How Pop Culture Has Impacted The Smarts Of Our Country

In chapter one of The Dumbest Generation, Mike Bauerlein makes several statements about our generation and comes to a conclusion that helps set the groundwork for the entire book. His analysis of today’s youth states that the current generation is lacking when it comes to intellectual knowledge. He provides evidence that states that today’s under-thirty population in the United States does not have adequate knowledge, and their lack of knowledge with affect them greatly in their adulthood years.

Along with the progression of society, major advances have been made in hundreds of different fields — particularly technology. Controversy has risen, and debates ensued over whether today's young Americans are really “the dumbest generation,” due to their “money, media, e-gadgets, and career plans” [Source A]. While advances have been made, they have brought with them resources to benefit off of, and ultimately assist in the overall intellect and intelligence of the human race.

Are Americans getting dumber? In the age of 24-hour News cycle and reality TV celebrities turn presidential candidates it would appear so. In fact, author Susan Jacoby wrote a popular editorial for the Washington post in 2008 called How Dumb Can We Get? Claiming that Americans are, well, getting dumber. Jacoby attributes the problem, one she calls anti-intellectualism, to the increased integration of technology into our everyday lives. However, before we heed the message of Susan Jacoby and brush up on our celestial navigation and nephology, let's consider a few things.

For example when he stated a fact that the Carr also uses logical appeal when he said, “we are becoming, in a word, shallower.”(Carr, 2010). The author uses this to convince his audience that if they does not agree with what he said in the article “The Shallows” they may become less intelligent. he also back up his opinion with fact of statistical and scientific studies that the internet does affect our intelligence by quoting a study that he collected from the Stanford University saying that “ those of us who multitask are shown to be, less creative and less productive” (Carr, 2010). He is using scientific figures that he conducted from the university’s to convince his audience of his claim about internet is making you

The younger generation of Americans, those under the age of thirty, are often criticized as being the “dumbest generation”. Many Americans blame technology for making “goods so plentiful, schooling so accessible, diversion so easy, and liberties so copious” (Bauerlein). Many are posing the question: Is the increasing ease in life causing our intelligence to slip? Those under thirty are not the dumbest generation, in fact, technology is expanding, changing, and pushing in new directions intelligence and mental capacity.

“Steven Johnson proposes that what is making us smarter is precisely what we thought was making us dumber” ( 1 ). Television shows, reality shows, and even games are way different from what it was thirty years ago

Nicholas Carr is the brilliant author of The Shallows: What the Internet is doing to Our Brains. In the Shallows, Carr discusses the unassailable issue that many countries face today. Not only teenagers, but more and more adults as well, have been using technology more often than ever. Yes, almost everyone has a so-called “smart phone” in their pocket. But the question that is presented in this book is: Is the latest technology actually smart, or are the advanced systems just making us less intelligent?

For You, Steven Johnson explains how as time progresses, Americans in general are becoming smarter without even noticing it. Johnson calls it the sleeper curve, and although he doesn’t explicitly define it, it is basically a theory that suggests that there are subconscious benefits to the increase in complexity of everyday things like movies, TV shows, and video games. Essentially, in the book, Everything Bad is Good For You, by Steven Johnson, Johnson just explains how modern media is gradually becoming more complicated,

In the response to Edge.org “Worrying About Stupid,” Roger Schank gives his opinion on the people of today and how their thought process works. Or better yet, their lack of a thought process. Schank argues that media, and educations are contributing to the rising level of “stupid” today, and big corporations benefiting from it. Schank unsuccessfully uses pathos, tone, and dictions to explain his point of view.

In the article Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman, he brings into question if our society has in fact, delved into the story line of a George Orwellian or Brave New World scenario. In George Orwell’s 1984, the culture had gotten rid of useful and sufficiently communicative language, as well as written text contradicting anything to do with the government. The characters, along with being forbidden individual or radical thoughts, were deprived of their individualism and history. The Brave New World scenario, as mentioned by Postman, portrays another story. Instead of having external oppression, as in 1984, the characters willingly gave themselves over to the love of technology that, “undo their capacity to think.” Postman believes that the American culture is moving towards a Huxleyan future and gives an example in a study taken in 1983 by the Nielsen Report on Television. He summarizes that the average American child watches 5,000 hours of television before they even start school, and 16,000 hours by the time they graduate high school. This startling data contributed to a growing alarm that both television and other aspects of daily life (church, school, news, politics) are leaning more towards the pull of entertaining its audience than delivering

Introduction: They say that popular culture does not help us understand the educational experiences of the young ones whose families have little or no education and at the same time live in communities where there are unequipped schools. They claim that the internet is “rewiring” young people’s minds, young ones being given the opportunity to choose between the “pull of popular and the push of schooling”, choose the former. They prefer Justin Bieber to Isaac Newton. News stories say that in order for kids to be able to graduate from high school, they have to reject the “nonsense” they are being exposed to in our pop culture.

Contrary to an escalation in income, technology, and higher education levels, American Interest in Literature is deteriorating much to the dismay of author Dana Gioia. In his argument “Why Literature Matters”, he stresses the importance of literature in an intellectual society. Through Gioa’s use of statistical evidence and emotional appeal, he builds his argument through which he attempts to persuade his readers of the detrimental impact a decline in reading will have on society.

Gee, J.P. (2008). Chapter 17: Literacy, video games, and popular culture. In D.R. Olson & N. Torrance (Eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Literacy (pp. 313-325). New York: Cambridge University Press. Gee in this study prioritizes the importance of popular culture and video games as poular culture media characteristic.

Each of current media product carrying part of American life reality of feeling in themselves. When an international or ESL student has arrives to the United States, has a challenge of integrating into the society. Some are not as much eager for the host culture and some students trying to learn new culture more. For someone who wants to live in a new county learning at least a little bit of new culture is necessary. Learning pop culture definitely helps new comers to adjust to the new system. “recognizing power of pop culture and pervasiveness, teachers in various curriculum areas now incorporate pop culture into the curriculum for educational purposes” (Duff,

Popular culture has manifested itself in a number of ways. Currently, the most commonly used method of spreading and exchanging opinions, ideas, art, and other concepts is through the internet. Never before has it been so easy to shed light on a person or an idea, giving it levels of popularity that were considered inconceivable in ages past. In many circumstances the way people are portrayed through pop-culture is most likely how they were perceived by the bulk of people. Pop/culture serves as a way to connect people; help them relate to one another over shared opinions and interests. It was and is the representative of the majority. But what of the times before the internet? How was pop-culture expressed in a time when people did not have the ability to express their thoughts and opinions with millions at a time almost instantaneously? Theatre is one of the most time-honored means of entertainment. Before television and computers and the internet, actors would don a costume and tell act for masses of people. It was a form of storytelling that was not limited to the literate or rich or the scholars, but could be enjoyed by anyone form any economic background. Through it we can see our history and opinions in the form of characters, plots, and settings. We can observe the changing of mainstream opinions through the common themes and recurring motifs in the most popular plays.