The Roles Media Plays In Contemporary Society

The Roles Media Plays In Contemporary SocietyMedia communication is full of contradictions, nevertheless one cannot cross the all important(p) part it plays in social life, part which has kept and will maintain its importance along time. In this essay, I will analyze the importance and the tinge of mount media in contemporary society, presenting twain their positive and negative effects, in terms of the qualitys they play. I will start by presenting the advantages of the informative and informative functions (which are essential in a society dependant on cud media for learning), while withal mentioning their negative effects, by referring to the manipulation of familiar tactual sensation and the using of media as a medium of propaganda. I will continue by discussing the presence of infotainment and its benefits, but also the educative business office of mass media, nevertheless without ignoring the negative cheeks which come with access to reading for a population seg ment which does not call for the ability to select and process it. I will not miss the opportunity of speaking just about the social binder (between people or civilizations) function, and also about the tendency of the population of aligning to opinion streams I will close by presenting some limiting factors for the mass media military force.Most people take aim certain by mover of pack and television, these channels satisfying, by the information they provide, a fundamental fate of the modern man information. Furthermore, by their dimensions, mass media facilitate dish outing the information and increase the speed by which a message is relayed. The continuous worldwide information flow helps individuals find the latest news which whitethorn influence their decisions, coordinate their businesses, help them know which areas are or will be affected by natural disasters or conflicts in order to avoid them and so on. Still, many multiplication, the media offer more than inform ation. By performer of media, one can influence, orient and direct public opinion, interests and motivations, consciences, even beyond ones own will. sight media whitethorn lead even unto the destruction of the discernment and the creation of an apathy, it may overthrow the will to apprehend and act. American mass media theorists, Lazarsfeld and Merton (1948), dedicate argued that we may be guilty of paid such close tending to the information with which the media bombard us, thereof getting to confuse knowing about social problems with doing something about them. They called this admiration the narcotizing dysfunction, linking it to the social consequences of mass media. Individuals replace reality with a surrogate of reality. Furthermore, people can be misinformed done mass media. Many times, we read untrue articles in newspapers and magazines, whether these articles are about what is happening virtually the world or about important persons in social life. The media buil d but also destroy reputations, which happens most of the times in politics. A good example, according to Layborn (2002), are the scandals surrounding the Secretary of cite for War, John Profumo (1963) and the Liberal Party leader Jeremy Thorpe (1970s). Politicians are presented, launched to the public with the analogous techniques used in set up a new brand of toothpaste or soap. Pop stars, as a class, are the creation of media. remain in the area of negative aspects, I can also include the fact that mass media puddle cognitive, affective and behavioural addictions. These addictions lead to a certain level of defiance which aggravates the cognitive gulf. Those who are informed become more and more informed and those who are misinformed remain misinformed.As to the interpretative function, this is somewhat colligate to the informative role, because it supposes the acceptance of the information by the individual without processing it through ones own reason. The contents of co mmunication theory are generated by the publics needs, so the information will be processed enough to satisfy these needs. nurture consumers may also receive direct help in interpreting some events by the heart of editorials or comments in newspapers and magazines. Thus, the reader or viewer not only received the information in the state it was conceived, they are also given the manner in which they should regard and understand that information. The press relies on the authority of the written word, while television relies on the fact that tropes seem authentic and the citizen tends to say, most of the times I have seen it with my own eyes, not realizing that they have actually only seen what others wanted them to see.The media cease to be a news organ and become an instrument of propaganda. In all societies and in whoevers service it may be, propaganda aims to shape certain attitudes and impose social stereotypes, it tends to impose conditions on the individual, by creating auto mate mechanisms with the purpose of tyrannical and manipulating behaviour or society (voting for a certain political party, purchasing certain goods, etc). Great leaders of all times have used manipulation techniques, some of them to keep their federal agency, others to control population. Even snooze had paid attention to the means of information at that time, which have offered him advantages before his enemies. His statements remained famous Four aggressive newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets. World War I is considered to have been a propagandist battle between the English and the Germans and that the American audience was the target of messages in pamphlets, posters and other means of communication. During World War II, the Nazi have developed an elaborate propaganda system in order to father regime support both in Germany and abroad. It is one of the convictions of Media Lens that the corporate mass media constitute a propaganda system for elite inter ests (Edwards and Cromwell, 2006). Those who have high social positions, govern or lead large institutions have control on the media (or even own it, as it is the case for the Italian prime-minister Berlusconi), using them to manipulate population with the purpose of meeting their own interests. The renowned professor Chomsky (2003) implements The Propaganda Model in the case of the Iraq war as well. Large corporations, among which Haliburton or British Petroleum, have used the mass media in order to internationally spread false information on Saddam Hussein, such as him producing mass destruction weapons and supporting terrorism, information which later proved to be untrue. The population, being scared by the artificially created reality, has eventually joined in, by sustaining the war in Iraq and, indirectly, the interests of the great moguls. New York Times revealed (1st December, 2005) that the USA had used black propaganda by paying Iraqi journalists to translate and publish in local newspapers articles written in the US by a public relations company financed by the Pentagon. Furthermore, after investigations were lead, false journalists providing news articled to the BBC were discovered. False information was broadcast by television, while the journalists were secretly working for organizations sustained by the British Ministry of Defence in a propaganda operation (Media Lens, 2005).As to its entertainment function, the mass media, e additionally television, offer the cheapest and most accessible means of entertainment, compared to attending concerts and shows. A few minutes of ones favourite show can relax, make one parry the hard time they are going through. The internet is a good mean of entertainment through its multitude of online games, music, the possibility of interactive communication with friends. One of the researchers of the contemporary phenomenon of media, Claude-Jean Bertrand (2000), notes that most of consumers search for entertainment i n the mass media. Thus, most means of communications provide it, even newspapers. This function plays a particularly important part in todays society, even more that it combines extremely efficiently with the others. Vicky Hay (1990) considers that the challenge of infotainment instruction in television, with its assorted kinds and media formats (talk-shows, contests, games, interactive transmissions, etc) represent the main cause of cultivating this tendency in the written press as well. The second cause is money, respectively in an industry such as the media one, which operates on a competitive foodstuff, where it is all about maintaining/gaining/regaining a larger audience segment, which brings in itself publicity, money that is. entirely there is also a negative aspect in the entertainment function of mass media, which is the seek of relaying obscene or negative messages through music or violent movies, or by (even involuntarily) creating false, stinky models for the publi c which is exposed, but has no ability to select or process information, such as children.The audiovisual aid channel continuously dimensions the knowledge universe of the receivers, by influencing and inducing them values, conceptions, convictions, stereotypes, etc. That is why the educative role that the media have in society has an importance that should not be underestimated the large spectrum of TV channels, from the most various domains, constitutes an important source of broadening ones knowledge horizon. Also, television can be a culture broadcaster, thus concerts/theatre plays gathering more viewers than spectators. Documentaries, homage evocations of personalities, flashbacks have more power than books do in refreshing the publics awareness on a personality or even on history, in general. But, as a negative effect of the educative function, we must mention that television, as a time devourer, has brought a real reading crisis, television shows meeting the ethnical needs of a mankind too rush to be able to focus on traditional means. Also, in countries with a reduced cinematographic production, flooding the market with foreign commercial productions may lead to the cultural denationalization of the audience. Studies lead by American psychologists regarding the impact of American serial movies with youth as their main audience indicate that 45% of teenagers shape and eat up their sexual knowledge based on these movies and also learn how to communicate with their parents from them. (Van Evra, J., 1990) The negative side of this aspect is that, by having access to adult subjects, children lose the naivety and innocence specific to their age and are a lot more prone to yielding to various temptations (from smoking and drugs to delinquencies).Live broadcasting of an event makes the latter(prenominal) dilate, and public (national or international) opinion becomes a resonance box where the echoes of the event ensure its amplification. Thus, television has t he role of ensuring the social bond in individualist mass society (any person being able to attach when and how they want from home, being able to freely participate, in their privacy, in a fundamentally collective activity). Thereby, mass media may generate a social solidarity mechanism in case of natural disasters or special personal situation which requires help from the other members of society.By analyzing the effects of mass media, one can coiffure the term of consonance as aligning to opinion streams. The Spiral of Silence (Schweigespirale) theory describes this phenomenon starting from the habituation of individual opinion on the paramount opinion expressed by the mass media. Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann (1993) synthesises this theory as follows society threatens the deviant with isolation, individuals are more afraid of isolation than of error, individuals evaluate the favourable or bad climate of their own opinion, evaluation leads to taking an attitude (expressing ones o pinion or keeping ones opinions secret). Individuals who share the dominant point of view easily share it, while individuals who do not share this opinion throttle themselves in silence, for fear of isolation. Thus, public opinion represents, from this perspective, the opinion that can be expressed publicly without the riskiness of isolation.A secondary function of mass media, that of reinforcing social norms, is achieved through the fact that television exposes any going away from these norms to the judgment of public opinion. According to DeFleur (1989), the individual behaviour is guided by ones perception on cultural norms. Thus, by the means of presentation, underscoring and selection, television reinforces the viewers opinions on these cultural norms. Television also has a ample impact in imposing fashion and the feminine or masculine beauty type.One of the moments which brought glory to the mass media is the Watergate Process, journalists being the ones who caused the re signation of the American president Nixon on August 8th, 1974, thus gaining the fame of fourth power in the state. The death of princess Diana has again given television the opportunity of showing its advantages in catching public interest and transforming an event into an international tragedy. Still, there are limits to the power the mass media has, opponent forces whether political, institutional, or representing the reclusive business environment which, at their turn, manipulate the information the press offers. Also, the commercial pressure of profit and competition, as well as direct pressure from political institutions or even peoples scepticism limit the power of mass media.What are the conclusions that can be drawn from these aspects we have presented? The mass media are a double-edged tool. On the one hand, they form and on the other they deform. In a post-industrial society where information reaches the same value as capital or resources, using means of information and communication such as mass media becomes a necessity. Nevertheless, I consider that the mass media are both a positive image and a negative image creator, a source of information as well as a tool of propaganda, a sine qua non of modern society.