Conclusion An interesting result of this research is how particular research tools revealed several answers that appear to contradict the major assumptions of the research traditions they were developed within. For example, a political economy analysis does show evidence of very significant western media flows in terms of pay satellite and cinema exhibition. However, the same analysis also reveals a surprisingly small percentage of western entertainment material (5%) on the free-to-air Arab channels that are viewed in most Gulf households. The popularity of western movies demonstrated in this research must therefore be, at least in part, a result of active ‘choices’ by ‘consumers’. This conclusion sits uneasily within a political economy perspective. Conversely, a cultural studies approach that privileges audience readings or interpretations, and adopts qualitative, ethnographic research methods, appears to underscore the media imperialism thesis and a concern with massive ‘effects’. In this reading the audience are not ‘cultural dopes’ because, when they choose western films, many know that they and their culture are being influenced. Evidence of resistance is available in my reception analysis, especially with regard to stereotyping and sexual and cultural content deemed to be an ‘attack’ on Islam, but there is also powerful evidence from the ‘audience’ in question of ‘cultural synchronization’, ‘erosion’ of traditional values and ‘westernisation’. It seems, from this perspective, that for American cinema ‘everything the light touches is our kingdom’. These apparently contradictory findings are explicable when the notion of ‘split’ or even ‘multiple’ identities are granted. Evidence for such a phenomenon exists in the detailed answers of many students, as I have shown. It appears that (as Sreberny-Mohammadi (1994) demonstrates with Iran before the revolution) the Gulf States are torn between two apparently conflicting pulls, towards the indigenous and the religious, or towards global popular culture stemming mainly from the west. Currently this conflict is manifest in tensions and contradictions within reading subjects that I have illustrated. It may be, however, that western media will create fault-lines beyond the individual subject. It is not inconceivable that divisions will open in previously unified Gulf society between an educated, English speaking and westernised elite and an educationally disadvantaged section of the population. These divisions are more likely to appear as the Gulf integrates further into a global economy. This in turn could foster an Islamic fundamentalist 'backlash' and threaten the long term survival of existing states. This scenario may be unduly alarmist. Sreberny-Mohammidi (1994) reminds us that 'Modernity and 'tradition' do not meet suddenly, in pristine condition, but have rather been encountering each other for decades if not centuries' (p.7). Yet this observation does not apply with much force to the desert interior of the Gulf. Foreign contacts only fifty years ago were rare, except for those men who made the hazardous journey across the desert to trade with coastal towns. The social and cultural differences between the coastal, trading regions such as Dubai and the oil dependent interior regions may well grow under pressure from western cultural ‘onslaughts’. The differences may also be reduced as interior regions are ‘developed’ and new markets for western films are found. The Gulf is currently in a delicate balance and may shift in either of these directions in the future. This study has indicated areas of concern and interest that can only be more fully explored with further research. The role of western-oriented education systems and English language training in the consumption practices of Arab audiences is undeveloped in this work. A future study may also benefit from using Arabic questionnaires and surveys and Arabic speaking researchers. This would allow Arabs who are not articulate in English to express their views. It would also add nuances of meaning (as some students pointed out) to the responses recorded. The notion of split readings and identities has been broached in this study, but requires further interrogation. The link between western media consumption and wider consumer behaviour also needs elaboration. Film ‘reading’ practices at an individual, family and community level, need to be more finely assessed than has been possible in this paper. Research strategies that are sensitive to the culture but willing to probe controversial issues should also be further developed. Future researchers will tread a line between imposing potentially intrusive western-orientated research techniques, and leaving Arab audiences under-researched. Finally, listening to what Gulf audiences have to say (in their own words) about their experience is a key to unravelling the complex nature of their reading of Hollywood cinema.
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