ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the repercussions of U.S. media encroaching on the gendered space of the Caribbean. The Caribbean has many ethnic groups including persons of Indian, Chinese, African, Syrian, Jewish, German, French, British, Spanish, and Portuguese ancestry. There is also considerable religious diversity with various sects of Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism. In the Caribbean, there is an absence of a struggle against the globalizing forces of the influential U.S. media,1 with which millions of men and women in the Caribbean come into contact on a daily basis. There is the view that the impact of the U.S. media has resulted in the disintegration of norms and values in the Caribbean and its institutions. Accusations against the U.S. media as being cold and inhumane are justified by the irreversible damage the distorted portrayals of men and negative influences being entrenched in the psyche of women have had on the Caribbean. The consequence of this intrusion is the radical transformation of the national and regional experiences of West Indian teenagers as well as adults. One result has been the increase in negative values such as sexual immorality and crime.
