Localization of a Globalized Girls’ Night In

Movies,
Make-up,
Music,
Manicures,
Facials,
Food
and
Karaoke.

Put all the above together and you’ve got the perfect ingredients to an impressive “Girls’ Night In”. So, last weekend my sister and I had our cousins over to put this event together, but not in the way you’d expect. It’s common to see girls get together to stay in for the night and basically make fools of themselves in the privacy of their own homes.

The interesting part about the night in I had with my cousins is the fact that it was a localized version of a globalized “Girls’ Night In”. Let’s try to make that sentence a little clearer. The actual social get-together of young girls is popular around in the world. The way we see girls get together in movies seems fun and so we try it out. Not only do you see girls’ nights in acted out in movies you can also find it in commercials for facial products, or even food. It’s used in advertising that encourages the use of the product during the event.

This brings me to the first point of globalization. Multi-national corporations. There are several corporations that are involved in the different aspects of the event. Take for example the movies that we watched, these movies were made by the big western production companies. Chick flicks in particular are always a favorite. It’s not only the MNCs of movie companies that benefit from this particular event so does the music industry, food chains, and the make-up industry. Events like this are what help these corporations to gain a profit from them.

The ideology of capitalism works in here as well. Now that the corporations have got us “girls” to buy these chick flicks, and indulged themselves with the profit they have made they try to come up with new ideas to make more profit off us next year! For example there are actual box sets that you can buy especially for this sort of evening. This ties into the next point, which is the government. In this case the government are actually benefiting from the corporations selling in the country. The more the companies make, the more they do.

As with everything in life there is resistance and consequences. The resistance to a Girls’ Night In would be that it could cause people to think that it isn’t necessarily healthy to stay in and lay around doing nothing every weekend. Others might resist stating that they don’t want these “foreign” events to be part of society. The consequences of having things as such aren’t severe, but there are a few. Girls’ might become enticed by these things and deviate from the social norm here in Qatar.

As mentioned earlier this event was actually localized. Localizing this social event to this region meant adapting the actual layout, or format, and making it our own. Instead of music in the English language it was in Arabic, and so was the karaoke. The food was where East met West. All of the things that a group of girls would do in say France were done at this particular event, just with a Qatari twist. All the little details of the night are what localized it, everything from the language, the dress code, and the actual relationship between the guests.



The one thing that was definitely global is that everyone had a good time.