Present a thoughtful response to one or more of the following sets of questions before Thursday's Class.
• Author Naomi Klein argues that advertising has changed from sponsoring culture to becoming culture (e.g., Sprite sponsoring a concert as opposed to Sprite becoming a component of hip hop culture). What's the difference? What happens to culture when its purpose is sales rather than expression?
• Distinguished scholar George Gerbner has asserted that those who control a society's stories have the power to shape that society's values. Who has control over your stories? Who do you want to have that control? Does who tells a story matter? Does MTV give an accurate voice to your stories? How does commercial control (i.e., control by those who are primarily interested in selling things) of media influence the kind of stories our society hears?
• Various social scientists devote their careers to helping us understand people who are different from us. For example, anthropologists study the structures and customs of a society or community. Ethnographers are anthropologists who focus on looking at the impact of culture on people's lives. Are there parallels between ad agencies and anthropologists? Between market researchers and ethnographers? Why might adults see teen society or culture as so different or closed that they need researchers to tell them what your life is really like?
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