollywood movies? 3. What are critical cultural values and political messages in each selected film that America tries to communicate towards the world audience? 4. What could be cultural effects of film to the audience? Hypotheses 1. Globalization affects film to play an influential role in international relations where it encourages America to realize a significance of the film and decides to use films as a medium tool to contain its political messages and cultural values to communicate throughout the world audience. 2. The objective of promoting American culture through Hollywood movies is to dominate the other cultural communities around the world and become the universal culture of the world. 3. Film has an ability to reach mass audience globally; they provide powerful persuasive messages by letting people learn through play. Thus, films with cultural values may provide preferred consequences to the proposed objectives of the film producers.

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Theoretical Framework Cultural Imperialism Cultural Imperialism is a domination of a more recognized culture over other cultures, in other word, cultural imperialism is a soft mean of colonization. Cultural imperialism can be due to economic and technological factors. It said to be that the cultural products i.e. MNCs, foods, films, news, and etc., of the developed world step across the border lines to the developing and non-developed countries and conquer the local culture of those ones. Receiving culture can be either a threat or a gift. The dominant culture may superior over and beat the cultural identity of local cultures. On the other hand, receiving culture is a spreading of some universal values, for example, freedom of expression, democracy, human rights, and equality. Regarding to Frankfurt School, the postmodernisms have been fascinated precisely by the whole degraded of landscape of schlock and kitsch, TV series, advertising, and the grade-B Hollywood film.

Chapter II An Analysis of Hollywood Movies Critical Analysis of Culture in Hollywood Movies Pearl Harbor Pearl Habor is a cinematic discourse movie where it contains both war and romance stories. Two boys grew up together, became good friends, and later fell in love with the same woman. The movie expresses the painful of love of three people and the suffer of American people during the war crime. 1. Freedom of Expression Begin with a scene where Rafe called Dannys father as a dirty German, to me it seemed that American adults and kids have the same right. It is considered that the Western societies do not pay attention on the hierarchy of society where the younger needs to respect the older in any case. Rafe has been blamed by his officer from being irresponsible flying dangerously. Perhaps, he refused that he has done it just because to show off, but he instead said that he has done it to inspire the man just like his supervisor has inspired him and got his fame. This shows that the lieutenant can speak out loud his reasons against his military officer, as long as he has good reasons to argue. Otherwise, this kind of conversation wont occur in the other society apart from American society where the under supervisor oppose the supervisor. To me, in the non-western society, they would mostly remain silence. The scene where Rafe meets Evelyn at the train station, they kissed and hugged while Evelyns friend asked Rafe for a man. This tells an expression of love, they show it publicly, they dont need to hind; because for them love is a beautiful thing. On the other hand, Evelyns friend asked for a man whom she can date with, and then Rafe replied by take a pic. It shows that being not conservative or shy as a lady in American society is not unacceptable. At the navy department, American navy officers were trying to interpret, guess, what Japanese was doing. They were curious of the Japanese movement and they have been trying to tell the navy officer in trying to protect or prevent the Japanese from taking any action to America. Hence, the officer did not believe because he said that it was just a guess. This anyway entails the freedom of expressing their minds and observes in front of the higher officers of American navy department without hesitation and reluctance. Finally, the officer required a completed interpret code where he could make a right decision. 2. Nationalism The culture of nationalism can obviously seen on the American armies where they are

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passion to their nation. Before fighting, they recruited, they raised American flag, they marched, and they sang American song. It encloses their passionate on home country. During fighting with Japanese, they worked corporately as a good team work. They further followed the instruction given by their higher supervisors and officers. They have never broken the rules, because they put the important of their nation as their priority to achieve. Furthermore, some of them put their personal issue back behind, whereas they could work unreluctantly. 3. Sexuality Sexuality represents a low context culture of American society in which their behavior and tendency to express are very obvious. They spoke what they thought, they did what they wanted. They made love since the beginning of their dating or since the first time they have met. Danny and Evelyn had sex together just right after Evelyn came to see Danny, and flew to see Pearl Harbor from the sky side. They were happy on the plane, and after that it took them into love affairs. 4. Language The movie first taken place in Tennessee where both Danny and Rafe grew up. Tennessee is a state where the majority of people own farms and work in farms. Their career is agricultural and ranch work. Danny and Rafe were called farm boys in the movie. Their accent of speaking is a way much in a rural way. To me, they spoke English with short pronunciation. Perhaps, Rafe is an American born, he has graduated school, but he sometimes mixed up the letters and switched them. Otherwise, he passed mathematics and special listening, as he claimed. 5. Lifestyle During Dannys and Rafes childhood, they played in farm, dresses as farm boys, and their playground was a corn field. This emphasizes that the livelihood is the result of the surroundings and environment. Those two boys play with what they live with, or what their parents work on. They were familiar with the agricultural plane, and dreamed to be pilots one day. When Danny and Rafe became military men, their lifestyle was changed according to their work place. They worked along the coastal line. Their hangings out places were beach bars or night clubs in the down town. Additionally, the jazz music was popular at that time, a lot of couples went to the restaurants, listened to a jazz, and danced. Also, cinema played an active role; many people attended the movies shown in the cinemas. But the movies shown at that time were about war. 6. Value Once again, the race became a part of this movie which the white Americans are always more respected than the African American people. Most of the people, working in American Armies or any other American department represented in this movie, are white American while few African Americans working there are the labor class working in the kitchen or as the maintenances. It seems that the whites were more privilege over the blacks. A boxing between a white American and a black American on the navy ship, shows the dignity fight between the two races. The white wanted to show that the whites were always more powerful than the whites, while the white just wanted to gain respect. On the other side, Americans were made to believe any American men were meant to serve US military. As I have seen from the movie, most of American men were willing to serve their nations by becoming military men. In case, they believed that they would be able to seek their real gentleman from military tasks. Some of them wanted to be pilots. To me, being a pilot of those young American men stated the freedom of their life where all Americans are very keen on the freedom. Instance, Rafe voluntary gone to a war field in Britain, he believed that he could get a real combat training, and gain a first-hand experience in the war. Earlier, he wanted to be a pilot, and going to Britain would fulfill his dream of becoming a real army pilot. 7. Ideology In this movie, the reason America remained neutral and pretended the war was

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not a war yet, is because America believed that war was Europeans stake. It was a fight between the liberal world and non-liberal world where America did not want to trade off its sovereignty and honors with the violence that happened to change America and the world. Beyond my perspective, I believe that America, at the beginning, ignored the war because America put itself as a symbol of peaceful and freedom. They wouldnt do anything contradict to their ideology. To remain neutral is to tell the world that America is a peace lover and they wouldnt attack others first only to show off their power, but they would fight only if someone offended them and stepped down their fame. The Day After Tomorrow The day after tomorrow is a movie about the effect of global warming. In the movie, the melting of the polar ice poured the fresh water into an ocean, and it diluted the salt water in the sea which resulted to the ocean temperature to drop down 13 degrees. 1. Freedom of Expression Jack Hall provided his speech on global warming at the UN Conference on global warming. He acknowledged the representatives of the other nations about the global warming and its consequences. He ask been argued by the Vice President of America about the cost of taking an action on the environmental issue may result to the economic lost. In this argument, the Vice President seemed to look down on Jack as he knew nothing about governing the nation and economic. The vice president expressed that economic is a driven force of the nation, perhaps Hall opposed that if we took no action on this climate shift problem, it may cost a massive crisis to the whole world. From his speech, it showed that professor Hall was not hesitate in providing his speech in front of high level government officers from many states. Moreover, he was not too feared to resist the Vice President of America, but he further made fun of the Vice President argument. Similarly, Jack Hall looked down on the Vice President who has lower level of knowledge about science than his son. Sam Hall had an argument with his professor after he fail Sam in the exam. Sam had all the answers written down on the exam sheet, but he didnt put the solution because he has done it in his head. Otherwise, his professor accused him of cheating on the exam. Sam told his professor that he couldnt fail Sam just because Sam was smarter than him. This is an expression between the professor and the student, which would never happen in the eastern society where the students or the young people have to respect to their teachers or the elderly ones. While the UN Conference on global warming was taken place inside the building, there was a protest outside and said stop global warming. It was a right of expression where the green world lovers shall express as long as their act didnt violate the law, and didnt create chaos and violent. In the movie, it displayed the media as the center of information. The media first reached the situation taking place. They had freedom to report the live scene, before the government investigation. The public would sense live scenes and the information wont be distorted. 2. Nationalism The American flag and the Statue of Liberty were mainly showed how important to America they are. After the iced storm, the flag and the Statue of Liberty were frozen. These two institutes were seen as the symbol of freedom. The flag with all fifty states, and the statue which is a gift of Americas allies were destroyed by the nature. I think, this movie wanted to show flag means America where the Statue of Liberty is a symbol of friendship in the liberal world era. America is a leader in technological advanced; they have satellite dwelling outside the world, they have smart professor discovered the natural catastrophe, and they have natural history museum in New York where everyone who came to New York should have not missed to visit. In fact, America sees itself as a representation of civilized world. 3. Sexuality According to the UN Conference on global warming, most of international

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representatives I saw in the movie were males. Its much to say that it was a gender inequality. The women were against in attending international conference, they had no equal rights with men, and they had no rights to sit next by men. On the other part, at the academic competition where Sam and his friends attended in New York, it opened for both male and female students to attend. I saw a half of competitors were females and they expressed their intellectual and intelligence. 4. Language The movie did not portray any unique usage of language. There were few conversations than an appearance of pictures. As Peter, an ill boy in a hospital mentioned that he couldnt read but the pictures told story. The day after tomorrow represented a lot of pictures where those pictures elaborated a lot of details where the audiences didnt have to imagine themselves. 5. Lifestyle Timing is very important; being on time is a very important culture for American people and American society. According to Sam, an American teen, who had an easy supper eating in the kitchen. Jack Hall jumped to the conclusion when he has got his son grade report card. He was mad believing in only one side of information, he didnt listen to his sons reason yet. But his son required Jack to see his reason. To me, American people didnt like judging things from hearing only one side. The reasons must be provided by both sides, and the most reasonable excuse would be accepted. 6. Value In the public library where Sam and a group of people were residing, there was one man who didnt believe in religion. Perhaps, he held the bible tightly. He said that bible is the holy book and that bible he was holding was the original one which was the first book ever printed. Meanwhile, the religion is important to all mankind even to a non-religious man. I think his intention to protect the bible was to pass it to the next generation where they can learn and behave according to the bible. Once, the police in the public library saw the people evacuating down to the south, he told the other people to get ready to move following those people. And all of them believed that police officer. This means to me that the government people were meant to the public as a credible source, they are the opinion leaders, where their statement or decisions are accountable. A smart woman married a smart man would produce a smart kid. As we can see in the movie that Jack Hall, a professor, married a doctor, and his son was intelligent. Jack believed that his son was a grade A student, he was not supposed to fall any exam. The movie shows a lot of friends hospitality and sacrifice. Sam and his friends were a good team work. They took cared each other, and they brainstormed when they faced the problem. Moreover, a new friend they met at a competition became their good friend. He had a thoughtful mind and always helped those three friends. When Jack decided to safe his son in New York, his colleagues went along with him claiming to safe his blind side. These show the hospitality, even in the terrible time, friends dont leave friends. Sams mother has a high moral of being a doctor, she decided to stay with Peter, her patient, waiting for the ambulance. She sacrificed her personal safety with the boy who had no parents to pick up, and whom couldnt have been moved without the ambulance. Finally, the ambulance came to pick them up, because they heard that there were someone left behind. It shows that Americans will never leave Americans behind in a tragic time. 7. Ideology Once more, the movie portrays a sense of American hero. When Laura went back to help a mother and her kid who have been locked in a taxi and spoke no English. Laura was a translator speaking French to them. In sense, without Lauras help, the mother, the kid, and the police would have not been survived, because of the flood quickly coming to them. Laura safed three peoples lives, but she herself has got injured on her leg. Her blood was poisoned under

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the water for a while, she had a fever later, but she was recovered and was not dead. This delivers the message that Americam always does a good and right thing, and the good intention will never hurt America. Apart from a good faith, the movie shows that America firmly relies on their economic. Their economy is much more important than anything else. The cost of losing economic advantage is huge where its hard to be recovered. The Devil wears Prada The name of a movie is a metaphor. The movie is about the fashion magazine which is very famous in America. Andrea Sachs knew nothing about fashion but got her first job at the fashion magazine. 1. Freedom of Expression The first expression occurred during the job interview between Miranda and Andrea. Miranda didnt like the way Andrea dress and Andreas size. And she was about to ignore and was intentionally not going to hire Andrea. But Andrea impressed Miranda by saying that she was an editor-in-chief at Northwestern University, she is fast to learn and understand. Andrea also mentioned about her work ethics. Finally, Miranda decided to hire her. This interview speech represented that Andrea was a brave in showing her intellectual in order to get a job. She was willing to fight for her career. A gossip between two girls even the one they were talking about was walking through. This showed an open minded of American people, and they didnt pay much attention on the conversation behind their back. One sexual expression was a kiss at the corner of street in Paris, in which both kissers were not a couple or lovers. Andrea and Christian Thompson kissed after their dinner. They both were not in love, and they were not in their home country, but they still expressed their feeling in a public place though it was at night. 2. Nationalism I have seen fashion in a movie, clothes, shoes, and bags were the world brand names that are from many fashion leading countries around the world, mainly in Europe. Otherwise, the cosmetics that were mainly used in the movie were the American brands. This, to me, seemed that Americans sense that their cosmetics are the best in the world. Moreover, Americans should consume what Americans created or produced. Runway was number one fashion magazine of America and it was known worldwide, from the movie. I assume that the American people work for this magazine are supposed to be the most intelligent people in fashion field. The fashion designer was the best, and the editor-inchief of the magazine was the most memorable. It further stated that the Runway would have to be the number one fashion magazine in the world. 3. Sexuality Andrea and her boyfriend stayed together at the same apartment before getting marry. They had an intimate relationship, and had an affair. It seems normal in American society. A couple livening together before marriage is acceptable and welcome. On the other hand, Andrea and Christian Thompson had an affair at their first date. They didnt even love each other. After a night of an affair, the next day they could pretend there was nothing has happened the night before. So, it makes me think that it is usual having sex without any relationship or conversation for Americans. 4. Language The conversations between Miranda, and her secretaries and other employees were short and firm. I think it is because she was a boss, and she didnt like to explain things. On the other way round, she was a bossy boss, so she didnt like any one to b other her on going mind. I think she would have something in her head and mind to think about all the time, because fashion goes fast, the new updated came out the day before, it may outdated the next days.

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Miranda always looked at people from head to toes. Her eyes language said lots of thing, whether she was satisfied, or she was impressed. She didnt talk that much, but she used her eyes a lot. 5. Lifestyle The skinny women had different way of eating from the fat ones. The skinny ate low carp food, while the fat ate fast food, and onion bagel. In this movie, Starbuck was mentioned where Miranda always required her coffee from Starbuck. Starbuck is a global brand, but to this movie, Starbuck was put as an exclusive brand for the top class persons. In the fashion world, everyone must be fast and updated. The people working at the Runway dressed fashionably and walked confidently, and they had few minutes to eat with few food and low carp. In New York city, everything seemed busy. People always took subway of taxi to go to work, while most of them lived in the town houses or departments. Because there are lots of people reside in New York. The people walked fast, the traffic was busy, and the cars ran fast. And the house rent in New York was high. American people in this movie were keen on wine, I saw the main characters drank wine everytime they met or even at the dinner. Plus, the party was mentioned again in this movie. Women and purses are inseparable. Once, the purses must be compatible with dresses and shoes. So Andrea carried different purses every single day depended on her clothing style and dresses. 6. Value New York is a city where most of people want to go, and some want to get a career and live there. Its a dream city in which there are important places, famous places, and shopping places. Andrea wanted to go to New York just because she hunting her dream of becoming a journalist. To me, I believe that Andrea thought that New York is a big city where it contains a lot of opportunity for her to be a journalist. Besides, she may think that good and famous journalists grew up in New York where the famous and credible news agencies located. The people in the fashion factory must be skinny, and used brand name products, while Paris is a land that people in the fashion career dreamed to go. It is seen as a land of fashion. 7. Ideology The people who work with the fashion magazine or are in the fashion sphere must in interest in fashion, had a sense of fashion, and read fashion magazines. Perhaps a decision of Miranda to hire Andrea, as she had a hope where Andrea was intelligent and she may be survive at her magazine, showed that the smart person could gain advantage in doing such things. Andrea didnt fit to the magazine but she has got a job because of her outstanding speech in front of Miranda, a lady everyone was scared. Andreas father came to visit in New York, and he concerned about his daughter. He didnt believe that being a secretary with hard work, late work, and low payment, would support his daughter to be a journalist one day. On the other hand, if Andrea decided to attend Stanford Law School, she would success there and achieve a better life. Milk Milk is a biography movie of Harvey Milk, who was a gay, and later became a district representative, and the gay activist. The death of Harvey Milk reflected that everyone should receive the equal rights, the freedom of expression, and the political stand. 1. Freedom of Expression The freedom of expression shown in this movie was very obvious. The speech and the movements were the most active form of expression in Milk movie. As it shown, any American was freed to speak in the public place. They were allowed to provide any speech that did not violate laws, and rights of others. Milk and his team were free to deliver the messages for the public gains, they have got the public attention, and the other public followers. Moreover, they were able to recruit the people and march them to the important places. Otherwise the speech

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and the march must be under law, and have been done non-violently, and peacefully. They said things out loud, they laughed, they booed, but they didnt act against anybody or aggressively. The gay movements were much seen from this movie. Even those gays were unacceptable, and they did not receive supreme rights of their status in the society yet, although they were allowed to gather together and protest. In this movie, gays were very open minded people, they admitted themselves for what they were, and they wanted their families, and the society to accept their status. So they kissed in the public places, along the street, even that community was not familiar with gays and anti gays. 2. Nationalism The Golden Gate Bridge was represented in the movie, the bridge was considered as a symbol of San Francisco. To me, this is a persuasive and attractive tactic, where America wants to tell that they have the beautiful bridge. They know that the Golden Gate Bridge is the destination to some tourists from all over the world, so they included the bridge in the movie. San Francisco was mentioned in a movie as a place for refugees. This entailed the hospitality of America to the other nations. 3. Sexuality The homosexual is another main theme of this movie apart from the gay rights. The gay lovers with the sex appeal and the kisses. 4. Language According to the movie contains a lot of speeches, so there would have to be the scripts written. Once the young man, Cleve Jones, as a representative of Milk, he went on stage with his script of speech. It was his first time, he was not so confident so he had to hold the script in his hands during his speech. However, he has achieved leading people to the hall. The next times Jones went on stage without any script, as demanded by Milk, he was more confident and spoke more naturally. 5. Lifestyle Jeans were very popular during that period of time especially in gay group. They Worn the jeans which looked like the bells. Gays were shunned by the cops, they everyday came to attack those gays just for fun. In return, those gays hated the police as well. The movie shown that gays had sense who were gays like them. Though, they saw the men walking on streets, they talked to them, they subconsciously knew those were gays, just from the physical appearance. 6. Value Polices and gays were enemies, they both hated each other. To be a human is just to have done something to make yourself proud of. As mentioned by Milk, that he was 40 years old, and he hasnt done something he was proud. In the movie, gay men always claimed that they paid tax, then they should have received equal rights. I think that tax is a big deal for American people. They believe that they pay tax for their good welfare and they can do whatever they want. Gays were believed to be sick and wrong people in American society. They were about to protect their children from being taught by gay teachers. Some Americans didnt want their kids to be recruited by the gays, so the gay teachers should have been eradicated from any school. The intelligence didnt make the person to be accepted in the society if he or she was gay. One person in Milks team, he has been graduated from Harvard, but he has been ignored by his surrounding people because he was gay. 7. Ideology Gays were unacceptable and not the people who could do such right things. Regarding to Milk, politics was a theater, to gain attention from the public, you must

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have to speak and took a political stand. He believed that an activist was someone who was brave, but that person would be a target who was insecure and could have been assassinated by the major prejudice of America. Additionally, Milk believed in hope. Hope for a better tomorrow, and without hope, life was not worth living. The Social Network The social network is a biography of the inventor of the most popular social networking, facebook. Mark Zuckerburg is now the youngest billionaire of the world.He has a lot of friends online, none of them in his real life. 1. The Freedom of Expression Mark Zuckerburg was free in creating a social online page. Otherwise, he was invading the privacy of other students. American students, especially Harvard ones, they had freedom to think, freedom to act, but they were not allowed to attack the privacy, because they have been admitted to the code of ethics of the university. Mark Zuckerburg received a written message from his ex-girlfriend during class. He seemed embarrassed and scared. His professor further insulted him by saying that he would be the first person who fails the class. Perhaps, Mark was able to give a solution to his professors question. The facemash was created by Mark, and the students at Harvard could access through. They were free to play the game on facemash, and free to choose which girls were more beauty. 2. Nationalism As mentioned by Edourdor, they wanted to created facebook and spread to Colombia University, and Stanford University. It showed the pride of this group of student. Its compatible to America. America always proud of what they have and good at, thus they usually promote their intellectual products, technology, and civilization to the world. Hence, this movie is a representation of America, where it wants to tell the world that America has intelligent people who could make a lot of money. The American people are smart and seemed to be the smartest in the world. 3. Sexuality There were a girl kissed girl scene and sexy girl dance scene. Moreover, Mark and Equardo had sex with the Chinese girls in restaurant bathrooms. It was not a right place, it was a public place, and there were many kinds of people who had both open minded and close minded about the affair thing. 4. Language The language portrayed in this movie was mostly about the language used on the internet. It had to be short to save space and save time to read and write. On the other hand, it was a legal language used by the lawyers. Those words were a bit hard to understand, because it was a legal way. The lawyers had to clarify and made them simply to understand to their clients, while the movie maker had to make language understandable to the worldwide audience. Because of some of those words were used only by American attorneys. 5. Lifestyle University students loved parties, they had party at the beginning of the semester, at the end of crew competition, they had party at the exclusive clubs, and some of them involved with drugs. They drank beers, smoked and any kind of alcohol. Additionally, the rich and smart students were in a crew team and went to gym. 6. Value The rich students didnt receive any special treatment from Harvard University. This means that all Americans will get an equal rights whether they are poor or rich. There wouldnt be any privilege to any student. To me, the movie wants to tell the world that America is a developed and civilized nation where it treats their people equally and distribute the welfare to every citizen fairly.

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It is believed that the CFO or the organizer of facebook must have to know every step in using facebook. The Chinese, Equordors girlfriend, didnt believe that Euordor didnt know ho w to change his relationship status on facebook. He was the CFO and he has got to know how to change it. In the business field, the lawyers are necessary. To do a business, or to talk about business, the stakeholders were required to have their lawyers looking through the documents before signing, otherwise, they would be fooled and lose benefits. 7. Ideology Harvard University is an old university, its one of the Ivy League (there are eight old univisrities). Harvard is of the best universities of America, and it was rank in the best top ten university of the world. The students study at this university are seen as a supreme class students, they were considered as smarter than any students from other universities. So, to the Harvard professor, they believed that Harvard students were better inventing a job themselves than finding a job. It means that their students are eligible in making their own job and their own money, they are not deserve to be employees, or the companies or any organizations are unlikely to hire them because of high ego and confidence.

Chapter III Conclusion Expected Cultural Effects of Hollywood Movies to the Audience 1. Language Effect After exposing to the movies, the people may turn to speak American accent, they may also adopt those American slangs and jargons to their daily life. Regarding to my survey, almost a half of survey pool, 77 people, they adopted the language they have heard from the movies to their life. Thirty eight people, whose favorite nationality of movie is American, accepted that they absorb the American English spoken in movies to their speaking accent. Generally, I think most of people around the world speak American English accent more than any other language. 2. Lifestyle Effect According to my survey, once again, around two third of the total survey pool adopted the lifestyles represented in the movie to their usual lifestyle. They behave, they dressed, and they express their feeling or rights according to the movies they have exposed to. As it appears that there is a rating system for the movies nowadays, one reason is to protect the audience from exploring to the violence, and crimes, and to protect the teen audiences from sex and drug abusive. The teens and some people always imitate things occur in the movies. Some of them had sex before an appropriate time, and it sometimes causes abortion, and other social problem. Some of them committed suicide imitating the scene happened in the movies. The main lifestyles I have seen from the movies are partying, smoking, and drinking alcoholic beverages. These kinds of lifestyle were mutually and commonly include in every of those 30 movies. In the other societies nowadays seemed to absorb and adopt these lifestyles to their routine life. For example, since I have watched these movies, I think that to celebrate something, I should then organize the party, and make the alcoholic beverages as the main drinks. And from my survey, some of my samples believed that smoking is a personal behavior, and its acceptable in Thai society. 3. Value and Ideology Effect Regarding to my survey, only one third of the survey pool adopted the ideology and values taken place in the movie to their real life. It means that the ideology and value culture affect the life of the audience the least. Otherwise, the ideology and values contained in

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Hollywood movies always cause the behavior and thought changed in some people. For example, I used to think that America was the worst during World Wars, but after watching the movies about World Wars, I realized that Germany was the worst who killed Jews brutally and cruelly. Freedom seemed to be the main ideology of America as it normally appeared in the movies. Freedom must be granted and to fight was to gain freedom. Moreover, most of the movies represented that America is the best nation in the world with benevolence, moral, and ethic. During World Wars, America was the only nation who remained neutral, and tried to ignore the war. But at the end, when the wars became more violent and brutal, and spread through many nations around the world, America became a hero who declared war with the enemy of freedom and helped those nations who have been invaded. This turned out that after watching Hollywood movies, some people believe that freedom could bring peace, and they require more freedom to their life. The Possible Effects of Hollywood Movies on ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community: A Threat to National Identity and Sovereignty? Positive Effects The most possible effective effect to ASEAN countries of those Hollywood movies is language effect. Since the movies are watched world wide and became popular, they attract the people to imitate the English speaking behavior; including accent, pronunciation, hand writing, and etc. To watch those Hollywood movies in English will provide more efficiency to people in ASEAN countries in speaking English. Once, the people absorb English, and fluently speaking, reading, and writing; they would be more freely and comfortably communicate to the people in other ASEAN countries and any country in the world. I dare to say that language effect would encourage a deeper integration of ASEAN countries, and promote ASEAN socio-cultural community in 2015. Because of those people understand English, it causes the communication to flow freely, and it creates mutual understanding between people and governments. Negative Effects The more people expose to the Hollywood movies, it is more likely for them to lose their own identity and original culture. If they absorb and adopt those American cultures in Hollywood movies to be parts of their life, then there would be no ASEAN culture. The American culture would take over this region. The people who speak American English, use American products, eat American brands, and perform American lifestyle, will see themselves more luxurious than any others. On the other way around, America may become an influential power in Southeast Asian region. It could cause all ASEAN countries to be under America rules. Promoting American culture through Hollywood movies shall be considered as America is using a smart power to imperialize ASEAN. Hollywood movie is a smart power, its a soft tool of colonize the third world countries. The promotion of Hollywood movies could bring the new identity to the communities and could bury the sovereignty line of states.

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