Module 15 - Zombie Narratives

I will be analyzing module 12. This module contains the popular culture of zombies. We were assigned to watch one of the earlier movies. I choose to watch the movie king of the zombies, produced in 1941. I will also be dissecting the subject through the lens of race. Although slavery of the African-Americans was outlawed, that does not mean they were culturally accepted immediately. This was displayed in the movie on several occasions. One occasion was when the Mantan Moreland, who played the character Jeff. Jeff and his white associates, seem to be on good terms, but Jeff remains a subordinate as he is their valet. The portrayal of an African-American during the filming of the movie would hold African-Americans to a secondary role. Both actors and the characters that were portrayed would generally be secondary characters. This is affirmed as all of the entire servants of the Dr. Sangre were only of color. Jeff is casted as a comedic relief for the movie, making little jokes and talking about with smart remarks. At one point, Jeff asks to spend the night with his white associates, who were a portrayed as a more prestigious role such as a pilot or a colonel in the military. Even the main evil antagonist was a white actor as well. The portrayal of the servants in the movie shown that they were happy and content with their position in the cultural hierarchy. Not interested in talking back to their master or achieving more. At one point, the slaves notice one of Jeff’s associates was slacked and converted into a zombie. The servants were surprised because they have never seen a white zombie before. This does not seem normal to the servants, but because of the circumstances, the Doctor has to kill one of the associates to prevent further snooping. Eventually, Jeff and his remaining associate manage to escape the island and return to the mainland. Although strides and changes have been made as popular culture constantly changes, a good example of this would be Star Wars. They have successfully casted a minority, as well as a female lead. Despite a few major movies recently, representation of women and minorities in movies are still bleak or unchanged (Bahr, 2017)

CITES

King of Zombies. Jean Yarbrough. Perf. Dick Purcell, Mantan Moreland, Henry Victor. Distributor, Sterling Productions inc. 1941. Film. 
Bahr, Lindsey. "People Want to See More Diversity in Movies, but It's Not Happening Fast Enough." Business Insider. Associated Press, 31 July 2017.Web. 26 Apr. 2018.
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Module 15 - Cultural Hegemony (Module 9)

Domination of one social class or a group in society describes hegemony. As of lately, hegemony has become a strong part of mass media, in the news particularly. For my example of, I chose to write about hegemony and how it is involved with the news. Each news station is viewed as something that is independent or differing from other news stations. What many of the viewers do not realize is that many states require news channels to cover certain parts of the news, and leave other parts out for the sake of the state ultimately controlling what the public knows and does not know, or trying their best to at least. Many stations are required certain topics, and are held accountable if they do not report on the proper things, as the state has the idea that by controlling what the viewers see, naturally they can control what they viewers think about said topics depending on the presentation of those topics. Often times, you may notice something that is portrayed in the news as a positive thing although in your mind you know it isn’t a positive thing, like framing the raising of tax percentage by providing pros to the topic and leaving out the cons, for this topic specifically the con would be ultimately needing to pay more in taxes, which is more money coming out of the tax payers pocket at the end of the day to go towards doing something that may not necessarily benefit all tax payers. By using the framing technique, media often controls the crowd by making an idea or thought seem ideal to the viewer when in actuality it is affecting them more than helping them.