Media culture facts for kids

Media culture is a term that describes how our modern society, especially in Western countries, has been shaped by the mass media. Think of it as the big influence that TV, social media, news, and movies have on what people think, what they like, and what they believe is important.

Sometimes, people use the term mass culture. This term suggests that culture comes naturally from a large group of people. But "media culture" means that the culture we see around us is often created and spread by the media itself. Another way to say "media culture" is "image culture."

Media culture, especially through things like advertising and public relations, is often seen as a way to influence many people in society. Some experts believe that big media companies mainly show ideas that are already popular or powerful. This idea was explored by thinkers like Theodor Adorno back in the 1940s. Media culture is also closely linked to consumerism, which is why it's sometimes called "consumer culture."

What is Media Culture?

The news media often takes ideas from scientists and scholars and shares them with everyone. They might focus on things that are exciting or surprising. For example, giant pandas are very famous in popular culture, even though they live far away in China. But parasitic worms, which are very important for health, are not as well-known. Sometimes, facts and stories change a lot as they are shared widely, and can even become untrue.

Does Media Culture "Dumb Down" Society?

Some people worry that media driven by what sells might make culture less deep and more focused on just entertainment. Susan Sontag suggested that the most important values in our culture are increasingly coming from entertainment. This can lead to topics that are not very serious or even cruel becoming normal.

Critics sometimes say that popular culture is "dumbing down" society. They point out that newspapers that once covered international news now often focus on celebrity gossip. TV shows that used to be high-quality dramas are sometimes replaced by cooking or gardening shows, or reality TV programs. This can make people constantly surrounded by unimportant details about famous people.

Some critics have also said that serious art and real folk culture are being replaced by mass-produced items that are made to appeal to the widest audience possible. They argue that after World War II, media companies became very large and powerful. This led to less real news and more entertainment or exciting stories that might make people feel scared, prejudiced, or aggressive.

How Media Influences TV and Movies

Experts like Altheide and Snow say that in a media culture, the media increasingly affects other parts of society, like politics, religion, and sports. These areas start to follow the rules of how media works. Since the 1950s, television has been the main way to shape what people think.

In a book called Mass Culture, Dwight Macdonald argued that popular culture is often simple and doesn't deal with deep topics like death or tragedy. He felt it also misses out on simple, natural joys. He believed that people, after being exposed to this kind of culture for a long time, start to want only easy and comfortable entertainment. Another thinker, Van den Haag, suggested that all mass media can make people feel disconnected from real experiences and from each other.

Critics of television and film have said that the quality of TV shows has gone down because stations try to get high ratings by showing whatever is most eye-catching. This often means the content becomes very superficial. Hollywood movies, they argue, sometimes focus on "shock-value" and special effects, with themes about basic feelings like aggression, revenge, and greed. The stories are often simple, easy to understand, and follow a similar pattern to older movies. This can lead to less creative stories, characters that aren't well-developed, and dialogues that don't feel real.

More recently, scholars have started using the term "mediatization of culture." This means looking at how culture is changed by the way media works. Media are cultural things themselves, but other areas of life also depend on media and what it offers.

Media Culture and Religion

Some people have compared the way media culture uses mass marketing to the role religions played in the past. They suggest that media culture is taking the place of old traditional religions. The strong excitement and passion people show for a new product, which is common in consumerism, has been compared to the intense feelings seen in old religious practices.

On the other hand, the Catholic Church, which was a very powerful religious group in the Western world, has been seen as an early and clever example of public relations and advertising. It was like a big company selling its "product" to many worshipers, who often acted like consumers.

Symbolic Consumption

When people decide what to buy, they don't just think about how useful something is. They also think about its symbolic value. This means what the item says about who they are and where they fit in society or a group. In other words, the products people buy help them tell a story about themselves and who they want to be.

Experts see this "symbolic consumption" as something that society creates. A product can only show someone's identity if a group of people agree on what that product means. These meanings are often shared with consumers through advertising, magazines, and television.

Jean Paul Sartre wrote that sometimes, things or even people can become part of how we see ourselves. People might create a story about their life based on what they buy. This helps them connect with their past, understand themselves, or show changes in who they are. Creating a "lifestyle" through buying things might mean avoiding old buying habits that represent a past self or certain social groups. The meaning of goods comes from beliefs that are shared by society.

Feminist Views on Media Culture

Feminist approaches to media culture look at how media affects women. Since feminism is a broad topic, feminist communication theory explores many ideas. These approaches often highlight how media has influenced women, what roles women play in media, and how to change certain ideas within media culture.

For example, Angela McRobbie studied teenage girls by looking at a popular magazine called 'Jackie'. McRobbie used a "structural feminism" approach to analyze the ideas of femininity in magazines and other media. She looked at how themes of romance, home life, fashion, beauty, and pop music were presented. These themes, when shown in the popular magazine 'Jackie', had a big impact on the teenage girls. The study showed how these aspects affected how the girls acted, thought, and presented themselves at that time. McRobbie's more recent research continues to show how this is still happening with media culture and women.

Feminist approaches can also be used when talking about media culture in terms of fashion. This includes how fashion relates to other media like music, magazines, and celebrities. For instance, some researchers discuss how women and young girls can be influenced by "postfeminism" styles in fashion. This idea doesn't ignore the meaning of postfeminism for society, but it looks at how a certain way of feminist thinking has affected women and media culture.

There are many feminist approaches to discuss, and different ways for researchers and people to apply these approaches to media culture. It's important to remember that feminist approaches are just one of many ways to understand or analyze media culture.

See also

In Spanish: Cultura de masas para niños