cummingsoe

[cummingsoe]

Pop/Media/Visual Culture Opinions

First I’ll start off by describing what I think popular, media, and visual culture are. Pop culture to me has always been just what was the most watched, listened to or talked about thing going on in the world that everyone knew about and I was pretty spot on with that. I also now see it as an overarching term that includes media and visual culture. Media culture also encompasses parts of visual culture but it more-so has to do with movies, television, video games and radio. All the different aspect that go into making these things such as camera work, costumes and background music all effect the way a message or assumption about a character or story are portrayed. Visual culture is similar but instead of the movement and sounds it’s more about the way things are seen. 

One thing that stood out to me the most was learning of Arthur Jafa. I fell in love with Beyonce’s visual album, Lemonade, the second I watched it. I loved the emotion and visual representation and the difference between color scenes and black and white scenes. I never knew who Jafa was, but once I found out he was the one that inspired and helped with the creation of that album I started to look into his work a lot more. 

I watch movies and T.V. shows on the daily and find myself being able to foreshadow when a character will die, or my personal favorite, when a scary part in a scary movie is going to happen. I never considered this as engaging with media or visual culture, but I would use all the context clues of the movie like how early on in the movie it was, the lighting, the lack or prominence of the background music or the characters saying things that symbolize future events. 

I definitely engage more with movies and T.V. than I do things I see on the internet because I feel like the news and people’s opinions are so much more drastic or skewed online versus in a movie. I do definitely need to realize though that movies can have just as much bias or underlying real world opinions as the Internet will. Overall though I DEFINITELY think one can enjoy popular media while being critical. In my opinion the best way to be an educated consumer of all the different culture in our world, you have to let yourself be exposed to it. Whether that be in the real world, through art exhibits or simply just sitting at home and looking into different news outlets for the same story.

[cummingsoe]

Welcome!!

Hey Everyone! My name is Olivia, but all my friends call me Olive. I am a senior at VCU. I have a major in Health, Physical Education and Exercise Science (HPEX) with a concentration in health sciences. I identify with she/her. When I’m not doing school work I am a server at Sidewalk Cafe (come in and see me sometime!) I enjoy going to bars with my friends, binge watching a bunch of different shows, going to the river, doing word searches, or playing card/board games. 

I’ve never really thought about what the word culture by itself means, but I usually identify it with the way individuals and groups of people choose to live and the individuality between them. Pop culture is based off of things the media portrays. Pop culture is more specifically referenced to movies, movies, shows, internet and things more modern and updating whereas culture is an ongoing process that can see its roots going very far back in time. 

I would say I usually engage in the media by looking through social media. I use twitter more so than the rest, but I also find myself using snapchat, instagram and facebook on a daily basis too. I tend to just check up on others through those apps instead of posting which I guess makes me more of a consumer of media than a producer. I also sign up to get news updates through various news sources everyday to try and stay updated on different events, even if I just read the first line and not the whole story. Usually I’m not very critical because I don’t like to look into to very negative topics because it could just bring me down. When it comes to political seasons or the shootings that have been going on I do tend to look more closely into those stories.