The term globalization has come into popular use in many areas of discourse. For the most part, it refers to the development of global financial markets, the growth of transnational corporations, and their increasing domination over national and local economies. As the authors use the term in this article, the meaning and significance of globalization can be extended far beyond marketplace and economic conditions to include how they think about virtually all areas of human exchange in their lives, including visual culture and art education. Globalization is not a clearly defined "thing." Globalization cannot be measured completely nor can it be turned fully on or off. For some, globalization "is what we are bound to do if we wish to be happy; for others globalization is the intractable fate of the world, an irreversible process" (Bauman, 1998, p. 1). In this sense, globalization is defined and engaged at any given moment through its construction and context within specific discursive spaces. While meanings of globalization are positioned within specific contexts, for the purpose of this article the authors focus on four interrelated ideas, each of which might become the subject of more extended discourse in art education. (Contains 4 figures and 4 endnotes.)