THE EFFECT OF ADVERTISING ON CULTURE.
To begin my discussion of the issue of commodification and advertising, I.
would like to look at TV. We live in a television culture. This.
television culture is produced primarily by what we know as TV networks.
(which is, as I think about it now, a rather strange metaphoric use of the.
word "network") who receive money from corporations (with advertising.
agencies serving as the go-betweens). Cable TV has the potential to.
provide input from local communities, and government sponsored "public" TV.
does exist, but these forms of TV can be compared to regional dialects.
existing at the margins: it is commercial TV which sets the standards for.
the medium. Here I do not want to go into detail about how networks.
themselves are corporations (although for the reader interested in this.
kind of thing I would recommend _Networks of Power: Corporate TV's Threat.
to Democracy_, Dennis W. Mazzocco, South End Press, 1994) since I merely.
want to outline the nature of the product (or culture) they produce. Let.
it suffice to say that TV networks have not been immune from the trends of.
late capitalism towards corporate merging and restructuring (downsizing,.
etc.).
"The arrival of the culture of TV, then, was the imperceptible result of.
many factors--material, commercial, demographic, technological. This.
culture, however, represents not only the convergence of those disparate.
developments, but also--or primarily--the fulfillment of an old managerial.
idea: to exact universal assent, not through outright force, but by.
creating an environment that would make dissent impossible." (_Boxed In:.
The Culture of TV_" Mark Crispin Miller, Northwestern University Press,.
1988, p. 11).
We often think of TV as merely a technological invention, which like all.
inventions can have both positive and negative impacts. However, as Miller.
points out TV is more than that: it functions as a culture within a.
culture, or rather it comes to be the dominant culture.
