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Popular Culture and Schooling


            By analyzing chapters three, four and five in Nelson's "Schooling as Entertainment", it can be shown that a connection does exist between popular culture and schooling, resulting in school becoming more like society. This connection can be seen through the exploitation of television, drug use in the classroom, and the constant struggle to be "popular".
             Television has created and shaped our culture both in and outside of school. T.V is what portrays the image of popular culture. (Jan 5 2004, notes) With the development of the television in the nineteen fifties, comes the access to world issues and trends such as fashion and language. Because of this, television is said to have a "Globalizing" effect, in which the whole world is linked through television. With this in mind, we see the trends change as times change. Take for example the acid washed jeans, and the neon colours of the eighties or early nineties. This look was thought to be "cool" at the time, but looking back, people often question why they wore the clothes they did. This example can be directly related to the fashions viewed on television at the time. "Every new media changes us" (Jan 5 2004, notes), it changes the way we look, and the way we act. .
             In this manner we can see the affects that television has on schools, shaping individual to be more like the "popular culture". "Television has been the centre of our popular culture for fifty years. It has influenced our identity, who we have become, both as individuals and as a culture." (Nelson 2002, pg 59) By being forced to go to school kids are exposed to the popular culture every day. They see what the latest trends are and learn the new slang. This exposure in the class- room is different then the exposure of T.V. because nobody is forced to watch television. Television can be turned off at any time unlike school. "Whereas a classroom is a place of social interaction, the space in front of a television set is a private preserve.


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