Iran Changes Throughout The Years

Media as a whole has evolved alongside with the growth of technology, that give us new ways to interact with each other with social sites like Facebook, Twitter, etc… It also gives way for individual to get more information to get in touch with our culture. But often times, some of the information were given to us by media can be ignored and interpret it differently than the original meaning, especially the depiction of minorities in media. It is hard to watch any form of media in today's society without seeing some kind of injustice toward minorities or the representation portrayal of that particular minorities in the form of entertainment value without being analytical and invoke some kind of negative reaction toward that kind of representation.

The media today is something that is used more than anything else by teens to obtain information about the world. “Social media in this day and age cannot be ignored; it is now a critical part of presidential politics, it has been part of the revolutions in the Middle East and its going to be an unavoidable part of high-profile legal cases; just as traditional media continue to be” (Hochberg 1). The media have reached the peak of influence since the beginning;

This continued to exacerbate the gap between the social classes of Iran. The main reason for the Shah’s confidence in bringing his people prosperity was the mass amount of revenue Iran was generating from Oil. The nationalization of Iran’s oil in the fifties meant increased profits for the nation. Iran’s economy was growing exponentially; its GDP was five times higher in 1976 than it was in 1960 (Clawson, p.15). Islamic modernists, such as Marxist Mujaheddin-e-Khalq, opposed the Shah’s capitalist economic policies (Diller 1991, p.152). There were several other groups that were not pleased with the Shah’s growing focus on economic growth, including the ulemas (councils composed of local Mullahs or respected religious leaders) (Sanders 1990, p.66). These ulemas possessed considerable local influence, as they were in charge of the educational systems and had influence over the urban poor and bazaar merchants (Diller 1991, p.152). In the midst of all that was going on in Iran, Khomeini lived in exile in Paris. The Ayatollah however, was well informed, and managed to sneak tapes into the country to his supporters and the local ulemas. These tapes spread the word of Islamic fundamentalism to these groups that opposed that Shah, and gave them a binding power that eventually would be the revolution of February 1979. Not long, Khomeini had

Iran was now unprotected, and a new power came into being. The Arabs invaded and the quality of life changed. “People fell into poverty as the greedy court imposed ever-increasing taxes. Tyranny tore apart the social contract between ruler and ruled that Zoroastrian doctrine holds to be the basis of organized life” (21). The Iranian people couldn’t survive with a ruler who had no sympathy or respect for them. Their life was being over run by foreigners.

With the shah still sick, it was hard to manage what was back in Iran. The speed of change in Iran was too hard to get command. “The shah was in trouble, reaping the harvest of years of brutal and unpopular policies, including the use of secret police that controlled dissent with arbitrary arrests and torture.” It was obvious that the shah had lost all control of his people of Iran, but the president had hoped for an alliance of opponents to be formed. A man

The complexity of America’s relationship with Iran increased steadily beginning in 1908, when Iran struck oil. The Shah, the king or emperor of Iran, after taking the place of his young predecessor Reza Shah Pahlavi with the help of the CIA, led Iran into a period of extreme wealth and prosperity, the likes of which the Iranian people had never experienced. However, with the growth of wealth in Iran came the growth of Iranian resentment towards the West, specifically the United States. The Iranian’s resented the uneven distribution of wealth that they felt existed and the United State’s influence in “westernizing” their society. In 1963, this growing hatred led to a conflict with the Islamic clergy. The conflict was quickly settled by the Shah, but he was unaware that this dispute was the beginning

According to M. A Mughal, the media and its influence on the societies, has grown with the advance of technology. With these advancements, the impact from mass media has grown to not only impact our beliefs and values, but our assumptions as well (Kulaszewics Pg 4). The growing media has evolved racism, which is identified as a serious issue that can cause social disruption and panic in society. This can lead to hate-crimes such as murder or racial harassment. With a large amount of people utilizing the media, it has become an influence for the population of the United States.

At the time of the 1953 coup, oil revenues were less than 34 million. But by 1977 oil revenue was at over 20 billion. This big leap in oil revenue led to the increase of people in the middle class. In 1953, the middle class was only 5.4% of the labor force but by 1977 the modern middle class formed 6.7% of the labor force in Iran. The expansion of the middle class is impressive, except the Shah administration did not form a good relationship with these people. The Shah put in place policies that benefited the upper class instead of the middle and lower classes (the people that do all the work). Furthermore, Structural Causes of the Iranian Revolution, by Ervand Abrahamian (May, 1980) continues to talk about the importance of the middle class in Iran. The strongest piece of the middle class in Iran were the bazaars, who accounted for two thirds of the retail trade in Iran. From 1953 to 1975 the regime’s policy was very relaxed towards the bazaars and the bazaars were successful. But in 1975 due

When the Iranian Revolution succeeded in 1979, Iran wanted to gain the admiration and the support of Arab countries, benefiting in particular from the support by the Shah of Iran and his relationship with Israel before the collapse of his regime. On this very first day of the victory of the revolution, Iran was keen to extend its bonds with the Islamic world, and when this was not possible in most cases, because of many complex causes of the revolution, Iran began to look for «organizations» instead of «regime’s or countries», in order to continue its role in Islamic issues. Iran was keen to show that this role was one of the foundations of the revolution and its beliefs, in

National Geographic : 27 Sept 2006. Television. Abrahamian , Ervand. Iran Between Two Revolutions (Princeton Studies on the Near East). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982.

Pre-revolutionary Iran was very different from revolutionary Iran. During the revolution, Khomeini held power(). He was a devout religious leader that enforced very strict laws on how the country should live by bringing religion and government together. Because of this, women were forced to wear veils and wear long garments to hide their figure. Reza Shah ruled Iran before Khomeini and had entirely different political ideals. He wanted to keep religion and government separate from each other (). As soon as Reza Shah was inaugurated into power, he seeked to progress Iran by adopting western ideas and culture (Sarder 1). Throughout his rule, Reza Shah turned Iran into an urbanized country by making social classes and improving their educational

In order to understand the current issue involving certain groups being incorrectly portrayed in media, it is important to first understand exactly what mass media is. There are a variety of technical definitions for the term “mass media.” According to Britannica, “Media is used to pass on information to many people in a society” (“Media”). Merriam-Wenster claims media is a “mean of communication that is designed to reach the mass of the people” (“Mass Medium”). Recently, a spike of innovations has led to an increase of possible methods of communication that can be inducted into the field of mass media. Tomi Ahonen, an author on telecommunications and technology, popularized the term “Seventh of the Mass Media” to prove that cellphones are a new form of mass media. This has made the world more familiar with the different categories of media. The seven designated forms include print, recordings, movies, radio, television, internet, and cellphones (Duarte). If more people in the world contained this knowledge of media, it might be more easily understood the effect it can have on so many. In addition to knowing what media is in today’s age, it is also important to fully understand misrepresentation.

The Iranian Revolution, also known as the Islamic Revolution of 1979 took place in Iran. It is when Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi the emperor of Iran during that time, was overthrown by the revolutionary forces led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and thereafter established the Islamic National Republic of Iran. The Iranian Revolution brought a big change into the international community and how it viewed revolutions. As Iran’s revolution lacked many of the fundamental causes that were though to give rise to revolutions. It was unusual in the sense that it had no ‘agrarian’ pattern. As the traditional social structure was maintained after the revolution and it reinstated old structure as the Muslim clergy came into power. To understand what led to the Iranian Revolution of 1979, we need to look back into the Iranian history and the timeline leading up to the revolution. In doing so, we can use the psychological theories of revolution and structural- functionalist theories of revolution in order to analyses and explain the cause of the Iranian Revolution.

As Michael Axworthy states on the back cover of his book, A History of Iran: Empire of the Mind, Iran is a “land of contradictions”. As this is true these contradictions is what makes Iran, Iran. Iran today is looked as the pinnacle of the Islamic faith in the form of a Government structure. Since 1979, Iran has been known as the Islamic Republic of Iran and Iran will continue being an Islamic Republic for centuries to come. Iran has a rich history of intellectuals and scholars. Iran is known for its vibrant culture that dates back longer than the Western Ideals were even conceived. However Axworthy asks a question about Iran and its impact on the world’s history and the current events that we see in Iran today, Axworthy asks “Is Iran an aggressive power, or a victim?” This statement is a true paradox, can Iran be the next Nazi Germany, the next Soviet Union or the next Great Islamic Caliphate or is Iran just fighting to keep its culture alive from a vast array of attacks from foreign entities and internal struggles.

Iran has always, it seems, been the breeding ground for some kind of political upheaval or another. In recent times, back in 1979, there was a major revolution which was, in some ways, similar to the revolution we are seeing today. The people were angry and they were tired of being controlled by the government that was in power. They had concrete ideals and were incredibly passionate about their revolution. The revolution Iran is experiencing today does not appear to be quite as passionate and does not appear to maintain a belief in any real solid political system. They just know they want something different. In the following paper we present an illustration of the current revolution that is taking