Outline

Media and Inequality: An Overview

I. Introduction to Media and Inequality – Brief history, introduction to discussion on white patriarchal media, address problems and shortcomings

II. Theme – The paper will address the lack of “outsider” influence on popular media, from print news to feature length film, from gender inequality to racial inequality, this paper will show inequality in media and provide enough insight for the first time student as well as enough depth to keep a scholar interested. I haven’t found anything that is a complete overview of current issues dealing with media, such as New Racism and media illiteracy, and decided to write something myself. The actual point is education and how important it is to the development of society, people need to be taught to be aware of the things that they see, as the media around us is trying to get us to consume, and isn’t working with us, but rather with our wallets. On top of this, the majority of media created is for one particular consumer, the white male. I want to address this, illustrate how it manifests in various forms of media, and present possible solutions. I want this paper to be accessible to any reader and to lay down a foundation of current media and inequality issues for my own reference in later works. This is a technology and inequality class and I’m looking at media as a form of technology, media as a whole is biased, and I wish to confront this bias in my paper, rather than focus on the minute detail of specific occurences, which can be taken out of context. Popular media such as newspapers, magazines, television, film, music, and the internet will all be under review, and I hope to create a lens through which these media can be viewed skeptically and rationally.

III. Frameworks – Social Constructivism, Determinism, Technological Momentum. This paper will particularly address these frameworks, constructivism in that our technology (media) progresses due to society’s needs, determinism in that the media created is the result of prior types of media, and technological momentum in that while things are currently inequal, we are making progress for equality and constantly moving forward in this sense, not backwards.

IV. Sources  - Stewart Hall, various academic articles by accredited scholars Gorham, Larson, Heider, Chen, Bramlett-Solomon, Chen, Billings, etc. full works cited will be provided with the paper, all sources will be accredited and published.

Reflection Four

Technological momemtum, or the progression of technology over time is a combination of technological determinism and social constructivism. Hughes tells us that a “technological system can be both a cause and an effect; it can shape or be shaped by society.” There are certain technologies which upon their development have reshaped society in a way that cannot be reversed. Hughes’s example was the automobile, and how it has changed the way cities are developed. The Phoenix area is a good example of this, as it has been built spread out allowing for more traffic. Other examples I can think of is the pager and eventually the cell phone. Before the inception of these devices, it was much easier to disconnect oneself from social networks. This has shifted, however, in that now the majority of people can be expected to be available or will be shortly, speeding up our interaction and communication. I live in a house and do not own a land line telephone, with the existence of broadband a regular telephone has no use for me, I use my cell phone for all the important phone numbers in my life and it is the way I can expect people to communicate with me. I think perhaps as the youngest generations become older, land line telephones will become even more obsolete, as the only use I can think of would be for faxing, however even then certain cell phones now include the proper connections to use them for transmitting this type of data. I think it will be interesting to see how the progress of personalized, individual communication continues.

Third Reflection

Based on the lecture and discussion in class, the progression of technology is complicated and difficult to predict. In the instance of the bicycle, the original design is deviated from for social reasons, despite being a less effecient device. Once the social necessity for the bike vanished or became obsolete, so did the bike from mainstream culture, and the design reverted back to something much closer to Da Vinci’s original.

This illustrates an interesting phenomenon in technology, where function can take a backseat to form and aesthetic value. Being able to discern between technologies that are used for form rather than function is a useful skill, and is similar in nature to media literacy. By being skeptical of technologies and determining which values they favor more, form or function, we can wade through technology that exists purely for superficial reasons and technology that most effeciently handles a specific task. This element becomes more complicated, however, in certain circumstances. Returning to bicycles, an example would be bicycles that adhere to Da Vinci’s original design, however are also stylized or otherwise decorated for aesthetic value, such as the cruisers one might see around campus. While the device itself exists in it’s most effecient form, there are many derivations which appeal to varying social perspectives.

A student getting across campus doesn’t need a racing bike, and a bicycle racer would not likely want to use a cruiser. This sort of adaptation diversifies the use of a particular technology, however also forces us to ask another question about existing technology we see – if a technology does appeal to form rather than function, has the technology reached it’s most effecient point where variation is purely superficial, or has the form of the technology so overridden the function that it has lost effeciency?

Second Reflection

As was demonstrated in class, it is difficult to argue against the inequality created by technology. While the issue of the bridges being too low for buses is brought up, it is easily countered that already existing means of transportation, ferries, can still be used for public transportation. It can be said that the overpasses are not meant to restrict bus travel, but rather to allow for an easier commute for those who have their own cars. The group defending the bridges brought up how the money saved from building at decreased elevations would be able to be used towards a metro system in the future which would eventually save more money, even though there is no evidence to show this was something the original designer of the overpasses intended.

Despite the valid reasons for having the bridges built in the way they were, restricting the type of vehicle to personal cars during a time when they were affordable mostly to only middle to upper class white families created a large inequality between who would and would not use the new bridges. As the original builder, Robert Moses, has had his intentions made clear by his biographer, he exemplifies a built in form of inequality that comes with technology.

It brings up a couple questions, such as where else have systematic prejudices been created? Are we aware of them all? My experience studying racism in the media has shown me that race is still an issue that has yet to reach equality due to the very nature of media which are marketing to the largest possible demographic, and is another example of systematic inequality. This type of inequality has been called the “New Racism” by some scholars and is deceptive because the general public assumes that civil rights movements of the past have achieved equality when the inequality has just become systematic and less obvious to those who are unaffected by it.

First assignment

Inequality and technology have a complex relationship. As technology improves, it begins to replace jobs previously done by skilled laborers, and simultaneously opens new jobs for skilled laborers having to do with those particular technologies. This trend increases the importance of education, which is only available to those with higher incomes, this creates a cycle where uneducated laborers become obsolete yet do not have the resources to receive higher education. I have seen the effect of this on my parents, who’s lack of a college degree only allows them access to certain jobs, which are mostly based on their prior experience, and they are constantly competing with college graduates making it very difficult to advance in their fields.

While the development of technology is important, it’s also important that as a society we allow careers for those who do not have the resources to attain higher education, and also make higher education easier for lower income brackets to attain. A couple solutions come to mind, perhaps programs that utilize an obsolete skilled laborers talents while providing them with an education at the same time.

Technology is rapidly progressing, however access is limited, and there may be areas where otherwise outdated skilled laborers can apply their talents and also train to operate the technology that surpasses them. I think a cohesive utilization of talents which are slowly becoming obsolete and education based compensation, as long as monetary compensation is enough for workers to live on, will benefit our society and help to bridge the growing gap between income brackets.