How T.V can change the way we interpret our World !!

Dear Readers,

Food for thought: Okay this ad totally got my attention; Its an Ad about “Aids” from France I believe their trying to create awareness by really shocking the public. I found the pic on google which provided a series of comments on the site from people around the global community. Peoples reactions differed based on where they were from. For example, imagine how someone from Africa may respond compared to someone from Canada.

This week in class were discussing television, so I decided to write about popular north american programs that are being broadcast all around the world and how this is having an effect on the global viewer. The chapter discusses the effects of U.S television on Canadian culture but many of the same questions can be asked when observing how the nations across the world are being effected. I was born in the Czech Republic and I have gone back to visit my family many times since moving to Canada at the age of 2. The cultural ideals in some ways differ from those in Canada, and can be observed through their local “boob tube”. Czech films or television programs tend to have more sexual slander, for example on our evening news during the weather portion the weather person slowly takes off his/her clothes while informing viewers of what they can expect for there weekly weather. The Czech programs are very traditional, every night after dinner at 8:00pm a childrens’ bedtime story is featured and the family often gather around and watch together. Czech programming often depict more smoking and consumption of alcohol in there programning as well reflecting cultural practices which support no legal drinking age. Evening television /adult programs are mystery shows, comedies ( the American show Friends) depending if you have satallite you can recieve MTV and programs that come in different languages.

The presence of an international audience allowes nations to have a cinematic voice in mass media. As the objective of ‘The National Film Board’ (NFB) of Canada is created to “interpret Canada to Canadians” now due to technological advancements international viewers are being able to interpret Canada as well. Czech for me is a second language and those of you who can relate agree that jokes can’t be interpreted quite the same in both languages and some vocabulary can be difficult to translate. Are viewers watching programing from different parts of the world missing the real meaning because their missing the cultural context?

There is a popular demand from the global community to view the next glamour movie that comes out of Hollywood. Hollywood is quick to supply and their ideals are being interpreted on a global perspective. How are the latest images effecting the global viewer and what can be said about the american culture? There is this new fad of torture flicks like “Hostel” and “SAW 1, 2 and 3 and 4″ … and many more have become very popular. Your old fashioned Edward Scissorhands wouldn’t scare a three year old these days we’ve become so desensitized by T.V programing and Films that watching people get torchured seems to be the next best thing. Don’t get me wrong I love a good horror movie just like the next person but watching someone get torchured is not really necessary, Is it? And what kind of effect does this have on the global viewer’s that are not yet desensitized to the violence on american t.v? But then again its not our cultural norm to watch the weather man or woman take their clothes off either?? hehe.

Kindest Thoughts , BE

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Published:: February 6, 2007 / 11:04 pm

Category:: 3390

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bananaramma 2.7.07 / 1am

Its great to get a different perspective on television viewing. Its not very often I think about how northamerican tv is viewed in other countries or by people of different cultural backrounds. I do know that the local televsion I saw while travelling in South East Asia was so foriegn to me that I was unable to appreciate or understand what to me appeared to be very corny soap operas and oddly gory fictionalized history shows. Thanks for getting me thinking, your blog is great.

somcmadworld 2.7.07 / 1am

I was just in Ireland over the summer and i was amazed by what i saw on thier TV and their newspapers. Their equal to the sunshine girl was topless women. And then i was watching a show with my grandma one evening. It was a perfectly acceptable show with no swearing or sexual content and afterwards thier was a show about a nudist colony. It showed everything and nothing was blocked and i was amazed. It was only 7pm yet they had completely naked people on TV. I was also watching another show and i was amazed how many swear words there were. They did not block out as many swear words as Canada does.
Also those ads about AIDs shocked me. I wonder how people are reacting to them in France.

gumballs 2.7.07 / 4am

Wow I loved your ads that you posted. Im in prevention myself ( of addiction, so mainly drugs and alcohol) and I think that sometimes its so hard just to get people to care, and not be apathetic. Its rediculus. I agree though, its so about the audience, and one ad would not work for all audiences. This ad would only offend and possibly hurt the people of africa, where as with our culture, and the european culture, where sex is everywhere, and people treat sexual encounters like trophies, it might have more of an impact. Comming from a health perspective, sometimes it helps to scare people a little. Reality isnt all that interesting to most people. They know the risks, they know what harm they are potentially bringing upon themselves. I love these ads that you found I think that they are wonderful!!

I also liked what you said about people in other countries not understanding what our movies say, and likewise us not understanding what theirs are saying. I actually had an experience with this and it was extremely frustrating. My family used to have exchange students living with us. We had quite the revolving door growing up, and there were always students that BARELY spoke english in my house. I remember wanting to go to a movie one night with a friend and my mom made me bring the german exchange student. She was smart, and her english was better than most students that we had, but throughout the entire movie she would lean over and ask me to explain things that people were laughing at., and it was so hard. She usually just gave me a pity laugh to make me feel better for trying to help her, but she still didnt get it. After that we stuck to renting DVDs and just putting the subtitles on so that she could understand it. We did this with all of the students after that. I couldnt take it. Awesome post, thanks!

Media's Advocate 2.14.07 / 6pm

It is an excellent point on how different socities my view certain television shows and commercials. I always forget that the networks on regular cable that are available to us are drastically different in other continents of the world. The ads about “aids”from France i think are what the public in North America need. People are still not using proper precautions and are engaging in risky sexual behaviours. I think ads about aids should be grusome and the truth because the american ads are not doing it for the general public!!!!

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