Sex violence and crime Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Sex violence and crime - Essay Example Furthermore, popular magazines form a part of the communication of language as seen through the Freud/Marxist theories which â€Å"reproduces sexuality as the male gaze toward a woman/object† (Keddie 1996). Carrette, in a critique of Foucault, however, believes that he has left the female perspective out of the discussion of sex, his history on the topic male centered without the feminine point of view. In examining the concept of what is true, discovering how truth is defined provides some substance to the topic. Truth is a concept that suggests that there is a sense of the absolute somewhere within the greater historical perspective. However, according to Foucault, it is all perspective and indefinable through a notion of reality versus illusion. What is presented to the readership of popular magazines is a perception of truth that can neither be confirmed nor denied as the possibility exists that it is someone’s truth (Taylor 2008). The plausible deniability of compl ete falsehood makes the representations have validity. Despite the desire to rail against the overwhelmingly illusionary editorial elements of the imagery and rhetoric within popular magazines, the reality of the world that is created has the prospect of reflecting the truth somewhere, thus they can be said to be true. The Discourse of Sex within Magazines Sex is a rudimentary element of life which has a biological function of procreation, but sexuality is an extended element of culture, complicated and confusing as it has become a focus that extends far beyond its founding purpose. Sex is mediated by culture, described, commented upon, and distorted in a never ending search for identification, classification, and perfection. According to Paris (2011), sexual behaviors are a learned process in which the ways in which sexual identity is displayed in order to find a mate is defined by the norms of a culture. In observing each other, the members of a society discover how to behave in o rder to become a part of the social groups that are divided by gender. Gender ideals are defined by mimicking the feminine or masculine of older generations, children looking to their role models in order to find their position in the sexual framework of their culture. In this age of communication, however, the focus has shifted from members of familial groups and their communities towards the images and discourse that is provided through the popular media, magazines providing a great deal of the images that affect the perception of female and male sexual roles. Little girls no longer focus their attention upward towards their mothers as much as downward into their hands a they peruse the magazine and forward to the screen of the television or their computer, these images impressing upon them an unattainable perfection through which they seek their own position within the framework of their gender. The hegemony of culture infected by the conceptualization of truth that is brought fo rth through a discourse of untruths that are presented as realistic reflections of a cultural script that is imposed rather than developed through social interaction (Norris 1996). In other words, rather than the dialogue happening through interactions with others within a community, interactions are now constructed between a person and the power of the magazine in dispersing ‘truths’ and designing dominant knowledge. The pressure on little boys is just as profound, their mandate to

Three Newspaper Eras Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Three Newspaper Eras - Essay Example 27). Innovations in printing, combined with the interest that was generated by current events, created increased readership and a need for more consistent reporting. According to Dietrich (2010), the political events that surrounded the American Revolution changed the nature of the newspaper industry. Until this time, newspapers consisted primarily of notices of events and advertisements. However, with the interest that was generated in the politics of the colonies versus the British government, reporting began to arise in which the political events were related in story form. Stories of the war began to be printed for the public that was greatly interested in what was occurring. The period from the end of the American Revolutionary War until the 1850’s saw a rise in partisan writing as the partisan press era dominated the newspaper industry. They battles between the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists were fought within the press as positions were declared and sides were taken. However, during the 1850’s the newspaper industry found it could increase its circulation by creating pieces that were more unbiased than within partisan based writings. The objective of increased readership to promote profit provided for newspaper writing that no longer took a political stand, but reported Freedoms Journal was the first African American newspaper. It was first published in 1827 and was followed by as many as forty other African American publications. The North Star, a publication begun by Fredrick Douglas in 1847, was dedicated to the cause of abolition. It was titled The North Star because the slaves who escaped captivity used the north star as a guiding light(LaRose & Straubhaar, 2009, p. 95). The first Native American Press was begun in 1828 with the Cherokee Phoenix which was put out in 1828. However, it was only a year later when the American government, founded on the principles of the Declaration of Independence which