Comm Final Flashcards
Functions of the Mass Media
Societal, Individual
Societal Functions of the Mass Media
1) Status Conferral (media can give status to things/people/tell us what’s important)
2) Pass on norms, values, traditions, and enforce them
3) Narcotizing (negative function)(gives you so much info at once that you go numb to it)
4) Service Political System (helps it work)
5) Social Cohesion/Community (mass media is the base of common focus/interest/communication
6) Service the community (makes our economy work)
Individual functions of the Mass Media
1) Guides our Behaviors (weather tells you when it’s gonna rain, so you bring an umbrella)
2) Guides our Understandings (how we perceive the world)
3) Helps develop self-concept (we explore reality)
4) Professional Tool (job career/support info)
5) Facilitate Social Interaction (info to talk about/share with others)
6) Substitution for Social Interaction (porn)(valuable for introverts)
7) Emotional Release (relax, entertain)
8) Ritualize our Lives (gives us structure/order)
Content vs Medium
Content: of a function is important, newspapers contain content
Medium: depends on the general nature of the medium and the conditions of its use
Manifest vs Latent Functions
Manifest: Direct, intended, obvious
Latent: indirect, hidden, subconscious
Storage Issues with the Mass Media
1) Longevity (how long will it last?)
2) Capacity (How much can we store?)
3) Portability (How easy is it to move the content around?)
4) Accessibility (How easy is it to get the content?)
5) Reproducibility (How easily and accurately can you make copies?)
Post WW2 Decline
1) Television
2) Paramount Case
3) Red Scare
4) Foreign Film
Post WW2 Decline: Televsion
People just stayed home to watch TV, they weren’t going out as much
Post WW2 Decline: Paramount Case
Argued that studios controlled the production, distribution, and exhibition (all 3 aspects of film). Courts made studios to leave one of the three, so the studios sold their theaters
Post WW2 Decline: Red Scare
The “Blacklist” was created to bar anyone or anyone they associated with from making/being in movies if they were in ANY way associated with communism
Post WW2 Decline: Foreign Film
A lot of other countries started developing their own film industries and competing with the Americans
Response to the Post WW2 Decline
-Tried to make movies more attractive
-Improve sound, improve picture
-Making screens even bigger
-3D technology started to develop
-Large scale epics were made, spectacle films
New American Cinema (1960s)
-Freedom of expression
-More social awareness
-Rise of independent films
-Film was no longer appealing to the lowest common denominator, it was becoming more sophisticated
Blockbuster Phenomenon
Started with Jaws and Star Wars
-Youths would see the films multiple times
-Films became less character driven and more plot driven
-Only goal was to maximize/multiply profit
To maximize profit
Reboots, remakes, prequels, sequels, films based on novels
Independent Films
-made outside the Hollywood system
-films are seen as art in foreign places
-cheaper to make
-no major stars
-attract a more specialized audience
-edgier, more character driven, more serious
-Disproportionately represented at awards time
-Studios set up specialty divisions to release more serious/independent films
Modern Theaters
-Late 1990s and on got a quality upgrade
-Bigger seats, stadium style seating, more leg room
-Adding restaurants, shops, adding to the social experience
-Adding luxury theaters too
-Emphasis was the quality of the experience
-Studios got back into the exhibition game
Relationship between Film and TV
-Cooperation and coexistence
-Started to show films on TV
-TV would make regular shows air
-Video became important (like video rentals)
-Studios started selling directly to the public
-Sell through market started with family films
-Direct-to-video video: movies that went straight to video, not theaters
-Studios started making more money through video than the box office
-Merchandise selling grew and grew
Audience
-Decline in proportion of people going to the movies
-Youth is still the primary audience for films
-Teens have been the most important elements (younger people see the films more than once, they buy more candy)
The Nature of Film
-Most persuasive medium
-Films draw you into their world
-People mostly watch films to be distracted/entertained
-Film appeals to us through certain cliches
Regulation
1915 ruling said that film was a for-profit business, so it wasn’t regulated by the 1st amendment
-Hays Office and Code was created, then destroyed by 1968 when the MPAA rating system was developed
-Miracle case reversed the earlier ruling of the government, but the film industry decided it liked regulating itself