Media, Culture: Beauty, Media And Culture

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Beauty, Media and Culture How the popular culture influences ideas about beauty among either women, men, or both. Here in America, the conventional definition of beauty is what is perceptible in any form of our popular culture. This includes television, movies, music videos, billboards, fashion blogs, social media (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter), as well as anything ran on print and in mainstream media. The business strategy that is often used in these forms of media is that, women’s bodies are often used as a tool for advertising products that are entirely not related to the items in play, for instance, fancy cars, liquor, as well as guns (Kitch 56). Much as utilizing women’s bodies as a tool for selling the products that are totally unrelated …show more content…

For a long time, women have been depicted explicitly in media through art, music, and dances (Roelofs 60). The message that has been passed across is that of reducing the status of a woman in society to a sexual object. This reduces the self-esteem of women in society as they are regarded of low social status and immoral behavior in society. It is worth noting that the standard of beauty is not universal and furthermore it is dynamic. ‘Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder’ summarizes this fact. The standards of true beauty vary from one culture to another. From a cross-cultural perspective, beauty is normally associated with all that is good, kind; moral and attractive (Wolf 12). Conversely, the ugly is linked with cruelty, evil, and …show more content…

Young are often most susceptible to this, and advertisers often take this weakness to their advantage and they are the most common target market for their business strategies. Media has a negative influence in shaping the ideas of culture and beauty, in that it exploits the naivety of men and women due to their lack of knowledge on the ideals of ‘true beauty’. They often capitalize on this lack of knowledge to get huge profits and create a name for their businesses. It is for this reason that parents need to assist their children from a tender age in understanding what true beauty is all about. The ideals of true beauty are often universal and vary from one culture to another. Values need to be instilled on the need for realizing one’s true beauty, which entails discovering one’s self-worth and they should be brought to the realization that beauty is innate and dynamic and it does not need huge investments to look like those celebrities. Moreover, it is imperative that men and women appreciate how they look and desist from being hog washed by the ‘realities’ that mass media often dupes them to

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