Hyperculturality - Culture and Globalization

Byung-Chul Han, one of the most important thinkers of the modern age, deeply examines the effects of globalization on culture in his work titled “Hyperculture”. He states that with the process of globalization, cultural forms of expression have been displaced, and a hypercultural sphere has emerged where there is no longer a distinct difference between native and foreign, near and far, familiar and exotic. Emphasizing the impact of technological developments on the transformation of knowledge and thought, Han defines hyperculture as a mosaic universe containing different times and continuities within it. He states that we have all become "hypercultural tourists" in this new, borderless cultural sphere. In this work, Han explores the concept of hyperculture around the ideas of thinkers such as Heidegger, Hegel, Kafka, Herder, and Kant, while pursuing critical questions about what our position should be in the face of hyperculture.