The Problem Of Pop Culture

Pop culture, what does this term even mean? It seems to be a word that contains subjects of media, social structure, and society as a whole. According to the dictionary, pop culture is defined as “cultural activities or commercial products reflecting, suited to, or aimed at the tastes of the general masses of people”. In the society we live in today, we are constantly surrounded by pop culture, either that is with television, magazines, different sources of social media and/or exposure to others. Due to pop culture being such a dominant contribution into our world today, it has effected many parts of society. The domination of social media has created idealistic views that are stressed upon female adolescents in particular. Upon media’s influence, traditional tactics and work have been modified in order to keep up with our technology oriented society. This alters the schools and education systems. Through the use of television, social media and other means of pop culture, serious study is necessary due to the negative effects it has on the younger generation and the effects it has for their futures.

In ours’, it’s everything from MTV hits, to Breaking Bad to Miley Cyrus. But historically, pop culture derived from the lower classes and the “low” culture, the exiled counterpart to “high” culture. High culture was considered to compose of art, literature, and classical music created by and for the most prestige. Over time “pop culture” slowly began to replace the phrase “ low culture,” pop culture or low culture was defined by what it wasn’t; elegant, refined, high culture, than rather by what it was. Mass culture. The masses looked for entertainment and distraction, soon enough it was assumed for pop culture to simply just amuse. However, pop culture can never be dismissed as being “just” entertainment or for “only” amusement.

Popular culture is a fusion of interest and activities that groups of people share. merely, anything that has to do with entertainment is popular culture, such as Movies, TV shows, actors, singers, toys, games, sports, clothes and the list continues. In many ways, popular culture touches every aspect of our lives. It plays such a major role in how our society views the world and how we perceive everyday things. Pop culture has a way of effect our lives no matter what we do to thwart its’ influence.

Einstein once said, “If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life believing that it is stupid.” Likewise, if a poor test-taker is judged by their SAT score, they could be forced to attend an inadequate institute of higher education. For decades, the SAT has been “the test” that makes or breaks a student's chances of getting into their top college. Generally, the privileged populace do well, but minorities and women do not come out as strong and are therefore limited to college choice. The SAT has proven to be an unsuitable, biased method for predicting success of students in college.

The SAT is seen as a gateway to college. At top tier universities, it gets your foot in the door. According to Goral, “The elite universities that can point to this exam and say that if a student doesn't score X, Y and Z on it, then we're not going to consider them.” Many students believe that these tests are the only obstacle left on the way to their dream colleges, so they study for hours on end, hoping for a great performance on this test. Many of these students even cannot wait once they’ve tested to see their scores.

Imagine a test capable of making or breaking a student's chances of getting into his or her dream college. Imagine a test score that can be easily influenced, but only through thousands of dollars worth of coaching. Now imagine that same test but biased towards certain crowds of students while also being incapable of accurately predicting their futures. Is this the test you want for colleges to use in order to distinguish students? This is the SAT—famous for the unnecessary pressure it presents to students as well as the unfair disadvantages it presents to many others. Since these SAT scores are extremely artificial, SAT tests are not an accurate predictor for future success.

Many know the stressful feeling of having to take the ACT. The exam room fills slowly with worried faces and remains quiet until the test stars. Students grasp their pencils tightly, their palms sweating with the thought of their future at stake with this single test. In order to get into any college, an ACT or SAT score is required. These required scores for admission vary from school to school which can make it difficult for every student to attend their dream school. A single test will determine who can and cannot attend a certain college. With this system, it can deny students with potential in certain fields a place in a college because they might not test well. College admission should not be based on

Colleges and universities such as Iowa State need ways to evaluate applying students which really show their potential as college students. A three hour-long test cannot reveal many traits of successful students. Qualities like good study habits, a positive self-concept, the ability to set goals, and real world knowledge are not shown in a test like the SAT (Fairness). Another problem with the SAT is that today so many preparation methods exist; the tests aren’t really a true showing of what a student knows. There are many companies who claim their product can be that miracle teacher that boosts a student’s score and get them into the college of their dreams. Should colleges really be base this large decision on knowledge that can be just "picked up" in four short weeks or an entire twelve-year education?

Misinformation, false and inaccurate information, can not only affect one’s bias but future poor decisions about consequential matters. Many of today’s spread of misinformation derives not only from the reader’s interpretation of the given bias and rhetoric within the sources, but the afterward outspread of this information. In the case of standardized testing, media often portrays it as an unnecessary and overwhelming tool used to equally assess the student population in core subjects. But, the media never shines the light on those who rely on the tests to excel in their classes. In “SAT Scores Helps Colleges Make Better Decisions, Gaston Caperton of the U.S. News and Report argues that SATs indeed gives colleges administrators a fair field

The idea of pop culture has many different opinions surrounding it. Some people believe that it’s a God sent to us, others think it's the devil. Chris Hedges and Melissa Ames both have opposing opinions on this topic. Hedges, in “American Psychosis,” discusses that pop culture is bad because we focus too much on superficial topics and not enough on the real problems in our world. Whereas, Ames, in “Engaging ‘Apolitical’ Adolescents: Analyzing the Popularity and Educational Potential of Dystopian Literature Post-9/11,” suggests that pop culture is a unique tool that you can use to understand politics and our world’s problems. Both authors struggle to convince their peers to believe their ideology and they both have unique ways of doing so. By

Generally speaking, the SAT is a one-day test where students are forced to test in specific areas such as math, reading and writing in an allotted time period. An individual’s success cannot be measured by a snapshot of time. Many believe that time does not help reflect a student’s overall performance because there are multiple of variables that can happen throughout the time period and day to that individual. In addition, the SAT testing does not take into account other academic areas that a student may excel in. While a student’s GPA on their transcript can show administrators the student’s strengths and weakness since it reflects an accumulative of four years in high school, thus it is able to better represent a student’s academic

Central Idea: The society we live in today blames popular culture for destroying the lives of most young ones. Critics come up with conclusions that pop culture is the cause of educational failure. But they fail to look at the real reasons why we have a lot of young ones who cannot graduate from high school or even afford a quality education. My aim is to convince my audience that there is a lot going on in our society other than pop culture when it comes to education and learning.

This belief that standardized test scores are their ticket into their dream school, makes those students focus only on what they believe will be most important to their test-taking skills, instead of the aspects of their education that may benefit them more in college, or their future jobs like working with other people, speaking in front of peers, or being a leader of a group. These students are forced to eliminate many valuable parts of their education for standardized test preparation, and often it is just for them to learn how to fill in bubbles on a scantron, and skim through passages to find answers. During my sophomore and junior years of high school, I took seven ACT tests, and was forced to miss multiple school days in order to take residual standardized tests, and I believe that I missed valuable time in class just to have a chance of getting a point or two higher on the ACT. Putting so much pressure on one standardized test in a high school student’s career causes that student to put their efforts into doing well on that one test day, rather than on the 180 other days of classwork and interaction with peers. Focusing solely on what would benefit them during tests causes anxiety for many students when that day comes where get to finally use their

The study of popular culture is useful in many ways. To be more specific, this course has reached its three intended main ideas: what it means to be American, how to be more consumption-conscious, and how to apply these studies in our own lives. Jim Cullen puts this in a less specific sense, arguing that the study of popular culture can “afford valuable clues – about collective fears, hopes, and debates” (Cullen, The Art of Democracy, 2). We use these clues to understand the world around us, as well as why we do what we do as Americans and as humans. I will be touching on themes that relate to this quotation by Cullen, escapism, exploitation, and globalization, as well as how these themes relate to the course goals.

Popular culture is generally believed to be comprised of a variety of elements. For example, popular culture covers the most contemporary and instant aspects of our lives. These aspects can often show the characteristics of rapid change, especially in today’s highly technological and informative world in which, people are highly influenced by the universal media. Certain standards of behaviour and common beliefs are reflected in pop culture. Because of its cohesion, pop culture both influences and reflects people’s daily life. Moreover, brands can reach iconic pop status. However, these aspects are not constant and may change rapidly. (Abbott and Sapsford, 1987).