Module 4

I like that we are towards the end of the semester because now many of the concepts we have learned are overlapping and connecting.  The videos were a great way to introduce this module and explain the connection between media and popular culture. From the video, I learned that culture is learned through stories and media relates to culture because it replaces family as the story teller (Dugan 2010). When children reject the culture of their parents it is very easy to blame media, to make media the “villain” (Dugan 2010). Fear also plays a part in this. People fear that the media doesn’t show negative consequences to bad decisions, so people in the “real world” will bad decisions and expect no negative consequences. People also fear other cultures because we don’t understand our role in them and it makes us feel uncomfortable (Dugan 2010). Common culture began with use of the radio and then shifted when mass communication and was mostly local before mass communication. With mass communication, common culture is created with shared experiences from those all across the nation (Dugan 2010). Most of us are part of the dominant culture, the type of culture that is accepted by society. However, more and more people are using their bounded culture in public (Dugan 2010). These videos connect to the readings because it helps us understand how media and culture are connected. The videos also help us to understand why media is so convenient to place the blame and how that cause individuals to make incorrect assumptions.

From the beginning of Chapter Six I easily related it to the chapter about cyberbullying because once again I gained a new perspective and now better understand the real statistics. Chapter Six teaches us about promiscuity in popular culture and people assume that the media is to blame. Before reading this chapter I also considered that viewpoint to be true. The chapter tells us that “young people are not nearly as sexually active as people fear” and then explains to us why this is true. One of the reasons is headlines that people see, these headlines are usually rare and extreme cases but it leads to people making generalizations and assumptions. This was illustrated by one of Roffman’s articles. Another point I found extremely interesting was how “sexual content” is defined. The book states that “sexual content” is defined to include things such as “flirting, handholding, kissing, and talk about sex” (Sternheimer 2013). Which makes media seem worse when this term has such a broad spectrum. When students were surveyed only 9% were influenced by the media (Sternheimer 2013). Sexual content is also not as new in media as we assume, there is just a lack of old films and people forget that they existed. When the issue with media became big enough, the “new film industry promised self-regulation by creating a special organization to monitor movie content” (Sternheimer 2013). This relates to another video we had later in the module about beauty products. The beauty products were not being deemed safe by the FDA or any type of government regulation but just of their own regulating organization. So basically unless your film or beauty product is going to cause an angry mob, it will most likely be approved. The media provides “sexual content” because of market forces, because of society (Sternheimer 2013). Not the other way around. Two other important and interesting facts I enjoyed from this chapter were that society hopes “people will not engage in sexual behavior before socially defined adulthood, despised the fact children reach physical maturation earlier than in midcentury” (Sternheimer 2013). The other fact that we view the past with a lens of nostalgia, so it will always seem more innocent to us(Sternheimer 2013). Although media is an easy scapegoat for promiscuity, it is not the cause.

The next issue in Chapter Eight is one that we have probably seen many examples of, beauty image, obesity, and eating disorders. Once again the fist thought is to blame media. I like how this chapter really examined the facts and explains how all of this is connected. Obesity blames media because one watching television takes away from active time, and two is has numerous ads for salty or sugary unhealthy foods. Studies conducted found that there is more association than causation (Sternheimer 2013). Another important question to ask is “what factors lead to more television watching and other sedentary activities?” Some of this can be related to poverty, children in low-income areas may not have a safe place to play outside (Sternheimer 2013). Or their parents work, leaving them alone without supervision. The chapter makes a really good point of saying “while turning off the TV seems like an easy solution, it fails to take into account the complex realities of today’s health care needs and the economic realities of many families” (Sternheimer 2013). On the opposite end of the spectrum the media is also blamed for eating disorders, which we have seen some examples of throughout the semester. The media gets blamed for giving us examples of unrealistic beauty ideals, mainly through the thin and fit celebrities we see on screen. Psychologists who research eating disorders have not found a direct link between the disorder and media, they are far more complex issues (Sternheimer 2013). Although this may be a factor there may also be a lot of other factors, so it is not far to blame the media completely. The book also directs our attention to the fact that instead of worrying so much about the media we need to worry about the health care system as a whole (Sternheimer 2013). Overall the videos and readings helped me to understand how media is related to these issues but may be not the cause for them. It gave me a much more realistic perspective of what is actually going on.

Sources:

1. Dugan, T. (2010). Impact of Media on Culture–What is culture? (Part 1) (8 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYu5azRNUck&feature=youtu.be
2. Dugan, T. (2011). Developing a Common Culture: The Role Mass Communication Plays in Forming a Common Culture (Part 2) (4 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXheNwPsa1g
3. Dugan, T. (2011). The Functions and Effects of Culture (5 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9bQiRMQUaE
4. Dugan, T. (2010). The Communications Process: 8 Elements (Part 1a) (<1 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v3RS1zk5qI&feature=youtu.be
5. Dugan, T. (2010). Impact of Media on Culture: The Communications Process (Part 1b) (3 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V105boBOdI4
6. Dugan, T. (2013). Impact of Media on Culture: The Communications Process (Part 1c) (4 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDQ6l7Q8AbI
7. Dugan, T. (2010). Impact of Media on Culture: Feedback (Part 1d) (7 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LC2-_7ofDbk
8. Dugan, T. (2010). Impact of Media on Culture: The New Media Landscape (Part 1) – Conglomerate vs. Partnership vs. Synergy (6 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4hCWEhQbkE
9. Dugan, T. (2010). Impact of Media on Culture: The New Media Landscape (Part 2) – Convergence (9 min). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qSOdmCDoow
10. Sternheimer, K. (2013). Pop culture promiscuity: Sexualized images and reality. In Connecting social problems and popular culture: Why media is not the answer (2nd ed.). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
11. Sternheimer, K. (2013). Media health hazards? Beauty image, obesity and eating disorders. In Connecting social problems and popular culture: Why media is not the answer (2nd ed.). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.