George Jhally Image Based Culture

Over the years the concept of culture has shaped people and what they believe in. According to the textbook culture is defined as a set of beliefs, traditions, and practices. The conception of culture can be described as material or nonmaterial. Material culture is described as everything that is a part of our constructed, physical environment. On the other hand, nonmaterial culture refers to values, beliefs, behaviors, and social normal. I believe culture can be defined and shaped in many ways. I feel that culture differs from one location to another because the natural environment has an impact on the culture. Also, some people come up with their own ideas and values. There are changes within cultures across time because people grow and develop

In accordance that artifice is the heart is the consumer culture, looking into today's society simple commercials demonstrate that aspect. For example commercials have influenced an image based culture where pictures are used to get the consumer's attention. In continuation with that actors may be photoshopped with drastic changes in weightloss.In agreement with Hedge’s proposition of illusion,”tools of mass propaganda to create a sense of faux intimacy with citizens no longer need to be competent,sincere, or honest.” This statement follows up on the types of propaganda that appeals to people for it to be successful. This is true because images appeal to people hence the term “image based culture” which in turn result in marketers

In Chapter Seven of Practices of Looking, we start to explore in the ideas of advertising, consumer cultures and desire. Everyday, we are faced with advertisements through newspapers, magazines, TV, movies, billboards, public transportation such as buses and taxis, clothing, the internet, etc. Logos, such as signs, or anything that resemble a brand, are everywhere, they are on clothing, household items, electronics, cars, etc. Consumers are always showing off their brands and advertisements and we are used to seeing those brands and advertisements in an everyday setting. In modern media, advertisers are pressured to always change the ways they show off and get the attention to consumers, old and new. Advertisers also used present figures who were glamorous. Advertisements set up a certain relationship between the product and its meaning to sell the products and the hidden meaning we link to each of the products. Advertisements use the language of conversion. Advertisers try to create a customer relationship to the brand to try to form them as familiar, necessary, and also likeable.

Gender and the Media by Rosalind Gill addresses gender stereotypes that are brought onto women and men through the media resulting in objectification and subjectification. Gill discusses how the representation of gender is altered as a result of the media in Western societies. Gender and the Media is aimed to address the rapid transmission of media and how those changes affect the construction of feminine and masculine gender roles in society. Gill uses her interest in the contradictions of gender construction by society, to analyze gender and the media. Using feminism as a backbone for her research, Gill and many commentators support the idea that feminist ideas are common and may even affect the media. Gender and the Media addresses multiple forms of media: postfeminism in advertising, gender in the news and journalism, and gender in magazines. Gild aims to address the construction of gender representations, elements for gender analysis, and feminist culture with Gender and the Media.

Take a look around and think about how far our society has really come along. Yes, we finally have a woman running for president, an African-American president, same-sex marriage laws, feminism and minority movements, but we still don’t have thing like equal-pay, or proper representation. Similarly to how a magician manipulates his/her audience’s perspectives by directing their attention to a particular part of the stage to see “where the magic happens” while the actual “action” happens elsewhere; Lisa Shaffer argues that pop culture has put on a performance of progression yet works behind the scenes to reinforce traditional social values. In the articles “Men’s Men and Women’s Women” and “Dove’s ‘Real Beauty’ Backlash,” the authors agree with Lisa Shaffer’s idea of the media’s regressive intentions, and support their claim by providing analysis of varies commercials that underline traditional social values.

The most dominant mass marketing technique known as advertising has become inevitable. Advertisements are everywhere in some form or fashion. Whether it is billboards, posters, fliers, or any other print media, advertisements are there fulfilling their purpose; in other words, they are breaking down the “tuning out” barrier. In the article, “Jesus is a Brand of Jeans” written by speaker, social theorist, and widely published writer, Jean Kilbourne, she expresses that we are all influenced by advertisements. She indicates that majority of the power of advertising originates from the mentality of believing advertisements have no effect on oneself. I agree with Kilbourne on the fact that advertising affects every individual.

“The power of the media lies not only in their ability to reflect the dominant racial ideology, but in their capacity to shape that ideology in the first place” (Omi, Winant). The media holds power in the way it shapes society. The media influences the way society views race, class, and gender to make it favor a particular group, or class. Race, class and gender are portrayed through various outlets of media including music, television and magazines. In the popular women’s fashion magazine, Instyle, these three elements are shown. Yet, Instyle magazine does not openly represent all races, classes, and genders. There are certain races, classes, and genders that are focused on more heavily than others, leading this magazine to have a narrow-minded

When looking at advertisements, magazine covers, and sometimes music videos, what is a common theme? Social media or media of any sort deliberately displays a lack of diversity in intersectionalities to try to appeal to most audiences. In the process of analysing Cosmopolitans front page cover of Kate Hudson, one can see the representation of sexual objectification, lack of diversity, and common reoccurring intersectionalities in media. From not only a couple images in the media showing these aspects, but almost all presented images have shown to create many more negative effects than positive effects in American culture. First in dissecting the Cosmopolitans cover, we look at the focus point which is Kate Hudson.

In the All-New Volvo XC90 commercial the first words to appear on the screen is “What is Luxury?” In this commercial it appears that luxury can only be afforded by primarily white, rich males. The media in the United States has made a lot of progress towards showing gender and racial equality on TV but America still has a long way to go. As of 2015 white men still have a patriarchal ranking in media compared to women and minorities. This essay will be discussing how intersectionality, such as gender, race, and class, play a key part in gender roles in TV media today.

In the Tom Ford ad, a woman is seen laying down on her side, half naked and slim, looking at her face full of makeup through a mirror. Marketers use the concept of gender, mainly women to display sexuality, providing a resource that can be used to receive attention. The audiences’ attention is caught right away in this ad as they see a “sexy” woman being the main focus. Advertising shapes a society’s culture, and reflects its values. Furthermore, advertising is a part of “a discourse through and about objects” as it does not mention anything about the product but how it is connected to major domains in our lives (Jhally 328). The makeup product of Tom Ford is not mentioned in the ad whatsoever, but the mirror is used as an indication of beauty viewed through society’s expectations. It promotes images of what the audience assumes to be “the good life” as it tries guiding us to become “happy” through the purchase of products. If a woman were to buy any makeup by Tom Ford, she will automatically be happy as the makeup will give her glow in life because she will be able to do anything with her new and enhanced beauty. The concept of advertising consists of wrapping up your emotions and selling them back to you (329) by giving fake happiness and satisfaction that loops an individual to chase goods in order to fill the void of

The media has become an essential part of men and women’s lives for years, dating all the way back to before World War II in the late 1930’s. It was said to be that the media during this time injected “values and morals into society” (Jade). In today’s society, there are several different types of social groups. Some of the social groups may be effected by the media and how they portray the perfect woman and some may not be effected because they may “reject the messages that are not consistent with the values of that group” (Jade). There are also several different types of people in this world, some of whom have very low self-esteem or confidence and are therefore affected more by what the media says than others with a higher self-esteem.

Scholars have discussed the media’s increasing influence within contemporary society, and shaping of identities. It has been suggested that the media provides us with limited notions and materials to brand ourselves, which involve the concept behind being a man or woman and differentiate the means of what is acceptable and not in society. There are various prominent mediums used by the media to convey or direct a message. Images from media arbitrated precepts tend to become the conception of the individual’s self. Vigorito and Curry (1998, p. 136) indicate that pop culture is increasingly visual and images seen in the media tend to convey the ideal cultural norms, values and gender relations. These images are not subtle, but explicit notions

For the purpose of this essay, I decided to talk about the representation of race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality. In order to make it more specific, I decided to focus on those representations in media, like televisions and magazines. I will argue that people does not only need to be represented, but they also need to be represented well . Because, first, the way that people are represented can shape others beliefs about them and secondly, those representations can also have an impact on how those people see themselves or their cultures.

Magazines play a very crucial role as powerful managers of socialisation in favouring and normalising particular types of hegemonic discourses about gender, sexuality and race (Sanger, 2009:138). Women’s bodies are mostly regulated and policed by the media in what is believed to be normal and represents beauty. They are objectified according to their body parts and for heterosexual male satisfactions. However, my interest is to draw attention to the ways that magazines have a tendency to help normalise whiteness and the ideas of white femininities as the ideal representation of beauty. By using Sanger’s article (2009), my discussion discloses that the privileging of white heterofemininity as normative and ultimate, at once creates racist colonial

Advertising is one of the channels of social communication. The system of social communication provides not only the preservation and rebroadcast achievements of culture and cultural norms and everyday practices, but it is also a crucial part of the process of inculturation personality which is essential to the processes of social development as a whole. An important event in the evolution of modern mass culture was the so-called “visual turn” resulting from the multimedia revolution of XX-XXI centuries.This revolution led to the dominance of visual cultural forms, including outdoor advertising as a mass phenomenon culture.