In week 8 we talked about the effects of social media on our society and how it has fundamentally changed how our society is run. Social media today plays a pivotal part on how we connect with people on a wider scale than ever seen before in history. We can talk to someone on the other side of the world in a literal second of our time. This connection between people has allowed us to feel more understanding of peoples cultures, ideas, and identities. But in the midst of global pandemic with riots and protests beings seen around the world some would say that we have lost touch with our morality and that social media is playing a larger part to divide us rather than connect us as was social media platforms purposes. I believe social media platforms have gotten exposed for their usage of algorithms to predict what people would want to see or the friends the algorithm thinks they should add. When social media platforms do this they polarize and radicalize people to certain beliefs that they themselves do not notice. Therefore I think social media has become a unhelpful source in peoples daily lives unless its used in the right way to create more understanding.

We see it all to regularly that people are consumed with how they take information and can be trapped in the same area of the social network not being exposed different ideas and cultures. This is especially true when people feel like they are in the minority and will choose to not speak their minds because of the difference in population that have the ideas in question “Facebook and Twitter users were also less likely to share their opinions in many face-to-face settings. This was especially true if they did not feel that their Facebook friends or Twitter followers agreed with their point of view”(Social Media Spiral of Silence, Keith N. Hampton, Lee Rainie, Weixu Lu, Maria Dwyer, Inyoung Shin,Kristen Purcell, August 26, 2014, Pg. 4) . Not allowing people to have a comfortable place to voice their opinion without fear of being made fun of or brutalized with attacks is something social media platforms have continued to lack.

We can also see how social media platforms try to cater us to certain products that we might like. This can be good in certain situations that we might find objects that we would want. But we can see how using such algorithms to predict products we might like is in fact still a part of our social problem of being trapped in a cycle only things recognizable to us. This can be anything from the color of a T-shirt we want to the sizes of T-shirt to what is said on the T-shirt. It personally perplexes myself when I’m talking about a product out in the open then I see a ad for the same or similar product the next time I’m on a social media site. This goes past trying to help out the individual in situations it is clear how these social media sites are trying to make as much money as possible while taking advantage of the usage of phones and technology in general.

With the social media model that has been shown there’s a dilemma at the core of social media business that counter acts it. A social media platform can either keep advertising the same kind of social groups and products that allows people to find things similar to the person. But doing so it risks radicalizing the person due to only being subject to the same kind of social network. Social media platforms could also let people experience different ideas, people, and products that might be very different to who they are as a person. Doing this would allow for better personal connection with people of different areas of society. The downside to this is that the algorithm does somewhat help with getting people to see products that they might like and potentially become a sale of said products. This is a hard choice for businesses as a whole to make because the point of a capitalist economic system is to make as much value as possible. But doing so could allow for side effects such as the spiral of silence. “We’re the real culprits. When it comes to elevating one perspective above all others and herding people into culturally and ideologically inflexible tribes, nothing that Facebook does to us comes close to what we do to ourselves”(How Facebook Warps Our Worlds, Frank Bruni, May 21, 2016). The crazy about how his system is that we as costumers don’t get to choose how we want it, these companies choose for us using these algorithms trapping us in our local sector of the internet.

It has become apparent that such social media sites are not doing the intended results. Instead of bringing people together and connecting people from around the world it has lost its morality. It has instead chosen to be the benefactor of the capitalist system and be able to profit off the polarization of countries such as the United States.

Bruni, Frank. How Facebook Warps Our Worlds. New York Times. May 21st, 2016.

Dwyer, Maria. Hampton, Kieth. Lu Weixu. Purcell Kristen. Rainie, Lee. Shin, Inyoung. Social Media Spiral of Silence. August 26th, 2014.

Since the day my generation was born social media has impacted all of us either in a positive or negative way. To us it’s our way of life, we have become so familiar to social media its second nature. Social media has been a platform where people post their lives and feelings to the point where they post everything about themselves. The internet has impacted the way we use social media to this day.”If you’re trying to seek a job but post everything you do on the weekends, most employers can look these things up and you’re likely to not get the job. Your first impression is everything in life that affects you getting hired or not hired,”(Miller). What you do on social media is equivalent to how people will perceive you. Social media was originally started to meet new people, build new friendships and relationships. One down fall of social media is that if you want to deactivate your account it doesn’t officially go away, it can always be viewed or searched by many people.” When people start to be comfortable with being an open book on social media, the “reasonable standard” of the privacy is being lowered,”(Miller). Another downfall of social media is that younger teens are allowed access to these apps just by lying about their age when creating an account. One ,they are not old enough by the app rules and two ,they will experience and see things they shouldn’t.

By the 1980s, many home computers were becoming more common and social media was becoming used everyday.”Internet chat rooms were first being used in 1988 and continued to be popular well into the 1990’s,”(Hendricks).The invention of the smartphone boosted social media from the desktop and laptop computer. Social media dates back as far as 1840s. Andrew Weinreich founded Six Degrees social media site in 1997,(Jones).This allowed users to upload a profile and make friends with other users. In 1999 the first blogging sites became popular. “Social media was first created for a site centered on professional networking allowing people to unite with businesses and school contacts as well as companies,”(Maryville). Social media has helped many businesses develop quickly and get ahead of itself, also it has helped people find an easier and better way to connect and communicate with one another. However on the other hand “social media has provided many people with problems such as stress, mental health issues, emotional insecurities and waste of time,”(Pantic). These days social media impacts our lives everyday, whether it be work, school, or personal lives. “Moveon.org was the first activist social media site in 1998. It began as an email group passing around petitions opposing the impeachment of Bill Clinton. After it went on opposing US military actions. Just before the year of 2000 blogging sites began to appear,”(McFadden). Blogging sites are a very popular social media spot today.

The evolution of social media has made our human impulses to want to communicate with other people and with the advances in our digital technology. It is the history of humans wanting to establish a close connection with people. The first social media commercial advertisement site was Lunastorm, this began in the 2000s. At times social media is a challenging industry to keep their users engaged. “That is what happened to Friendster in 2002, it was used as a messaging site but also a dating site. Friendster eventually closed in 2015 due to the lack of users. In 2003 Myspace was being launched. By 2006, it was the most visited website on the planet!,”(Samur).The reason it was popular was users were able to share new music directly on their profile pages. The invention of the smartphone boosted social media from computers. The first apple iPhone made by Steve Jobs in 2007, helped focus people to the online community that was building on mobile devices.” In 2019 the Pew Research Center reported that the social media use in the United States showed that 72% of American adults use some form of social media. But in 2005, a year after Facebook went viral that number was at 5%,”(Perrin).This meant the rest of the internet didn’t even know what it was. There was two other major sites in social media that collapsed after a burst of success.

The unstable growth of social media has provided millions of people opportunities to post and create new content on a larger platform. A few years ago, no one thought social media would be as big as it is now. There is a large portion of these social networks that is opinionated and fake news that we have to take into account everyday. These issues are constantly posted and discussed on social sites for everyone to see. This modern technology has become our life so fast. It has made distance between the people feel so close. I think people will always be in contact and share their feelings with one another. This is what has made our world full of new and exciting things.”No matter the age, we are always aware of breaking news that is happening. Even when different parts of the world are advancing or not we will still be connected through social media. So what happens next in social media? The media will be shaped by the new businesses as well as by advances in old stories about technology. How will big social media platforms such as Facebook, instagram, TikTok, and others be popular?,” (Maryville), to answer these common questions, I think it will determine how our society handles these next stage of social media’s evolution. I believe that there are people in our world who have educated themselves in these topics. They will continue to study these problems and will help us grow our social media and as a society. Our world is is quickly changing in every aspect of it.

Citations:

Samur, Alexandra. “The History of Social Media: 29+ Key Moments.” Social Media Marketing & Management Dashboard, 27 Nov. 2018, blog.hootsuite.com/history-social-media/.

University, Maryville. “The Evolution of Social Media: How Did It Begin and Where Could It Go Next?” Maryville Online, 2 June 2020, online.maryville.edu/blog/evolution-social-media/.

Miller, Kristine F. Introduction to Design Equity. University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing, 2018.

Hendricks, Drew. “The Complete History of Social Media: Then And Now.” Small Business Trends, 25 Nov. 2019, smallbiztrends.com/2013/05/the-complete-history-of-social-media-infographic.html.

Jones, Matthew. “The Complete History of Social Media: A Timeline of the Invention of Online Networking.” History Cooperative, 3 Nov. 2020, historycooperative.org/the-history-of-social-media/.

Pantic, Igor. “Online Social Networking and Mental Health.” Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., Oct. 2014, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4183915/.

McFadden, Christopher. “A Chronological History of Social Media.” Interesting Engineering, Interesting Engineering, 2 July 2020, interestingengineering.com/a-chronological-history-of-social-media.

Perrin, Andrew, and Monica Anderson. “Share of U.S. Adults Using Social Media, Including Facebook, Is Mostly Unchanged since 2018.” Pew Research Center, Pew Research Center, 31 July 2020, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/04/10/share-of-u-s-adults-using-social-media-including-facebook-is-mostly-unchanged-since-2018/.

“Hey, Tom!” I yell up the stairs.

            “What?!” my brother answers.

            “Do you wanna record the podcast?”

            “Yeah.  Just give me a minute.”

            “Okay,” I say.  “I’ll be on the sofa.”

            Conversations like this happen about every other week at my house.  One autumn day when I was a senior in high school, my brother and I had just had a funny experience where I kept running into my friend, Ethan, and it looked like I was stalking him.  As we started talking about other funny things that just seemed to happen to us, we decided it would be fun to do a weekly podcast where we told stories about what had happened in our lives over the week.  One of our favorite comedians, John Branyan, does a podcast that we love, and we wanted it like his in that it was relaxed and like our listener was right there with us. The next step after deciding our content was figuring out a name for our podcast.  We live in Almond, NY, and since our podcast was humor based, Two Nuts from Almond was born.  Since then, we have had several of our friends on as guests and experimented with a few different topics, including the occasional movie review and giving relationship advice.  We are not popular at all, but we mostly just do it for the fun of it and for our friends who like to listen to us.

anchor.fm/Twonutsfromalmond/episodes/Red-Bull-and-Mother-Mary-efmkil(opens in a new tab)

 Podcasting has become super popular over the past few years.  Lots of people I know have their special podcasts that they listen to, and it is not uncommon to hear about various friends starting their own.  In several ways, podcasting is similar to what radio used to be as they both use audio to connect to people.   The textbook, Understanding Media and Culture, makes the point that though podcasts are downloaded and radio is streamed or broadcasted, there is a chance that radio will morph more and more into podcasting (299).  To understand podcasting and where it may go, it helps to look at the beginnings of radio. 

Like the craze of podcasting in the past few years, radio also experienced a craze when it first began.  John Schneider says in his article, “Radio Broadcasting’s First Years—What Was It Like?” that at the beginning of 1922, there were 28 licensed broadcasting station in America, but that by the end of the year, there were 556 stations.  As signals were established, almost anyone could have his own “radio show” if he had the radio equipment; churches, department stores, newspapers, universities, and corporations all began to experiment with various radio programs, much like the variety found in podcasts now (Schneider). There were broadcasts focused on things such as music, sermons, sports, or weather (Schneider).  Radio broadcasting was eventually refined and organized into what it is today.  Podcasting is becoming more organized than it was when it first started, but there will always be a certain level of spontaneity they can have that radio broadcasting cannot.

Adam Sternburgh in his article, “How Podcasts Learned to Speak,” makes the point that with podcasts, “There are no editors to convince, no producers to pitch, no green lights to be green-lit.”  Anyone can have a specifically tailored podcast and he or she does not need the go ahead to do it.  All one needs is a microphone and a way to get the content on the web. Sternburgh also makes the point that podcasts are able to connect in an intimate way with people that other media has not been able to do. Another plus that podcasts have over radio, is, as Sternburgh says, “podcasts introduced portability, accessibility, and a nearly endless selection of subjects on demand.”  With radio, one only has the opportunity to listen to the broadcast once, but podcasts offer the flexibility of pausing and playing when convenient.  Sternburgh sums it up best why people love podcasts so much when he says that, “Podcasts appeal to the twin modern manias for constant enrichment and constant escape. Despite their low-tech origins, we should never have been surprised at podcasts’ modern allure.”

            Both of these points about podcasts make sense, and if they are true, then it would also be true that podcasts have great power to impact people’s lives.  I have been able to experience this in a small way through mine and my brother’s podcast, Two Nuts from Almond.  Not many people listen to us, but those who do have told us that they really look forward to the weekly episode.  Last March my brother and I were in the musical, Music Man, and it became the thing for the cast to talk about the latest Two Nuts episode.  Our friends in the cast also inspired us to make merch for the podcast, so we now have the official Two Nuts from Almond anklet.  We have also had several of our friends on the podcast to tell their own funny stories, and last Christmas we did an episode where we had almost everyone who had been on the podcast in the past year, come on again and share their favorite Christmas memory.  We have also done some podcast “extras” for our friends to encourage people to listen to the podcast, including making funny videos and taking pictures with Tom’s toddler-sized Darth Vader.

            Podcasting is fun, easy, impactful, and may be at least part of the future of radio.  Anyone with access to a mic can easily start their own, and one can find a podcast about anything imaginable.  Two Nuts from Almond has been one of the coolest things I have done with my brother, and through my own limited experience with podcasting, I would not be surprised if it continues to dominate the audio market.

Works Cited

Schneider, John. “Radio Broadcasting’s First Years–What Was It like?” The Radio Historian, John F. Schneider & Associates, LLC, 2020, www.theradiohistorian.org/first_radio/first_radio.html.

Sternburgh, Adam. “How Podcasts Learned to Speak.” Vulture, New York Magazine, 18 March. 2019, http://www.vulture.com/2019/03/the-great-podcast-rush.html.

Understanding Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication.  E-book,  

University of Minnesota Libraries, 2016

The 1920’s to 1950’s were an exciting time for the film industry.  Many famous actresses and early pioneers of film graced the screens during this time.  However, for African Americans and persons of color, Old Hollywood was a different experience laden with racism, discrimination, and misrepresentation to the public.  This lack of representation, along with a reliance upon stereotypes, contributed to underlying racial messaging that has helped shape a culture in film and television which disregards everyday life experiences of the African American (and other persons of color).  Many talented actresses at the time were forced to play roles such as the “mammy” and hypersexualized provocateur that misrepresented them and brought shame to their race.  These portrayals through film and cinema have helped to shape and solidify the images of public perception (although these images have changed over the years and representation has improved in recent years).  The concept of identity, and how a person presents themselves to make a living, is not only an issue that has historically hindered Black actors and actresses, but everyday Black Americans as well.  (How the Camera Sees Color) The beginnings of Hollywood filmmaking were neither kind nor truly representational for minorities.

Colorism and racism plagued early Hollywood, from silent films to minstrel shows, to segregation on set and has long influenced opportunities available to African Americans in the film industry.  Colorism is defined by the National Museum of African American History and Culture as the discrimination against individuals based on their skin tone.  In response to this discrimination, historically, African Americans often found alternate ways to present themselves when starring in films.  Some actors moved outside the mainstream film industry while others played into stereotypes.  The effects of colorism have proven to be damaging to the identity of Black Americans by leading to internalized oppression in the Black community. (On Dark Girls) http://static.oprah.com/pdf/dark-girls.pdf

When African Americans were cast, lighter skinned actors obtained the more prominent roles.  Roles for darker skinned actors and actresses amplified racist stereotypes, such as the role of the “mammy.”  This put many lighter and darker skinned African Americans into a situation where many felt as though they could not simply be Black without being categorized. This caused many lighter skinned African Americans to make attempts at passing for White in public settings in order to compete for more opportunities, which led to increased tensions in the Black community. (How Camera Sees Color) Some actresses felt it necessary to pass for White and many African Americans turned to other means of altering their skin tone.  Even lighter-skinned actresses and actors would have their makeup done in a way to make them appear even lighter.  Frequently, advertisements would make actors and actresses not only appear light-skinned, but almost white.  Many young children and teenagers of darker complexion began to think that it was “bad” or “evil” to have dark skin and so much that some used harmful chemicals to lighten their skin.  These actions have proven to have serious implications on many levels. 

As White and light skinned actors and actresses became the stars of most Hollywood films in the early 1900’s, darker skinned individuals had few opportunities for performing on screen.  When they did have an opportunity, it was primarily to play on racist stereotypes and assumptions about Black people.  Many Black actors and actresses, whether they wanted to or not, were subjected to skin appearance alterations including blackface.  Blackface is the use of makeup to exaggerate skin tone and facial features and was used in the entertainment industry to present a stereotypical and racist image.  (How the Camera Sees Color) Soon African Americans audiences grew tired of seeing themselves portrayed in such stereotypical and racist ways and decided to take matters into their own hands.  Between the 1910’s and 1950’s, African American movie theaters grew in popularity by featuring race movies.  Race movies portrayed Black actors and actresses in a way that Black viewers could relate to.  These films were produced as part of the African American ‘uplift movement’ and were designed with African American audiences in mind. (Early African American Film)  In a popular film, Micheaux’s Within Our Gates rather than casting African Americans as “pickaninnies” the characters are “deeply engaged in the political and intellectual life of the day, debating racial uplift and waging philanthropic campaigns even as they wrestle with the romantic torments typical of melodramas of the period.” (Early African American Film) While hundreds of race films were produced in the early 20^th century, they were excluded from the mainstream.  Although African Americans responded in creative and resourceful ways to discrimination during this period, colorism in Hollywood remains a pressing issue well into the 21^st century.

The historic absence of African American actors and actresses in leading roles has been evident throughout the history of Hollywood films.  As Black women struggled with areas of Otherness in order to emerge as Hollywood actresses in their own right, mainstream cinema erased, marginalized, and devalued them denying them their cinematic voice and reducing them to “the body.”  In addition, many Black actresses’ contributions have been minimized or completely erased in the Hollywood histories of cinema.  If a role were obtained, it was frequently positioned as the “shadow” for leading White female actresses of the time.  In many films prior to the 1960’s, the Black actress’s main function was to illuminate the virtue, beauty, morality, sexuality, sophistication, and other qualities embedded in the “whiteness of the female character.” (The Struggle for Visibility..) If she were of mixed race, (which many were) the Black actress was the “dark” self and usually reflected negatively on the White female actress.  In addition, the Black actress was typically cast in a minor role and usually played the maid/subservient, mammy, matriarch, or hypersexualized woman who was a shadow in the background of the film.  In playing the shadow to the leading White character, she contrasted with what was considered correct, upstanding, or morally befitting.  It was rare that the Black actress could expect to be viewed or judged based on her acting talent.  The industry always identified her based on her race and sexuality. In addition, Black actresses had to be prepared for segregated practices on the studio lot and for accommodations inferior to her White associates.  Segregated seating in public transportation, public facilities, and restaurants, as well as pay inequities made the Black actress’s experience in the Hollywood industry difficult.

By the end of the 1920’s, the best-known Black actress working in Hollywood films was Nina Mae McKinney.  The 1930’s introduced many new White screen actresses, most notably Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Shirley Temple, Ginger Rogers, Katherine Hepburn, Jean Harlow, Mae West, and Loretta Young.  Black actresses began to gain prominence as the screen companion, or shadow of these actresses.  They included Louise Beavers, Hattie McDaniel, and Fredi Washington.  With the beginning of the 1940’s, White actresses such as Jane Russell, Lana Turner, Lauren Bacall, Rita Hayworth, and Judy Garland began to gain prominence.  (The Struggle for Visibility) Only a few Black actresses such as Lena Horne, Hazel Scott, and Ethel Waters were able to come close to the sort of fame these actresses had.  The complications of racial identities with the roles they were asked to play on screen manifested in controversies within the Black community and the Black press.  There were not solely the issues of “passing,” but also the issues of how a Black actress’s on-screen roles reflected on the entire Black community.  The controversy ranged from actresses such as Hattie McDaniel who was accused of actually “being” the “mammy” figure she represented on screen to Dorothy Dandridge whom many had assumed internalized the role they played on screen.  Lena Horne and Hazel Scott were able to negotiate lucrative contracts with major Hollywood studios that excluded them from playing roles that Blacks considered demeaning to the race.  Beautiful, talented, well-spoken, and with an air of confidence and pride, Horne and Scott did not fit the image of Blacks that southern Whites preferred at the time.  Scott was an activist who revealed the complexities and magnitude of issues that centered on Black actresses, which spilled over into the society at large.  These issues were debated in the Black press, the Black community, in Hollywood, and in American society at large during that era. As African Americans struggle for more representation in media and film, we can look back at the early pioneers who fought for so much more than just a starring role.

The early 20^th century was indeed an exciting time for Hollywood and film, but the African American actress had a more complicated role to fill.  Not only did she have to grapple with playing the role without belittling herself or bringing shame on her community, but she also faced issues of colorism, racism, and discrimination.  Working on set included navigating segregation issues and playing the shadow to more prominent White actresses at the time.  The early film industry distorted the image of the African American female for its own personal gain and assisted in shaping and cultivating racist points of views in culture, film, and early cinema. 

Works Cited

Regester Charlene B., African American Actresses: The Struggle for Visibility, 1900—1960, Indiana University Press, 2010. ProQuest Ebook Central. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/pensu/detail.action?docID=547023

Smithsonian:  The National Museum of African American History and Culture https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/collection/how-camera-sees-color

The Association of Black Psychologists, On Dark Girls

Click to access dark-girls.pdf

Early African American Film, Reconstructing the History of Silent Race Films, 1909-1930 https://dhbasecamp.humanities.ucla.edu/afamfilm/whatis/history

You-Tube. The Birth of a Nation, 1915. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGQaAddwjxg

You-Tube.  Within Our Gates, 1919. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtwrCto9az0