Radio

     In the 1920s, government intervention prevented radio from being absorbed by corporations invested in other communication media, thus allowing room for complete contingency as it developed into its unique format of musical programming supported by advertising.
     All governments have the power to control and manipulate the circumstances of emerging markets. Excessive control is a form of determinism, which fails to accommodate social attitudes and desires, which prevents the realization of that market's potential. By allowing laissez faire economics occur, complete contingency theoretically should be achieved. However, in the age of corporations, emerging markets are often swallowed by existing conglomerates, which attempt to transplant the format of their prepossessed markets, in spite of the natural course of development.
     This latter would have been the case if AT&T had been allowed to continue it's early dominance of the radio industry. Having created the first radio network, AT&T was on its way to controlling the industry, when pressure from the government forced it to choose between telephone and radio, and thereby derailing its cross-industry plans. Being free from the influence of a company involved in telephone, the new media did not become a two-way system for social communication; instead, it continued in the direction it was heading towards mass broadcasting, which bound the nation together in an essential time for its survival.

Cultivation Theory

     In this blog post I hope to show how cultivation theory explains the pervasive notion that women should remain as passive homemakers. 

     Cultivation theory is a strong-effects social theory which states that the images we see in the media affect our perception of reality. If all we are is the sum of our experiences, and a large amount of a normal American's experience is watching television programming that shows repetitive societal images, cultivation theorists believe that the viewer will begin to perceive these images as representative of reality. This almost existential theory assumes that the given viewing block is a passive audience who does not critically distinguish false images from reality.

     Early television sitcoms from the 1950s such as I Love Lucy perpetuated images of women as belonging in the home, cooking, sewing, or otherwise supporting her husband and family. However, these shows only reinforced the messages of an even earlier media source: the Bible. In the website linked below, "Momof9" writes extensively about her belief that women belong in the home, but offers no rational explanation for her thinking, only references to various verses and passages that establish the image of a woman as a homemaker. Clearly, this woman, through constant exposure to this Biblical "reality" (and probably programs like I Love Lucy), has come to believe that this image is reality, and is happy to embrace this role which she has mentally cultivated in her life.

http://www.momof9splace.com/homemaker.html

Hegemony

      I believe that the concept of hegemony helped me understand the lack of advertisements such as this one from McDonald's promoting tolerance of homosexuality in America by explaining how the  heterosexual majority is against such a construct, and is able to avoid confronting the issue head-on by never bringing it into the light at all.
      Hegemony, as applied here, is essentially the dominance of one belief group in a society  over all others. By virtue of controlling the media, they determine what is shown to the broader community and in what light it's cast. In this way, it is possible for the majority to convey their own values as "common sense" basic assumptions. One may think of the media as a kind of engaging puppet show put on to entertain and distract an audience oblivious to the pulling of the strings going on backstage.
      Because the majority of America is conservative and pro-heterosexual, an ad like this one (aired in France) featuring a gay teenager as a welcome patron of McDonald's and closing with the tagline "Come As You Are" would never be shown. If there was a gay male character in an American ad, which in itself is unlikely, he would probably be contrasted negatively with the desirable prototype of a strong, tough, overwhelmingly heterosexual male of the mold examined in Tough Guise. This is not entirely to suggest that everyone involved in every advertising department across America is a part of the conservative majority, or that McDonald's deserves a halo for their strong action on behalf of civil rights. It's a matter of economics: the ad pandered to a strong liberal majority in France, but as long as the American hegemony opposes homosexuality, such an ad as this, shown below, is simply unmarketable and will not be seen.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/01/gay-mcdonalds-ad-in-franc_n_596361.html

I found this video on the Huffington Post website.