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Theories of emotion worksheet
The cultural industries theory
Theories of emotion worksheet
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The culture industry: Manufactured Emotions and Democracy
In the past section, I demonstrated how emotions play a significant role in viewing political satire by presenting a basic outline of the theory of emotion. In addition, I presented how humor could assist in encouraging the democratic process by showing both sides of the extreme points of view in an argument, and encourage political knowledge acquisition. Despite the amount of evidence that support this position, a clear disconnect arises between viewing these shows and the intent of these shows to spark discussion. In the next two sections, I hope to highlighq this disconnect between political viewing and political action. In this section, I will show how Max Horkheimer and Theodore Adorno's work on the culture industry can highlight corporate interest in maintaining a apathetic demos. In the next section, I will point out that political humor, like opinionated news reporting is subject to the same levels of confirmation bias. Though, it is understandable to connect both the culture industry and pre-cognitive bias together in the same breath, I will treat them separately, even though, I will tie everything together at the end. The culture industry, as I have defined in previous work is, “Art or any of its components as a commodity or a path to commodification.” For example, on South Park Studeo’s official website, they have a shop that contains South Park memorabilia including t-shirts, bobbleheads, hand towels, etc. So South Park is a path to commodification. Likewise, South Park airs on Comedy Central, which is owned by Viacom, so South Park in and of itself is a commodity of Viacom. This is why Viacom needs to market shows like South Park to a particular audience. ...
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...per, because of potential corporate interests from elsewhere as well as a cathartic moment that it is difficult to take on the American status quo, political humor serves as, “A mere dose of comedy and then we moved on about our business.”” In tying everything together, the influence of the culture industry, the effect of corporatism on the demos, as well as interpreting individuals and statements to bolster our political identity can be linked together into a political system known as, “Inverted Totalitarianism.” In which the mechanism used to establish this theoretical system is known as systematic democracy or as Sheldon Wolin calls it, “Managed democracy.” This mechanism ties the culture industry’s influence on the demos and explains how corporate capitalism can subdue and manage democracy and democratic actions by rerouting us to false freedom and choices.
“When a great democracy is destroyed, it will not be because of enemies from without, but rather because of enemies from within.” During the late 1940s and early 1950s, these words of Abraham Lincoln were all on the minds of Americans (McCarthyism). After fighting against Communism for decades, the fear of it taking down the country terrorized people’s thoughts. Even more so, people were extremely frightened of the idea that there could be Communists within the spotlights of American influence that were plotting the destruction of the United States. A fear swept the country for almost a decade, and it transformed every aspect of American culture. This transformation began in the entertainment industry and hit here the hardest. The fear of Communism completely spun the industry upside down and distorted everything that made American showbiz so distinct. Even today, the controversies of the 1940s and 1950s have left an impression on the current entertainment industry.
Michael Parenti (2002) declares media in the United States is no longer “free, independent, neutral and objective.” (p. 60). Throughout his statement, Parenti expresses that media is controlled by large corporations, leaving smaller conglomerates unable to compete. The Telecommunications Act, passed in 1996, restricted “a single company to own television stations serving more than one-third of the U.S. public,” but is now overruled by greater corporations. (p. 61). In his opinion, Parenti reveals that media owners do not allow the publishing of stories that are not beneficial and advantageous. Parenti supports his argument very thoroughly by stating how the plutocracy takes control over media in multiple ways: television, magazines, news/radio broadcasting, and other sources.
For example, the comedy shows The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon expresses satirical humor concerning politics. His show also demonstrates political satire by telling jokes and even impersonating political figures for the audience. He creates humor through sarcasm that focuses on real issues. His sarcastic humor causes others to feel more confident in their criticism toward politicians. For example, “Jimmy Fallon expresses his humor about Donald Trump, impersonating his appearance and imitating his voice while talking about politics. He uses his humor by impersonating Donald Trump and his sweeping generalizations with Madea (Rogo).” Jimmy Fallon shows people his views through humor and it creates a sense of community to express their agreeable and disagreeable views. As we discussed some ideas about satirical humor that affects political changes, it was important to reveal their feelings about changes in life and drove them to look upon their society or government more
This paper will address the failures of political satire to encourage political action, despite the fact that studies have shown that it is conducive for political knowledge acquisition. People may be attracted to political satire because it turns an undiscussable topic as politics into a light-hearted affair. Though not discussing the philosophy of humor per se, Noel Carroll’s theory of emotions can help explain how shows such as South Park, The Daily Show with John Stewart, and others can seta emotional response conducive to accepting other viewpoints. Though I agree with this point, an aporia rises when we ask why is it that these same shows have not sparked discussions or social reaction to the content on these shows? For instance, why is it that discussions about the legitimacy of Occupy Wall Street, gender justice, or even the two party system of democracy have not occurred when viewing these shows, despite the fact these topics are frequently discussed? In this paper, I will demonstrate that although political satire can be used to set a positive emotive response, that it als...
Popular culture also plays a role in why Americans do not trust politicians. Late-night television shows use politicians in their comedy skits, where their mistakes are punch lines for comedians. A study produced by Jody Baumgartner and Jonathan Morris found that people who view late-night television shows have a more negative view of candidates, (Medvic p. 5). In particular, people who view The Daily Show have drastically less faith in the electoral process, (Medvic p. 5). Russell Peterson argues that these jokes as “implicitly anti-democratic” because they declare the entire system as fraudulent, (Medvic p. 5).
Dye, T. R., Zeigler, H., & Schubert, L. (2012). The Irony of Democracy (15th ed.).
Cultural Studies focuses on the political and social impacts of media. Cultural Studies assumes that all cultural products are ultimately about power and possess value only to the degree that they attack established social order. Traditional Philosophy emphasizes the perennial difficulty of sustaining excellence in a culture seemi...
Nowadays young people are becoming interested in political news and learning about what is happening around the world. The traditional ways of a tedious man just reading a script not only takes away the interest in listening to the news but also makes it harder for the audience to build a relationship with the deliverer. Irony builds a stronger connection with the audience while addressing serious topics that need to be heard and discussed.Comedian Jon Stewart of The Daily Show is an example,“For young viewers in particular, “The Daily Show” provided a more trustworthy daily news summary than almost any show on Fox News or CNN”(Nussbaum). Throughout the show, irony helped him deliver an important message to the audience while keeping them interesting.
Popular culture is the artistic and creative expression in entertainment and style that appeals to society as whole. It includes music, film, sports, painting, sculpture, and even photography. It can be diffused in many ways, but one of the most powerful and effective ways to address society is through film and television. Broadcasting, radio and television are the primary means by which information and entertainment are delivered to the public in virtually every nation around the world, and they have become a crucial instrument of modern social and political organization. Most of today’s television programming genres are derived from earlier media such as stage, cinema and radio. In the area of comedy, sitcoms have proven the most durable and popular of American broadcasting genres. The sitcom’s success depends on the audience’s familiarity with the habitual characters and the situations
In the article, “Culture Jamming: Hacking, Slashing and Sniping in the Empire of Signs,” American author and cultural critic Mark Dery creates a definition for culture jamming while popularizing the term. He explains how culture jamming disguises itself in mechanisms that are used for social control. In the section, “Empire of Signs,” Dery focuses on a mechanism from a 1975 segment called “Media Burn,” which involved the collision of two American cultural symbols, the television and the automobile, to alleviate the frustration of television. The segment was extremely shocking to viewers due to it smashing and burning an idolized object in American society (Dery). Dery continues by defining other forms of culture jamming techniques, such as sniping and subverting, media hoaxing, adjusters, audio agitprop
According to A Novel Approach to Politics “Questions about the very nature of reality seem to be common in fiction of all sorts.” Especially, The Boondocks, a fictional cartoon, uses satire to describe real events that happen in society. The episode I tuned into was “The Trial of R. Kelly”, which explained how R. Kelly won his trial and the views of the people about his case. In the episode, the people outside the court house showed different cognitive frameworks of how they view R. Kelly situation. In other words, the media made sense of the reality of R. Kelly situation in different ways because of the media wanted to select certain information. In this paper, I will explain how the media exemplified mediated reality and agreement reality in the “The Trial of R. Kelly” episode of The Boondocks.
Watts, Amber Eliza. "Laughing at the World: Schadenfreude, Social Identity, and American Media Culture." Order No. 3303774 Northwestern University, 2008. Ann Arbor: ProQuest. Web. 10 Mar. 2014.
Humor is more than just amusing entertainment to pass the time. Though jokes and witty banter can be shallow, humor can go deeper than surface level to convey messages to audiences who would otherwise be close-minded about certain ideas. Humor is a great tool to get audiences to change the way they think, feel, and act. In “Saying Goodbye to Yang,” Alexander Weinstein uses humor to criticize some of society’s faults, such as the way it has become heavily reliant on technology, racially insensitive, and judgmental. As technology advances, people are adapting and becoming more reliant upon it.
The dominant traditions have an important role to many economies in terms of assessing change and continuity that involves the growth of prosperity and employment in the cultural industries. The process to determine the best solution may be complicated and tiresome as controversy surrounds these traditions. Profit generating and control may be the main reasons of these approaches, but they also carry an important characteristic in how society understands “the relationships between culture, society and economy.” (Hesmondhalgh, 2007, p.6) Many compare and contrast on whether political economy or cultural studies approaches are more useful towards the study of media and popular cultural. If both approaches can get past their differences, perhaps they may have the potential to work in harmony together in achieving the same goals.
From the beginning days of the printing press to the always evolving internet of present day, the media has greatly evolved and changed over the years. No one can possibly overstate the influential power of the new media of television on the rest of the industry. Television continues to influence the media, which recently an era of comedic television shows that specialize in providing “fake news” has captivated. The groundbreaking The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and its spin-off The Colbert Report have successfully attracted the youth demographic and have become the new era’s leading political news source. By parodying news companies and satirizing the government, “fake news” has affected the media, the government, and its audience in such a way that Bill Moyers has claimed “you simply can’t understand American politics in the new millennium without The Daily Show,” that started it all (PBS).