What is 'world music'?

I believe the term has two meanings. The first accumulates all popular music of the time and labels it ‘world music’ – as the majority of the world favours that music at that one specific time. Put simply, it is the music that the world likes. For example, the album that ranks #1 in worldwide sales at the end of each year could be seen as the world’s most popular album, making it ‘world music’.

However, this is a very literal way of interpreting the term. A more culturally-aware way of explaining the term (which is also the way I see it too) is that ‘world music’ is music originating from each individual country – Bhangra from India, Irish folk from Ireland and Aboriginal from Australia. These genres may not be enormous sellers in the music charts, nor very profitable, but they relate to each country they originate from.