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What does living a good and meaningful life mean? Many people strive everyday by doing meaningful things to exceed in this goal, while others have a big misconception about what a meaningful life is. Many people get their perspectives from either their own experiences or what we see or are told by others. These ideas come from the larger pop culture; larger culture can be considered a combination of three major sources - corporate/commodified culture, folk culture, and big subcultures.

Our society has been affected or brain washed by what we see or hear from the pop culture. The marginal messages are things we rarely see shown by the pop culture. The dominant messages are things you always see commonly, almost seen as if they are enforcing one idea on society. The media tells us the things we need in life in order for us to be happy by making false meanings of things that don’t really matter to our life. Most common pop culture messages we see are people must look good, wear nice clothes, have a big house, a lot of money, and stay physically fit. These are just some of the corporate messages that can be found or as we call it Dominant messages.

Dominant corporate messages are things or ideas that we see with in our daily lives that influence the way we live. The dominant corporate messages can influence our lives by what we eat, the way we look, what we buy, how we shop, and how we live. Looking deeper in to these corporate messages we see that the way they want us to live is almost like some kind of brain wash the society has on the environment around us. These dominant corporate messages betray to be things we need in order to live a good and meaningful life, but in reality the pop culture is manipulating us to spend our money or alternate the way we want to live to keep up with today's society "hip" and "cool" things. I think that in our society today the dominant corporate messages are that materials will make you happy. We see several dominant messages being shown through television, magazines, commercials, and the internet.
While surfing the web I came across VH1.com, while looking through their website I felt as if VH1 had a main corporate message which is becoming famous, but at the same I noticed that several of these shows displayed on VH1 are reality shows. The reality shows contradicted the message because they were showing how becoming famous affected these individuals’ lives and showing how these famous people were acting irresponsible. The shows showed that we as the society should not act like these people but at the same time, the shows were making these people become some type of idolized figures, which made no sense.
I think that in our society today the dominant corporate messages are that materials will make you happy. For example in the commercial that says "Every kiss begins with a Kay". The commercial is for a jewelry store and basically what they are trying to tell the viewers is that the jewelry will make your girlfriend/ boyfriend happy and that their love for each other will become greater. People are relying on senseless items to strengthen their love relationship, instead of spending their hard earned money on their lover; they could be spending quality time with their lover which is price less.
The dominant message that materials will make one happy cause people to rely on the materials they want so that if they don't get what they want they are angry until they get that thing. I think it is sort of similar to a drug addiction. People who are addicted to heroin or cocaine try it and then their bodies rely on the drugs and the junkie must get the drug or they go into a different state where their body gets all messed up. Then to keep on getting the drugs for their system they do things like become prostitutes so they can get what they need. People who think that the materials will make them happy buy and buy then when they don't have enough money or can't get the material they rob banks and steal from people because they think they will be happy with the money.

Looking at several magazines to see what corporate messages are presented throughout different magazines, I wanted to see if exactly I could connect different messages. Ironically both magazines I looked at were incorporating the same message and also trying to persuade their audience / readers to buy or spend money. The first magazine is Titled- Oklist - Spotlight on the Arts (Fall Issue). I came to the conclusion of their pop cultures message was to influence others to buy expensive books / novels by giving brief analysis of several books that may or may not attract great amount buyers. Although the corporate message is asking the society to spend money, the outcome of spending money will help or enhance our intelligence as well as reading levels. The second magazine I looked at was Titled - Bazzar. Nov 2008 issue, their overall pop culture message was to live a good and meaningful life you must require materialistic things in order to feel good about yourself as well as look good. From both magazines we see how pop culture is influencing the society to spend more money on useless self objects that would supposedly help us have a good and meaningful life. The products they are selling aren’t things that will help our society grow or expand, but things that are truly affecting our culture and bringing us down. The United States are viewed as having the most customers in the world, meaning several people are spending money on things that might not even importance to their life, in other words their just spending money to spend money. Several individuals fail to realize that the corporate media doesn't try to stop or help our society, but more of enforcing these messages on us. They sell us products to add a distraction to our life to stimulate our happiness, so we can forget about the miserable life we are truly living.

The "marginal messages of commodified culture" are those messages sold to us by advertisements, movies, TV, music videos, books, magazines, etc that define the good and meaningful life in a way which is unusual. These "marginal messages" expand the range of visions of a good and meaningful life both by offering new visions and also by (to some degree) contradicting the dominant corporate messages on the good and meaningful life. Marginal messages can be seen through movies, such as Foxfire, where roles of males and females are switched. The switching of roles is not as common as it may seem and sometimes the message the movie sends to the public is not as accepted by society as the main message corporate culture sends out. For example a scene from Foxfire is when there is a nude guy being photographed by a girl. In corporate culture you do not see the roles of males and females often switching. It has become part of our culture as Americans to believe that the man is stronger and the woman is weaker, the man is in control and the woman is helpless. But marginal messages often are about breaking this stereotype between men and women and giving women more power and showing that women can be a bit more masculine.

One deeper understanding of what our culture shows us as the good and meaningful life can be seen through the various mixed messages of our holiday seasons. One holiday that is highly celebrated throughout our culture is Halloween. Halloween demonstrates several different mixed messages that can be seen in our culture. The way we celebrate Halloween is mostly through young children. Children spend the entire night going around trick or treating to several different homes to try and gather as much candy as possible. There are so many contradicted messages throughout this Halloween holiday. Several parents always tell their children not to talk to strangers, but on Halloween "it’s ok for the children to go to a stranger’s home and take candy from them." Also at the young age older adults always tell children to be themselves, but on Halloween people dressed their children up as other famous figures, monsters, killers, singers, dancers, etc. Halloween can also be seen as a customer’s holiday because we are encouraged to buy decorations, candy, costumes and several other things. I also noticed that this particular holiday doesn’t express the message that family is important, and that you should spend time with your family like most other holidays.

On Christmas Day there was nothing special on this day for my family in particular. It was more of a day where everyone had the day off and a chance to spend some time together. For the first part of my day I spent it watching the basketball game Lakers vs. Celtics that was what I really wanted to see. Because I’m getting older presents seem to come less and less every year which doesn't seem to bother me. But I could remember those good old days when I was younger waking up at like 8 o'clock just to open gifts that was my excitement then. But now I’m starting to realize that presents and gifts barely has any meaning to which why we should be celebrated Christmas. I know not as many people actually celebrate the religious part of Christmas but the actual giving of presents, that’s what many people look forward to. While watching the game there were commercial breaks about the "Christmas spirit" which made me think about this class, there was a lot of messages being sent to the audience. While thinking about class, I saw a connection with the three faces of Christmas. The corporate Christmas-corporate culture, the family style Christmas-dominant folk culture, and the religious Christmas-Big sub-culture. While watching the basketball game, the news station decided to let troops in Iraq have a "shout out" to their family. This demonstrates that family is important and the stations can air it because it is one of the dominant messages. During the holidays there are always a few classic movies that the channels choose to show, for example "Home alone". This movie has messages that involve all of these cultures. The main character, Kevin, prays before he eats and in one scene he was in a church searching for something. This suggests that there are answers held in this religion known as Christianity. In the end the family reunites and shows love and concern for Kevin which promotes the family style Christmas, where it's important that such a holiday should be spent with your entire family rather than being alone.

Inauguration Day Assignment

In the Inauguration Speech Obama moved several viewers that came forth to watch his ceremony take place. Looking at the audience that attended the Inauguration, you can almost feel the trust and happiness those individuals have toward Obama. Everyone cheered when it was time to give appriciation, everyone was serious when it was time to talk about the challenges that were ahead of us. "America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations." Here we see Obama telling us that we as the United States are all in this together. We will not give up, but we must work together and have faith in ourselves as well as President Obama if we want to overcome the up coming hardships that we are going to face. He wants us not to give up. This speech as well as the Inauguration Day in general is a great example of what a good and meaningful life is because Obama had not allowed the corporate media to brain wash his life, also not allowing it affect his dreams of becoming the president. He strived for the better for himself as well as his family, not allowing priceful things or maybe even wasting time to get in the way of his success.

Letter to Middle School Teacher

Dear Mrs. Harrish,

Hi, how are you? You may or may not remember me but I was one of you favorite studentes back in second grade. Now I am currently in the 12th grade and Im taking this course about the meaning of life. Currently we are talking about life lessons we have learned and how it affected our own lives and the way we live. At the young age teachers play a major role in a childs life because you teach us the "do's" and
"dont's", whats right and whats wrong, and most importantly respect. But I remember you always telling me be quiet, do not speak during class, and you made me sit in the back of the class everytime I said something, even if I was right. But because I was young, I didnt know how to stand up for myself or tell any one you was treating me like this. I felt that the classroom rules you came up with had nothing to do with our learning habit. You just wanted to control us. But because i never followed any of your rules or ever stayed quiet, I find myself to be more out spoken during class lectures also following proper rules that help be become someone better instead of some trying to control my brain. Thanks Again.

Sincerly,
Christopher Campbell

MLK Assignment/ John Lewis's Speech in 1963

On Martin Luther King's belated birthday several shows, and news channels basically gave us the same Plastic Postage Stamp that Andy had warned us about in class. The Plastic Postage Stamps are "stupid doll figures who are not human." What the media does is they condence the powerful meaning of something to little things that should only because recongized. I noticed that on the news they gave a brief summary or recap of what Martin Luther King did, and who he was. They rarely said anything about his personal life or how he became the man he was, as if he just woke up and became MLK the civil rights leader. When I asked a younger cousin of mine what he did in school the tuesday after Martin Luther King Day, he told me that they watched a documentary of MLK and also read the "I have a dream" speech. I asked him what did he learn from that and all he could tell me was that he risked his life fighting for black people to have equal rights. This showed me that he as well as I was learning the "plastic postage stamp" of Martin Luther King Jr. The media only wanted people to see MLk as some type of god, that couldn't do anything wrong. They never talk about his true hardships, which gives us the false image of him. This affects our understanding of the good and meaningful life because this is alternating the truth which affects our beliefs of mlk.
John Lewis was man who believed in true peace and equality. Here in his 1963 speech he talks about the fact that African Americans during slavery and proverty many people had to sacrifice their own lives whether dieing or going to jail just so others could live a better life. "We do not want to go to jail, but we will go to jail if this is the price we must pay for love, brotherhood and true peace." In this quote I agree with him because here he is sayin that we are willing to take a sacrifice only to benifit from it. this is a good example of what a meaningful life is because he is standing up for millions of people including himself inored for everybody to live a better life.

Folk Culture Holiday Analysis

One deeper understanding of what our culture shows us as the good and meaningful life can be seen through the various mixed messages of our holiday seasons. One holiday that is highly celebrated throughout our culture is Halloween. Halloween demonstrates several different mixed messages that can be seen in our culture. The way we celebrate Halloween is mostly through young children. Children spend the entire night going around trick or treating to several different homes to try and gather as much candy as possible. There are so many contridicted messages throughout this halloween holiday. Several parents always tell their children not to talk to strangers, but on Halloween "its ok for the children to go to a strangers home and take candy from them." Also at the young age older adults always tell children to be themselves, but on Halloween people dressed their children up as other famous figures, monsters, killers, singers, dancers, etc. Halloween can also be seen as a cusomers holiday because we are encouraged to buy decerations, candy, costums and several other things. I also noticed that this particular holiday doesnt express the message that family is important, and that you should spend time with your family like most other holidays.

Holiday Break

On Christmas Day there was nothing special on this day for my family in particular. It was more of a day where everyone had the day off and a chance to spend some time together. for the first part of my day I spent it watching the basketbal game Lakers v.s Celtics, that was what i really wanted to see. Because im getting older presents seem to come less and less every year which doesn't seem to bother me. But I could remember those good old days when i was younger waking up at like 8 o'clock just to open gifts, that was my excitement then. But now im starting to realize that presents and gifts barely has any meaning to which why we should be celebrated Christmas. I know not as many people actually celebrate the religious part of christmas but the actual giving of presents, thats what many people look forward to. While watching the game there were commercial breaks about the "Christmas spirit" which made me think about this class, there was a lot of messages being sent to the audience. While thinking about class, i saw a connection with the three faces of Christmas. The corporate Christmas-corporate culture, the family style Christmas-dominant folk culture, and the religious Christmas-Big sub-culture. While watching the basketball game, the news station decided to let troops in Iraq have a "shout out" to their family. This demonstrates that family is important and the stations can air it because it is one of the dominant messages. During the holidays there are always a few classic movies that the channels choose to show, for example "Home alone". This movie has messages that involve all of these cultures. The main character, Kevin, prays before he eats and in one scene he was in a church searching for something. This suggests that there are answers held in this religion known as Christianity. In the end the family reunites and shows love and concern for Kevin which promotes the family style Christmas, where it's important that such a holiday should be spent with your entire family rather than being alone.