The Influence of the Media on American Culture

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The media has been a part of the daily life of the American people for the longest time, because of this fact, the media influences the decisions and views of how people should live. One big part of the media that tends to start to develop a sense of how the day-to-day American should live is Disney. Since kids are the main source of Disney’s billion dollar industry children have become an important dimension of the social theory (Giroux 1999: 65). “Within this context, television emerges as a consumer-oriented medium that reflects advertisers’ desire to reach a young, upscale, and primarily White audience” (Goodale1999; Henderson and Baldasty 2003: 100). As a result other races and ethnic groups other than white Americans are often put aside when it comes to the social media view of how Americans should live.

Due to economy reasons upper class male citizens is the main priority to social media. White men are often seen as the main consumers for the simple reason that they have a higher purchasing power than women or any other group of people in the United States. To many Americans that thought is often normal yet, when looked upon further it’s seen as a system of beliefs that appear normal and natural but they actually reinforce the superiority of certain people, practice and beliefs known as Hegemony Ideologies. Meaning other groups with difference races and ethnicity that is not white American tends to fall into the group known the minority group. Minorities are often seen to the social media as a disadvantage and as a result is less advertised in the media (Macionis 2011: 152).

However, when a group of people other than whites who appear in an advertisement is primarily “appear in toke roles, limiting their own visibili...

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...rs bad, and three men should have power and women should be subordinate and have good looks.

Race, stereotype, ethnicity, and racism are all around the world and it has become so normal that more often than not people tend to overlook those factors in the social media. As stated earlier the medias main goal is to make money as a result most white Americans is the medias main source of money. Yet, by doing so the media has segregated people by their race and ethnicity in the type of channels and advertisements they have created.

Works Cited

Henderson, Jennifer Jacobs; Baldasty, Gerald J. 2003 “Race, advertising, and prime-time television” Howard Journal of Communications 2(14): 97-112.

Giroux, Henry A. 1994 "The disneyfication of children's culture." The animating youth 94(3):55-66.

Macionis, John J. 2011 “The intersections collection” Prentice hall:152

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