Dissertation Abstracts
Globalization in everyday life of Iranian high school students
Author: Nourallah Pasha, pasha_np@hotmail.com
Department: Human Ecology
University: University Putra Malasia, Malaysia
Supervisor: Zaid Ahmad
Year of completion: 2014
Language of dissertation: English
Areas of Research: Youth , Sociology of Risk and Uncertainty , Local-Global Relations
Abstract
This research attempts to explore the Tehranian high school students' point of view about globalization and to describe influence of globalization in their daily life, and to interpret implications of alternation among these high school students.This research used mixed methods to collect data from the high school students in Tehran, capital of Iran. A total of 31 in-depth interviews and 206 questionnaires are the sources of information. The facts were gathered and presented quantitatively and qualitatively, illustrating globalization in the daily life of Tehranian high school students based on the research questions. Iranian high school students perceive globalization in different ways and derive different meanings from it. They perceive globalization as development, open relationship, dissemination of a massive amount of information around the world, and also suppression and exploitation of developing countries by the West. The findings indicate that globalization has influenced the Tehranian high school students' daily life within two dimensions, namely, de-territorialization and pluralism. In fact, globalization has influenced the students' eating and clothing habits, their communication and concerning distant events as well as their perception about other cultures and religions. Their everyday life has been increasingly defined as a global level with global standards. Globalization in the students' everyday life has given birth to two types of students: globalized students and alternated students. Globalized students are the majority of those who mostly wear branded clothes, eat their meals in fast food restaurants, communicate with others, and using modern media. They are concerned about distant events, and have plural and tolerant perception about other cultures and religions. Alternated students are about fifteen percent of the globalized students who have negative perceptions about their culture and being Iranian.