Monday, January 26, 2015

Erika Beedle Reflection Paper #2

Erika Beedle
Comm 211
Reflection Paper #2
Chapter 5

            As an advertising and public relations major, this class has me constantly thinking about the media affects on our society.  My future career plans will most likely be directly related to social media or technology.  As I increase my intercultural competence, I am becoming more aware of the negative outcomes the media can play in our perceptions of other countries.  Chapter five, titled Identity and Intercultural Communication has furthered my questioning about the media.  The chapter explained identity, and more specifically, what factors shape your identity.  For example, your race, religion, and gender all play a role in developing your identity. 
            I am college student in the midst of trying to find my identity and interested how the media may affect my own experience in developing my identity.  Through social media sites, TV, movies, and magazines I am shown how I am supposed to dress, how I am supposed to talk, and that money is correlated with happiness.  Whether you want to admit or not, the media has played a large factor in developing American college student’s identities.  Sometimes I look at others when trying to find myself.  I feel many times we are trying to find our identity in celebrities or people around us, and forget about the values are families have instilled in us, and what we want for ourselves.  Technology and social media are incredible tools, but at times they only show one side of the story.  Society has created an image we have to obtain to be successful, and we are told what our identity should be without us finding it on our own.

Questions:

1.  How was the media influenced your identity?
2.  Do you think this is an international problem?

4 comments:

  1. I agree completely as I was speaking with my African American partner a couple days ago he asked me "What the media portrays about Africa in America?" I was completely honest and said poverty and war are what are mainly showed in movies and on TV. I wish we were shown more than just those two factors, but many times media only shows the bad.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I agree completely as I was speaking with my African American partner a couple days ago he asked me "What the media portrays about Africa in America?" I was completely honest and said poverty and war are what are mainly showed in movies and on TV. I wish we were shown more than just those two factors, but many times media only shows the bad.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I enjoyed your entire blog and would like to focus on your questions. I think that the media has influenced my identity for the better. When i hear something negative it makes me want to get rid of the negative stereotype we see through the media.

    To be honest about your second question I have no idea. I think that other countries have bad media and news like us but not as extreme as ours.

    LOVED IT RIKKI :D

    ReplyDelete
  4. I agree with those who gave comments before me that your reflection is really good. I am glad you are critically thinking about your future career, the effect of media on audiences. I think is it is probably true that the media is socializing us into a consumer culture (you may not like this as an advertising major because you may be, one way or another, encouraging consumerism).

    Good questions! The fact that the media hugely affect audience's thoughts and identity is something international.

    ReplyDelete