Mass Media in American History
(Summary)
by Eriko Ohiwa
1. My interests now
I havenft known much about TV culture in America, so I want to introduce an old article I think interesting.
2. Introduction of the article of Goto Kazuhiko
American TV culture in 1970s was different from the other pop culture like magazine in whether they were reflecting the real society. In other words, in this time, the popularity on TV was confined to the sense of middle class white American who supported the post|war TV prosperity as program maker, sponsor, and viewer. Because of this fact, in dramas and commercial, there are gaps between reality and the TV world. To explain this, he picks up two elements, one is sexual description and the other is minority like black people on TV.
sexual description
First, by picking up sexual description, he indicates that women and men on TV were described ideally for middle|aged American.
Compared with UK, the sexual openness on TV in America was stoic. For example, in daytime serial drama, heroines were described as the best of women, or puritanical women, and indeed, these dramas were supported by women. So, he says this feature has deep connection with stoicism on TV.
And, he refers to the difference in commercialism. In America, TV programs are connected with sponsors, while in UK, TV programs are separate from advertisers. So in America, they didnft dissolve stoicism to save viewers for sponsors. But this stoicism didnft reflect real society. In this time, sexual openness was widely appeared in movie, stage, and published matter. So, this tendency was particular to TV.
Men and women in commercial, too, described as ideal. In this time, one|third of married women was working, but this fact wasnft reflected.
Minority
Second, by picking up minorities on TV, he mentions that the image of minorities like Black people were changed to something convenient to white American on TV.
Other media was sensitive to minority problem, and TV was also feeling the pressure of the problem, but they reacted to it by formal acceptance of minorities. By changing their image to favorable, they kept the world of white American on TV.
This was contemporary article, and in this, he try to demonstrate the problems held by TV in 1970s, and also reflections of middle|class white American. I think research like this is interesting and useful not only in reading historical background, but also in considering todayfs TV culture.
Questions and Answers Session@summerized by Takuya Kohmoto
Summary of Ms Ohiwa
Ms Ohiwa researched about TV culture in 1970s. She mainly introduced the article of Goto Kazuhiko. He mentioned that American TV culture were not reflecting the real society because the popularity on TV was confined to middle class white American. And TV program maker, sponsor, and viewer are occupied by them in those days. So there were gaps between real society and TV world. Then he picks up sexual description and minority like Black people on TV.
Sexual description in American TV was stoic, compared with UK. American TV tended to describe their heroin as the best of woman. This tendency was related to following facts. American TV programs were connected with sponsors, and main TV viewer white American. And this tendency kept the world of white American.
Ms Ohiwa thought it is important to distinguish mass media by their each feature, and she thought researching like this is interesting and useful in reading historical background and considering American culture.
Q. Why does she choose this era (1970s)
A. In this era, there were differences between TV world and real society.
Q. Why is she interested in 1970s or this article?
A. She thought researching like this is interesting and useful in reading historical background and considering American culture, like above. Mass media is one of her interests to research.
not available