Looking Back

The past semester has really been an eye-opener for how much media surrounds be daily life. The 7-9 hours of media exposure bombard me with hundreds of ads. But the overall effect of this media on my life is that the media begins to almost build up a culture of its own around me, surrounding me with ideas that benefit the media rather than society. It's almost like shaders but for the human eyes only allowing you to see below the surface. Miss representation is an amazing example of the effect media has had on me, specifically my outlook on the world. Companies such as Disney create a culture by shaping young impressionable minds into believing that it's natural to have young women seen as sexual objects of desire.
But my awareness of the media around me and the techniques they use will help me to look at situations the media presents to me and analyze them to comprehend their full intent. This will primarily help with advertising being able to look behind the brand and societal norms that have been formed around this brand as well as seeing what the actual product is selling. I'm now able to tell if I want to buy the product based on the product rather than the culture surrounding the company. My newly acquired skills will also help me dive further into political opinions appealing to certain emotional appeals in order for support.
Overall, this course helped me see the world media presents clearly with my own view rather than the one they want me to see. My media consumption habits have been changed this semester by this course and I have begun using much less media then I used to. It was such an eye-opener when I finally looked at my phone usage and it totaled up to about 9-11 hours a day. I'm proud to say that now my average has been lowered to about 7 hours per day. It's still high but improvement doesn't happen overnight. But more importantly I actually looked into any product that I was buying or any media scheme I was following making sure that when purchasing something at a store rather than the concept. This media literacy is extremely important in order to have e clear view of what's happening in the world around us. Without media literacy, we would let the media have full control of our world. Becoming an educated consumer helps us to see beyond the high status that companies wants you to buy and see the actual product that company is selling. More than anything, it makes me think twice because its extremely easy to purchase something on amazon with an impulse decision. From this class, I've become more aware of the world that surrounds me even though its changing rapidly. In all honesty it was a bit of a shock to realize that the little tweaks and quirks commercials have can have an effect on whether the consumer buys the product or not.
For example yellow is seen as a happy color because of so many things associated with it so if you put a sunset yellow theme in your commercial or advertisement, it's likely more people will flock to this product. However if you put a less appealing color such as a dark green, it may attract less people because its not as visually appealing. This is my takeaway from the Media blogs. It was a way to help me polish my glasses to see the up-in coming world even more clearly.