Some Examples of How Media Shapes our Perceptions

In America the influence of popular culture is all pervasive. It colors every aspect of our lives from early childhood until death. I don’t think you could even call that a bold statement, it’s so self-evident. As a child of the 60’s, the tail-end of the boomers, I was a member the first generation to grow up never knowing life without TV. Sure, my parent’s generation had been exposed to mass media; images up on the silver screen, and before that, the voices on the radio. But the deluge of commercials, “scientifically” designed by those guys on Madison (see Mad Men) didn’t kick in until my generation. I’ve heard it said that in this post-industrial society our most successful export is our culture (and I’m not talking about fine art and opera.) In fact, I heard on NPR that across the Arabic-speaking world American TV fare such as “24,” “MTV,” and “8 Simple Rules,” prove popular even when our government does not. Living here in the eye of the media storm I think it’s easy to become inured to the effect that the media has on our thinking. In the USSR we called it “propaganda,” here we call it “good business.” After all, a nation of sheeple nurtured on a diet devoid of critical thinking is so much easier to control.

So, I’ve been asked to produce a few examples of popular media and comment on how I see them fitting into the narrative of education in this country. I’ve wracked my brain and scoured the internet to try and jar loose some decent examples, but I find my memory tends towards general impressions and symbols rather than detailed recollection.
Well, here goes nothing:

Movies:
Urban- “Scared Straight” - 
This was a documentary that came out in 1978 and was aired on TV. Looking back, it shares a lot with today’s crop of reality television in the way a group of participants are chosen, put in an artificial situation, and then cameras roll as we get the chance to see how they react. However, this movie has a purpose beyond mere titillation or entertainment. The participants, 15- to 19-year-old boys who are repeat offenders are taken to Rahway State Prison in New Jersey in lieu of jail time to listen to the ranting of inmates who paint a picture of prison life so terrible that the kids are scared into going “straight.” I remember it was a big deal at the time, partly for the uncensored cursing, and partly for the truly menacing and terrifying prisoners who reminded me why it is a really bad idea to go to jail. I can remember the insolent attitudes of the young men melting in the face of a barrage of abuse from the prisoners, transforming them back into boys, afraid of where they were headed. Not really much on school, but that was the idea. These weren’t kids who went to class, at least not prior to being “scared straight.” There were follow-up movies (which I missed,) in which we discover if the boys stayed out of trouble. Most did, but the boys with the worst attitudes ended up in jail.

Suburban- “Dazed and Confused” - 
This is the film that says the most about my own experiences in school (minus the weird hazing spanking.) It takes place on the last day of school in 1976, and follows kids from different social and economic classes as they painfully navigate the typical challenges of suburban high school. I think one thing that resonates with me is their search for a sense of belonging. We see the jocks, stoners, nerds, and so on, circling and weaving, trying to locate the place where they can have the greatest self autonomy, and be accepted on their own terms. Even though the movie identifies the kids through clichéd stereotypes, the characterizations felt true and accurate to my own experiences of school. I think that this is in some degree due to our definitions of school being shaped though its depiction in popular media. I can remember participating in events at that time and thinking, for example, “So this is me, going to the prom, like in those shows. How come it doesn’t feel the way I was led to believe it would feel? Is that all there is to a prom?” That feeling of something missing seemed common to my friends as well, at least the friends who were somewhat self aware. I think the movie captures that feeling, wandering town, looking for action. As a bonus it’s got dead-on mid-seventies styles, cars, and paneling. Plus a killer soundtrack.

Rural- “American Graffiti” - 

Honestly, I don’t know if this really qualifies as rural, I haven’t seen it in 25 years. It’ another coming of age story, like “Dazed and Confused,” with a large cast and multiple storylines. I put it the rural category because it exemplifies the small town values that permeate movies about rural America. To me the movie is about loss of innocence, and the way youth sometimes rush to leave childhood behind, and sometimes don’t. The kids in this movie all know one another, and one another’s business. Like “Dazed and Confused,” all the action takes place in a single night, but in this film the teens are having one last expression of freedom before the end of summer. The world depicted here seems so foreign and distant, it might as well be from another country. It revels in the simple joys of small town life: cruising the strip, stopping at the drive-in, and listening to the radio. I saw all this behavior first hand when I lived in a small rural town in North Carolina’s Smokey Mountains.

Music: I had the most trouble finding examples in the music category.
Urban- 

Though I can’t recall specific tunes or lyrics about school, the sounds of early rap and hip hop are quintessentially urban and youth-oriented. I remember hearing rap the first time when the Sugarhill Gang played at an amusement park I worked at over the summers. "Rapper's Delight," their big hit, was a goofy dance song, popular with the kids, and straight out of New York. It was a new musical form that seemed exotic to a suburban guy who drove a Chevy Nova to work in an amusement park. Later, on the day I moved to Brooklyn from that small town in North Carolina, I tuned my radio and found “Mr. Magic's Rap Attack” playing all manner of exotic rap. There, on the BQE, I knew I wasn’t in Kansas anymore. I heard things like Public Enemy’s "Don't Believe the Hype" which pointed out the stereotypes faced by young black men and ferociously declared them to be lies. 

Suburban- “School's Out”-by Alice Cooper – 

Could there be a more suburban white-boy song about school? There’s nothing there that explicitly says “suburbs,” it could express the feelings of kids from anywhere; it’s universal that way. But where I come from Alice Cooper was a god. His concerts with the snakes, and the gallows, and fire and whatnot were must see events (Note- I was too much of a nerd to actually go to, or own Alice Cooper products- he was kind of scary.) Anyway, all my friends went, and the shows were filled with kids exactly like them. Why did Alice appeal to suburban white kids? I think a clue can be found in the lyrics of “School’s Out.” 

Well we got no class
And we got no principles
And we got no innocence
We can't even think of a word that rhymes

I can’t help but think that last line must have appealed to kids rebelling against their parents’ middle class, college bound, values.

Rural- “Harper Valley PTA”- Tom T. Hall – 

Another example of small town values, but this time it’s pointed out that beneath the appearance of propriety is a cesspool of hypocrisy. The song is the story of a single mom (widowed) who is called to task by the high school PTA for carrying on with men, wearing her skirts too short and generally being an unfit mother. She confronts the group at their meeting and points out all the truly skanky things that the PTA members do when they suppose no one is watching. At the end she calls Harper Valley a little Peyton Place, a name which calls attention to the soap opera quality of their lifestyles. This is the idyllic small town life turned on its head and run smack into the problems that are faced in bigger cities. The veneer is thin.

TV:
Urban- Mad TV - "Public School House Rock – Nouns" - 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhOFX9uBww4 

This little clip points out humorously, the expectations we have of urban schooling. Using the form of the Saturday morning educational cartoon series “School House Rock” we are treated to images of gangbangers, crackheads, guns, teachers on strike, graffiti covered hallways, drugs, set fires, and drunk principals in a catchy ditty teaching us the meaning of nouns. Kind of covers the bases, don’t you think?

Suburban- “The Wonder Years” - 

What “Dazed and Confused” does for my high school years, The Wonder Years” does for my years in elementary and junior high school. The show gets the all the details from the rows of identical houses, to the voice of the science teacher droning over the filmstrip they watch in class. It has stay at home moms, pitchers of Cool-Aid, and station wagons with fake wood panels. This show also concerns kid’s coming of age and loss of innocence, though I think it is also about our country’s loss of innocence as we entered the age of Watergate.

Rural- "The Andy Griffith Show" – 

Again, a small town stand-in for rural life. Mayberry is a town so small and safe that the police chief refuses to carry a gun, and the key to the jail cell is next to the door so the town drunk (remember when that was considered a comic character?) can let himself in and out. In this show people can be small, and take offense at little slights, but mostly the strength of country character shows through. There is a strong sense of community; the townsfolk really care about one another, bringing covered dishes for celebrations as well as sad occasions. People are mostly accepted as they are, warts and all, and there isn’t much value placed on the fast, big city ways. When Opie skips off to school, you half expect to see the old, wooden, one-room schoolhouse of the “Little Rascals,” but instead, it’s the brick, factory style school. Inside, the teacher is strict, but understanding, straight out of a “Dick and Jane” book.