Ms.Lees asks: Do you think the theater of the Elizabethan Age or the Entertainment media of today has any link or influence upon the social values or political ideals of the people or is it only a reflection (artistic expression) of the social values and political issues of the day? In other words - do you think entertainment (theater or other media today) reflects (is a record) what is going on in society or influences (has an effect) on society. Support your argument with logical reasoning and at least 1 example from your knowledge of the Elizabethan Era through our novel and 1 example from present day.
This is a very broad question that needs a very broad answer in order to be addressed efficiently.Entertainment contains both aspects, influencing and reflecting, but withing the broad spectrum of entertainment there are those who influence and those who reflect.
There will always be those few, if not only one, work of entertainment that changes everything and can heavily alter how society behave and what it holds valuable. For example, look at how video games have changed society, especially the teenage demographic. Although it has corrupted many of our youths, there is no denying it's affect on society. The game many consider the first shooter is called Wolfenstein 3D, released in 1992. It has poor graphics by modern standards, but display far too much gore and blood for youths. However, since it's release, the popularity of shooter games have skyrocketed. Since then, the violence and gore of a lot of today's video games are common household items and are seen as acceptable, despite condoning from parents, government etc.. This genre's popularity made it look like a "cool" thing among "cool kids", despite very little reasoning behind this.
The rap genre of music has also made a huge impact on society and,especially,the way it behaves. Tupac Shakur is considered as the pioneer of rap music, and made this music popular following the declining popularity of rock music. Because of rap music, the image it sends and association it has with street culture, it is now common, and sadly acceptable, among people to use words such "nigga", "dawg", "yo", and made being "gansta" look "cool", by means of wearing pants low, the excessive use of profanity, among others, that as recently as a decade ago was considered unacceptable. And it is undeniable that the first rap musics and artists had a lot to do with this.
Hmm - I looked back to see the comment I made for you and discovered it did not post as I had thought, so I will forgive you for some of the quick fixes that I thought you should have addressed. (eg the concert was called Live Aid - for Aid towards the famine in Africa. I remember it well as it was the first time an international concert had been attempted on TV)
ReplyDeleteI do see some improvement between the two versions. I like the blending of the varied examples and you fairly skillfully support both sides of the argument and your conclusion allows you to do this in a way that is far stronger than the typical "sitting on the fence" argument - for that - well done.
I would have like to see you use some examples from the novel to support the Elizabethan arguments a bit more. There is very little in your composition to indicate whether or not you have even read the novel and we should see evidence of that embedded within your examples. You could have discussed the role of the theatre a bit more - given the background / conflicts that arose in the novel as well as the Shakespeare / Elizabethan England background you were provided with in class.
While yo skillfully close your arguement I would like to see a little more attention to the introduction - try to adjust it so that the question is turned into your thesis. Otherwise it sounds more conversational and while I know this is a blog - for our purposes here, you shold avoid starting by indicating you are answering a question. Intead blend parts of my question into your introduction.