Ｃｈｅｒｉｓｈ　ｔｈｅ　Ｂｌｅｓｓｉｎｇｓ　Ｂｒｏｕｇｈｔ　ｂｙ　Ｇｌｏｂａｌｉｚａｔｉｏｎ.docVIP

Ｃｈｅｒｉｓｈ　ｔｈｅ　Ｂｌｅｓｓｉｎｇｓ　Ｂｒｏｕｇｈｔ　ｂｙ　Ｇｌｏｂａｌｉｚａｔｉｏｎ 　　Yang: Nowadays, globalization has become one of the hottest topics. Under the trend of globalizing, many fixed cultures have been greatly influenced. And the cultural diversity has been affected by this trend. What is your opinion on such a phenomenon? 　　Kessler: Globalization is nothing new. It has been going on for centuries: Think of the Iranian musicians popular at the ancient capital of China, Changan, during the Tang Dynasty; think of the enthusiasm about China among European thinkers of the Enlightenment; think of all the words European languages adopted via Arabic, from sugar to tariff. The speed and scope of such dissemination have, however, grown enormously since the Industrial Revolution so that in modern times we have all become aware of changes which before went largely unnoticed. Its the pace of change in the last decades which has occasionally become dizzying. But there is no running away from this process. The challenge is to grasp the many opportunities it offers and to avoid being tossed on the rocks by the winds of change. 　　Yang: Germany boasts many philosophers, thinkers, for example, Kant, Wilhem Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx, musicians like Beethoven, Johann Sebastian Bach, writers like Johann Wolfgang Goethe, and scientists like Albert Einstein. From these masters, we can see that Germans are both sensible and romantic, and have made great contributions to human civilization. Now we hope to see, how does Germany deal with the relationship between the national culture and foreign culture? And how do the German view the American culture represented by Hollywood and Coca Cola? Is American culture a threat or a benefit to German culture? 　　Kessler: The ones you mentioned are certainly Germans. But at the same time all of these eminent figures worked and made their achievements in active contact with a wider community which far transcended the borders of the political entities in which they lived.