Issue Paper: Our Shrinking World - Essay Example

It remains a controversial question with technology gaining an upper hand to some. Proponents of the popular school of thought that technology is shrinking our world, point towards the possibility of the inventions ending the world. Technological advancements shown in the computers and other electronic devices that enable activities such as texting, and calling cannot be compared to the laborious and relatively cumbersome letter writing, postage or in the past, human portage1. Better still, we can move from point A to B very fast, and live exciting digital lives.

All this while we are still working on ways to do that at even greater speed in the future creating what appears to be a digital migration craze that is expected to facilitate a global meltdown in the future. Thus, technology undoubtedly brings the people together. Whether, it is either considering transportation or communication. The entire earth populaces now have the earth at their disposal to try venturing into greater opportunities, exploring other cultures, receiving news from any point of the world with ease, and making friends too.

Perhaps in order to have a profound grip on the contribution on both people and technology to a shrinking world it is important to take a walk down the history lane that is globalization. The eras and phases that globalization has gone through can be traced back to the time of Christopher Columbus. These eras can be seen as leading to the inception of globalization because the nations and the people were free to communicate and participate in trade activities with each other. It resulted to a dynamic and competitive world in items such as silver, slaves, gold, and cloves.

It will explain the concept of colonization and slave trade. It is only logical that the colonizing powers were concerned with the extent of their power on the colonies and the competitors2. The competitors, born and bred slave trade, a practice that led to the slaves being emigrants in