This inquiry looks at the reception and consumption of a particular musical import in twenty-first century United States: bossa nova. Using theories of cultural capital, Othering or exoticization, and treatment of "world music," especially as it factors into evolving hegemonic systems, I argue that the employment of cultural capital in the current moment has less to do with identification and separation of Others, and more to do with a sense of global citizenry. This argument is also based on seven ethnographies: four performers, two listeners/consumers, and one sample fan base. From these ethnographies emerge trends indicative of an accelerated globalization, which not only functions as a hegemonic system, but also substitutes new modes of consumption and exhibition of cultural capital. Ultimately, these world music creators and consumers are increasingly fashioning their musical and social identities based upon the melange that the Internet now so easily facilitates, versus an older and more hierarchical juxtapositioning of self and Other.