ABSTRACT
Of all the American pop-cultural products that are being consumed around the world, ranging from Hollywood films and Coca-Cola to television soap operas and hip-hop, the 1985 pop song “We Are the World” by USA for Africa is one of the most blatant examples of America’s dominance in global pop culture. A relatively simple charity pop song recorded by a group of American stars named the United Support of Artists (USA) can make such abstract notions as Americanization and globalization concrete. “There are people dying,” sings Stevie Wonder, without a doubt genuinely concerned about the starving Ethiopians in Africa. However, the American stars are there to provide relief with optimism and good cheer. “We Are the World” is not merely a charity pop record to raise western awareness of the Ethiopian famine and to collect money for aid, but is most of all a showcase of American superstars who function as ideological ambassadors of American values such as freedom and democracy within a free market economy, using a language that is strikingly similar to the rhetoric of Pepsi and Coca-Cola commercials. In this way, “We Are the World” can be perceived as part of “an engine of global hegemony,” presenting these American national values of democracy, freedom, and open exchange of goods and services as universal. 1
