Impact of Globalization on Education in India: Towards Global Standards or Cultural Imperialism?

Abstract

‘If you wanted to change a culture in a single generation, how would you do it? You would change the way it educates its children’, explained Carol Black, who directed the documentary Schooling the World: The White Man’s Last Burden (Black 2010), wherein she questioned the role of Western education as another form of subtle colonialism in the name of improving education standards. This paper critically analyses the effects of globalization on the education system of a country, especially in the Indian context, as a means of cultural imperialism and stripping away of its rich indigenous culture. This includes an impact on the medium of instruction, curriculum, pedagogical changes and learning outcomes in particular. Many scholars in the past have expressed a concern of how education can be used as one means to socially dominate countries (Carnoy 1974; Bowman 1976; Coolahan 2001; Kindler and George 2000). However, few others have critiqued this view by saying that colonial education was also a means of enlightened paternalism (Whitehead 1995). Yet others have built theoretical models to understand the development of comparative education in Western and Third World countries (Yang and Gou 2010). The critical analyses invigorate rigorous debate on how globalization has glorified Western education models and undermined the value of local knowledge and indigenous education models which were rooted in the context and were far more sustainable and holistic. Thus, the chapter concludes by suggesting that the merit of globalization with respect to education gets underscored if the local/indigenous knowledge get diluted or branded as ‘inferior’. Since culture and education are closely interlinked; therefore, for holistic development, it is imperative that indigenous culture remains intact. The authors acknowledge the importance of awareness and learning from other cultures, but it should not be at cost of the dilution of the native culture and erosion of the collective wisdom of the nation.