Use of the Word Hero in The Mass Media

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Use of the word hero in the mass media has become somewhat cliché. In 2010, an on-line search of three major American newspapers revealed that 5500 articles concerning the topic of heroes appeared between 2000 and 2005 (Sullivan & Venter, 2010). Although the presence of “heroes” and “heroines” in America is not surprising, it is unclear what meaning the word holds in today’s culture (Sullivan & Ventner, 2010). What meaning the word HOLDS. Think about that for a moment. The word hero, or even the idea of what constitutes heroism is different to everyone. While there are acts of heroism every day in our society, what and who the media chooses to classify or portray as heroes has very little to do with heroism. Most often in the media, the word hero is associated with athletes and celebrities. It is not uncommon to hear a performance on a football field described as heroic, when an athlete plays hurt, or in a movie when an actor or actress gives a grand performance in a dramatic film. The word hero should be HELD in high regard. It should be reserved for people who spend their lives, or perhaps lose their life, fighting for a cause, such as Martin Luther King, Jr. It should be reserved for people who put themselves in harm’s way in order to protect others from danger, like firefighters and police officers. The media does hold these type of people in high regard and does consider them heroes, but not often enough.

The idea of celebrities as heroes can be traced back to mid-70s when Farah Fawcett-Majors burst on to the scene as a pin-up model and television star. As detective Jill Monroe on the TV series Charlie’s Angels, she was described by a critic as “a powerful heroin, a representative of a decade of feminism” (Graebner, 2013). ...

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... Man in the Water”: The Politics of the American Hero, 1970-1985. the Historian. Retrieved from: http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer

PORPORA, D.V. (1996). Personal Heroes, Religion, and Transcendental Metanarratives. Sociological Forum, Vol. 11, No. 2. Retrieved from: http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer

WHITE, S.H. & O’BRIEN, J.E. (1999). What is a Hero? An exploratory study of students’ conceptions of heroes. Journal of Moral Education, Vol. 28, No. 1. Retrieved from: http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/eds/detail

SCHLENKER, B.R., WEIGOLD, M.F. and SCHLENKER, K.A. (2008) What Makes A Hero? The Impact of Integrity on Admiration and Interpersonal Judgment. Journal of Personality. Retrieved from: http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/eds/pdfviewer

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