Heroes and The Cult of the Celebrity - Assignment 1-3-4

 

Heroes and The Cult of the Celebrity - Assignment 1-3-4

Jamie Hunter

Professor Omar Alomari

HUMN240-E1FF

January 28, 2012

 

 

 

  

 

Heroes and The Cult of the Celebrity - Assignment 1-3-4

 

            Sheriff Ricky Grimes is the hero in the series The Walking Dead. The group of survivors from the zombie holocaust looks to the Sheriff as their hero. They admire the Sheriff because he is brave when he leads them away from the dangerous flesh-eating zombies. His achievements are great; he has managed to keep the group safe while he keeps a level head. He maintains a plan a step ahead of the ever looming threat of death. Unlike the Sherriff is his Best friend Shane.

            Shooting zombie careless and with no plan, gets Shane attention, but he is no hero. He competes for the attention of the group by doing attention grabbing stunts. Celebrities get attention by doing attention grabbing things also. For instance Angelina Jolie may gain a following because she adopts kids to give them a better home. She is a celebrity because many others have and continue to do the same thing; although adoption is a noble thing it does not take a hero to do it. Jolie does it for attention the same as Shane.

            Sherriff Grimes truly wants to restore humankind to some type of normality. His actions exemplify that aspiration. Shane wants the attention of the woman he loves which happens to be the wife of Sheriff Grimes. Shane does all that he does for her to notice him. He does not care about the interest of the group; even though several of them admire and praise him for his show of heroism.

            People who follow The Walking Dead series probably watch it because it has the idea of even through a zombie-filled world someone is wiling to step up and set order back to the world; even if it means he has to make great sacrifices. Something the ordinary just will not do. 

Rituals and Stereotypes – The Walking Dead Assignment 1-3-3

 

Rituals and Stereotypes – The Walking Dead Assignment 1-3-3

Jamie Hunter

Franklin University

Professor Omar Alomari

HUM240-E1FF

January 19, 2012

Rituals and Stereotypes – The Walking Dead

             The main characters in the television show The Walking Dead are: Rick (the Sherriff) and Lori (the Sherriff’s wife), Carl (the Sherriff’s son), Shane (the Sherriff’s partner and best friend), Andrea, (the Attorney), Dale (the old guy), Glen (the pizza delivery boy), Daryl (the survivalist) Sophia (the abused wife), and T-Dog (the minority in the group). The show is about the zombie apocalypse and its human survivors. As the small group, who has formed a community and bonds fights zombies and try to maintain some type of normality, they are still faces with the same old everyday rituals and stereotypes as before the world went crazy.

They gather food and supplies as a group and then sit as a group to eat and share strategies; much like a family that sits at the table and discuss their day at school or work. It is important for the group to stay together and work together in order to survive.  Many families that eat together or socialize in some form or fashion stay together as a close knit family. Like any family or community the group still faces riffs and misunderstanding.

The characters in the show have varying opinions about each other. For instance in one episode, part of the group left to go search for a member of the group who has been separated during a zombie attack. It is the third of fourth time they have gone out and have gone without Glen (the old guy) and T-dog (the minority). Although T-dog has been severely hurt during the previous attack by the zombies, he makes mention to Glen that they were left behind on the search because he was black and Glen was old. T-dog himself stereotypically believes his race made him less capable when it was because he was injured.

The show’s producers add to the stereotypes. They name the character T-dog and hint on the show that he is from a gang, although there are many white, Hispanic and Asian gangs.  They have a female character that is abused by her husband, although men are abused by women they show features a woman. The survivors many times go through the ritual of tending to the wounded even when they know the outcome of them turning into zombies once bitten is the same. The show stays with the theme that it is people’s nature to be ritualism and stereotypical, that is what makes it appealing; people can see themselves. 

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Popular Beliefs, Myths, and Icons Assignment 1-3-2

 

Popular Beliefs, Myths, and Icons Assignment 1-3-2

Jamie Hunter

Franklin University

Professor Omar Alomari

HUM240-E1FF

January 11, 2012

Popular Beliefs, Myths, and Icons

People make up monsters because they parallel the hardships in their own lives. People relate for the reason that most horror movies, science fiction movies and or movies with monsters have the happy ending where good wins over evil. Kirk Combe’s interpretation in his popular culture journal paper reads, “One great Truth being force-fed to Americans at that time was imperialism masquerading as national defense.” (Combe, K., 2011 p. 936)  He is commenting on the ideology that the Steven Spielberg movie War of the Worlds parallels this statement. In the movie people are in terror and panic because their defenses are useless against the invading monsters. (Combe, K., 2011)  American have a popular belief that some mythical government defense can and will protect them from anything foreign and invasion like; alien invasions were not accounted for.

            911 happened to Americans. Although the terrorist were not monsters the National defenses did not protect the people from the invading doom (much like Spielberg’s alien attack). Monsters are very iconic because they are big and bad just like terrorist are iconic for the very same reasons. People were angry at the government, but how can a government fight a monster it does not see coming? In Spielberg’s movie the aliens lay dormant until their counterparts invaded. A myth can be construed as terrorist cells, are living amongst us today; plotting and scheming as usual business.

            People hide from the possibility that terrorist are icons, because their actions usually mean fear and power. Monsters are always lurking around in dark corners, they are not mythical; in actuality they are a huge icon, otherwise gun sells would drop rapidly. Spielberg alien’s were defeated but not by the National defense. They were destroyed by their own lack of doing their research. A virus not compatible to their biological make-up killed them. Terrorist like the aliens usually fail because their plan fail. Bin Laden did meet his doom; he, some will say did not do his research. He did not take into account that his messenger led his assassins to him.

 

References

Combe, K. (2011). The journal of popular culture: Spielberg's Tale of Two Americas:

Postmodern Monsters in War of the Worlds (Vol. 44, issue 5) Retrieved from http://0-

journals.ohiolink.edu.olinkserver.franklin.edu

Icon Analysis – Assignment 2-1

 

Icon Analysis – Assignment 2-1 

Jamie Hunter

Franklin University 

Professor Omar Alomari

HUM240-E1FF

January 11, 2012

 Icon Analysis 

Americans are obsessed about what they eat, how they look, and whom the expert is on when, where and why. Three contemporary icons are, The Biggest Loser, Oprah, and Food Network. These three icons can relate to American eating habits. Restaurants that use to cater to hamburgers and fries for dinner have now added salad and wraps; they want to capture the ever growing industry of weight loss and healthy eating trends.

The Biggest Loser sells determination. Most people, who watch this show which promotes weight loss, are rooting for the heaviest guy/gal to win. Some people, who watch the show, may even see themselves as a contestant on the show who struggles with weight and needs guidance. When an advertisement artifact is displayed during the breaks, they are more likely to be about Cheerios or Special-K type products. Inspired people may go buy the healthier choice even if it only last the first couple of days. Next week the cycle will repeat it’s self. The thought may even be planted as a good ideal by one of the trainers on the show; after all, he is helping contestants on the show actually lose weight. 

People also listen to Oprah. Oprah’s weight in the past has gone up-and-down then back up or down again. How many times has Oprah influenced what people should or should not eat? Some people live for her word because she is a famous icon. She has followers who in turn spread her message. In other words, a person does not even have to watch her show to hear what she is saying; others say it for her and people believe. Oprah gives the command to watch Rachael Ray on the Food Network, and people watch.

Once a person is hooked on all the healthy choices the Food Network has to offer, they go and buy more items to complete their well-being. The Food Network offers a variety of good eating, “Special-K” some would say pales before the specially prepared expensive ingredients one may need to complete a proper organic-low fat-banana-smoothie. Food Network in turn sells to people the fascination of wanting to not only be a healthy eating, but also a gourmet cook. People then go out and buy the cooking utensils used, the costly pots and pans, and the lists go on.

Obsessions about eating, looks, and experts are what icons are made of. People buy what sells. Oprah sells. Shows about losers who are really winners sell, consumers want food that may or may not make them gourmet cooks. Without icons, America would not be able to promote market power. If no one is selling, no one is buying; if this happens, then in the long run no one wins.