Tag Archive for: instructor-none-2

The part I found most interesting was this quote from page 11 of Chapter 1:

“The news media are central within American public thought, maybe not telling us what to think, but, to borrow from a popular phrase, focusing our attention on what to think about. Known as agenda-setting theory, this idea suggests that the repetition of issues in the news shapes what the public believes is most important. The abundance of news stories similar to the ones listed above directs us to think about entertainment as public enemy number one for kids in particular.”

This quote seemed very relevant to me. Media takes secondary issues and, essentially, manipulates the public into thinking that is what we should be focusing on. I feel like it’s like when a school shooting happens and the media blames video games and music. Immediately the public decides that those are the reasons this happened. After that, no one considers that anything else (like improper treatment of mental illness, gun control issues, etc) might have anything to do with it. Media did not necessarily cause the issues that they report on, but they distract from the issues that the public should be focusing on instead.

I found these articles to be a pretty interesting read. Some areas I could already  guess to be true while other areas of the article surprised me entirely. The first article by Jolls and Wilson talked about media literacy on a broad scheme of things from the past to present. England and Canada were really the first two countries to experiment with the word “media literacy”. The U.S came along later and began researching media literacy based on the knowledge of other countries and used them to see the effects with the radio. A quote in this article that really stood out to me was by Marshall McLuhan which said “how one receives a message is just as important as the message itself”. This quote I think is really important because it shows that we can become knowledgeable by looking at the who, what, why, how, etc. of a piece of media. I agree with the article when it states that questions really are key when it comes to understanding media. However it is also rare for people to question things as it is much easier to just accept something for what it looks like. The article also explained how the same piece of media can have dozens of different interpretations based on the views, beliefs, and self-evaluation of the person looking at it. The last two article dealing with “Children as Consumers” and the “Health System by the University of Michigan” was a spot on yet troubling read. For the media to mainly spend all their time money and effort to advertise and manipulate children seems criminal. Also with how much TV watching goes on in basically every single household kids and pre-teens are suffering health wise and socially. The younger generation aren’t as active and see ads for fatty foods and so on. However on the flip side TV can be an entertaining and positive thing. It comes down to having everything in a balance not having too much or too little.

I found the article University of Michigan Health System very informational. Though the section about “Can TV influence children’s attitudes toward themselves and others?” I found to be completely true, as I grew up I’ve come to notice that as a child I took what was on tv seriously and thought it was true to reality.  Like it says in the article “Children learn to accept the stereotypes represented on television.” Even though I come from a mix of races, I honestly thought for the longest time that all black people acted like they were from the “hood” after watching Friday. As silly as it sounds I tried to avoid people associating me with black people because I didn’t want people to see me as the women in the movie.

The statement “Thin women are disproportionately represented on TV. The heavier a female
character, the more negative comments were made about her,” Kills me so much because as I began to gain wait I felt like I would be projected like an ugly person mainly because I didn’t see curvy people on tv and when I did it was either in a comical or a cruel way. For example the youtube star who criticized “fat” people  for being over weight which could cause children this day and age to think that being overweight could be negative and cause them to have all sorts of physiological problems, it’s hard  for girls at a young age to be happy with themselves, now their being criticized for their weight or even their looks.

I’m wondering what you all think of the perception tv gives us and how It makes you feel?

In the preface and chapter one of “Connecting Social Problems and Popular Culture” by Karen Sternheimer she makes two key points that really stood out for me. The first key point is “in order to understand social problems, we need to look beyond media as a prime causal factor” (preface) and the second key point is her statement of “media culture may not be the root cause of American social problems, but it is more than simply benign entertainment” (16). These two direct quotes contain a significant relationship: solely blaming media for the cause of problems is not the answer towards finding what the real issue is at stake. Prior to reading this chapter, I was under the impression that media was in fact the reason for the many problems that are seen in American society. However, after reading chapter one, my view on media has changed and now I see what Karen Sternheimer meant when she stated there are “structural factors” (15) that need to be understood in order to see beyond the big problem media causes. With that being said, what do you all think of Karen Sternheimer take on looking at “causal factors” in order to understand media better?

In the reading “The Core Concepts: Fundamentals to Media Literacy Yesterday,  Today, and Tomorrow” a quote that really stood out for me was “that is, we were not actually studying sports or music or news or documentaries, we were studying representations of these things”. This quote resonated with me because it further explained what media literacy means and what media literacy does which is to not only study but also understand what messages various mediums are showing represent and how it impacts the society that we live in.

Reading the article from University of Michigan Health System was great. “Television and Children” displayed an array of interesting points throughout the article such as TV having a positive and negative side, what influence does TV have on children, and if violence on TV has an affect on children at a young age. But, the point that stood out to me the most was of television being good or bad for children. Additionally, this article also touches on other aspects of children watching television that include traumatization of the child, school performance being affected, and lastly, their health.

“Television and Children” briefly touches on how television can be entertaining for children and may have educational components such as learning different cultures, and gaining exposure to ideas they may never encounter. In addition, they also speak of the negative aspects of watching television such as learning things from TV shows their parents wouldn’t want them to learn. In agreement with both aspects, there are a lot of variables that fall into play that affect the child watching TV. Depending if the child had a good day or not may lead to wanting to watch TV. Or, it could simply be an embedded routine the child has.

The article stated that ” a great deal is known about children and television, because there have been thousands of studies on the subject.” Moreover, they touch on how researchers have studied the affects of watching television at a young age. These include, being sleep deprived, having weight issues, behavior, school performance and more.