Cultural Reporter Video

Above is my Cultural Reporter Video. It sums up the cultural reporter project about the male culture and co-cultural communication theory which I have been working on all semester. Enjoy!

Cultural Reporter Blog #3

Often when thinking of people of a different culture the assumption that comes to mind is someone from a different country or region. However, according to Martin and Nakayama, culture is learned patterns of behavior and attitudes by a group of shared people (p. 88). With that being said a culture does not only exist in different geographical locations, but it exists everywhere in daily life. The culture of interest which I have chosen to focus on is the male culture. Besides the physiological explanation of what a male is, males can be defined by the idea of masculinity. Masculinity is defined as having characteristics of a man which includes attributes such as strength and dominance. Masculine characteristics are expected of males. This creates a culture group because it is a learned pattern of behaviors and attitudes which is mainly shared only by males.

When analyzing the male culture I kept the co-cultural theory in mind. The co-cultural theory is used to understand how people’s location in a social hierarchy influences their perceptions of reality regarding relational issues or problems (Martin & Nakayama p. 73). Co-cultural groups consist of a dominant and a non dominant group. When discussing males and females, males are often seen as the dominant group. They are considered the group with the most power (Martin & Nakayama p. 241). Males often use their physical or mental power to rule over others and it is mainly women which they use this power over (Phoenix, 2012). We saw it years ago when men were given the right to vote and women were not. This led us to believe that the male opinion was the only one that mattered. Today in society it is becoming less obvious which culture group is the most dominant, or is it? Women are making strives to be seen as equal to men but it seems as though the idea of masculinity is still creating that glass ceiling for women.

This is an image showing the expectations society has for the look of masculinity and femininity. You can see that the male has a more dominant power stance while the woman is more in the background and shows the characteristics of elegance and meekness.

When doing field work, I observed the male culture for 2 hours. I observed males individually and in a group and I also conducted 2 interviews. In observing, I found that men still view themselves as the dominant culture. Things I observed that suggested this were the way they talk about women. The terms and names used are not exactly positive. I would never hear males say a woman is beautiful or she has a great personality or that they would like to date her. They would refer to a woman hot, or they would comment on a physical characteristic or they talk about her as if she was just someone they wanted to sleep with (Jordan Stiens, personal observation, Oct. 28, 2012). These observations show that women are looked at as objects rather than a culture group of intelligence and equal quality to men. When conducting my interviews the answers given were very similar. Both interviewees described masculinity as strength or physical superiority, while they described femininity as compassion, caring, and elegance. Males see these characteristics of femininity as less important than the characteristics of masculinity. When asked why, the response was that “society wants strong leadership, and strength and physical superiority is the cornerstone of strong leadership” (Sam Shaw, Personal Communication, Nov. 7, 2012). I also asked if males thought that society would think of them differently if they embraced characteristics of compassion and caring as part of masculinity. Both people I interviewed agreed that society would look at them differently. They said “it is taboo for men to show female characteristics and they would likely be looked at as homosexual” (Sam Shaw, Personal Communication, Nov. 7, 2012). When I straight up asked the male participants if they thought they are the dominant culture when compared to females the response was, yes they do because “throughout history and even in today’s society leaders are usually strong intelligent males which shows that people look for those qualities in people whom they trust and follow” (Sam Shaw, Personal Communication, Nov. 7, 2012).  Throughout my observations and interviews the three key themes that I learned were: 1. Men are still seen as the dominant culture group in society today 2. Masculinity is defined as strength, confidence, and physical superiority and 3. Females have pressure from society to act and look a certain way but males have these same pressures as well just in more subtle forms. These three themes are nothing new but they do prove that even though women are intelligent human beings of equal quality there will always be a dominant and non dominant group between genders but the idea of male dominance is not likely to change anytime soon.

Below is a video that shows how masculinity and femininity are portrayed in media. The topics shown in this video are parallel to the ideas given by the men that I interviewed and observed.

Sources:

Martin, J.N., & Nakayama, T.K. (2012). Intercultural communication in contexts (6th ed.).

Boston, MA: McGraw Hill.

Phoenix, G. (2012). Male dominance: Under attack or dead concept?. Retrieved from http://malexperience.com/2012/04/male-dominance/

Sam Shaw, Personal Communication, Nov. 7 2012

Derek Sutton, Personal Communication, Nov. 7 2012

Jordan Stiens, Personal Observation, Oct. 28 2012

Cultural Reporter Blog 2

The theory which seems to be most prominent when conducting my research on the culture of male versus female gender is Co-Cultural Communication theory. This theory, as defined in our Intercultural Communications textbook, is “used to understand how people’s location in a social hierarchy influences their perceptions of reality regarding, among other things, relational issues or problems” (Martin & Nakayama p. 73). Co-cultural communication looks at the way dominant and non-dominant cultural groups interact. It studies the basic function of language between the dominant and non-dominant groups and how it is formulated and carried out. Co-cultural communication mainly only affects those of the non-dominant group. Non-dominant group members often find themselves in environments where they are forced to act the same as the dominant group, cater to the needs of the dominant group, or segregate themselves entirely from those of the dominant group.

Below are three sources which touch on the idea of Co-Cultural Communication Theory.  

Taylor, F. (2009). Content Analysis and Gender Stereotypes in Children's Book. Sociological Viewpoints, 5-22.

Paek, H., Nelson, M., & Vilela, A. (2011). Examination of Gender-role Portrayals in Television

Advertising across Seven Countries. Sex Roles, 64(3/4), 192-207.

Szymanowicz, A., & Furnham, A. (2011). Do intelligent women stay single? Cultural stereotypes

concerning the intellectual abilities of men and women. Journal Of Gender Studies,

20(1), 43-54.

 The first source discusses the impacts of gender stereotypes in children’s books, the second sources discusses how men versus women are portrayed in commercials across seven different countries, and the third source talks about men versus women IQ and how this relates to their communication patterns. These may seem like entirely random sources but they are all studying gender stereotypes at different levels. They all revolve around the main idea of male dominance.

Below are two magazine covers. On the left is an image of how men are often portrayed in media and on the right is a picture of how women are often portrayed. Which gender seems more dominant to you?

  In my research what I am looking for is whether or not males often see themselves as the dominant culture group over females, what types of things indicate that they believe this, why do they believe this and what things in the social media are indicators that males are a dominant group over females. What I am finding is that males see themselves as the dominant group over the female gender. I believe that this idea was started years before when males were seen as the single breadwinner for families and it has just been passed down from generation to generation. Possibly not even intentionally, this is just the thought process of people in everyday life. The idea that males are a dominant group is not surprising even in society today because there are so many things that suggest this. Social media is just one area where male dominance is portrayed daily. I still have more research to do but I have spent some time observing males. I spent time observing my four of my male friends. They are very candid about how they see females and the male’s role in society. Just watching football on a Saturday with them, you can get a pretty good idea of how they see themselves in comparison to females. I plan on continuing to observe males and how they act on their “dominance” and I plan to interview a few people to see how dominance plays a role in everyday communication.

Source:

Martin, J.N., & Nakayama, T.K. (2012). Intercultural communication in contexts (6th ed.). Boston, MA:

McGraw Hill. 

Cultural Reporter Blog 1

Culture is learned patterns of behavior and attitudes by a group of shared people. (Martin & Nakayama, 2012, p.88) This is obviously the book definition but I believe there are many definitions that can be assigned to the idea of culture. I think that the book states it the best way though. There are many different cultures that you can identify with. Some examples being, ethnicity, race, nationality, gender, age, and religion, just to name a few. Now some people might think well gender isn’t a culture. However, I believe that it is. Let us break down the definition of culture to show why gender can be considered a culture.

Take the gender of male for example. First we can determine that males are a group of shared people. We can determine this because males all share the characteristics of being male which separates them from females, creating a group. Now let’s look at the learned patterns of behavior part. Have you ever walked into a sports bar during football season on a Monday night? Just observe the patterns. There are tons of males drinking beer and cheering on their favorite football team. Now I am not saying that there are not females that do this too. Trust me I love watching football but this is a shared behavior that many men take part in.

The concept of gender identity doesn’t seem like it would be that complex. Either you are a male or a female right? However, I believe that the concept of gender identity is much deeper than that. In fact the definition of the book of gender identity is the identification with the cultural notions of masculinity and femininity and what it means to be a man or a woman. This topic is very interesting to me. Which is why being a female I plan to study the cultural construction of the male gender for my Cultural Identity Project.

As an interpretive researcher I have many options to go about studying males. First, I would like to observe males as individuals and see how they react in certain situations; second, I would like to observe males in group situations. The goal here would be to see if males react differently in group situations than they would in individual situations and if so what the cause for this would be. Thirdly, I would like to survey males and ask them open-ended questions such as what they believe it means to be a man and what characteristics are looked at as masculine. I have always been interested in why society creates different constructs for males and females and I believe this will be an interesting topic to research throughout the semester.

Below is a clip which I found very interesting. It talks about the social constructs of masculinity through Disney movie clips. At the end it talks about how the construct of masculinity can leave boys feeling physically inadequate. We often hear this brought up about the media and women but not very often about men. I think this will be a topic that will be interesting to dig deeper into throughout the semester.

Martin, J.N., & Nakayama, T.K. (2012). Intercultural communication in contexts (6th ed.). Boston, MA: McGraw Hill. 

Jordan Stiens Comm 211x Spring 2012 Cultural Identity Video

Above is a video that discusses just a few of the aspects that make up my cultural identity. Hope you enjoy!