Pop Culture American Idol: Reflection

Pop Culture

American Idol: Reflection of Popular Culture society's way of life is a reflection of its culture. Culture has many forms, through which we could define the way we live, the way we interact and how we perceive things. We are molded by cultural elements that evolved as society faces developments of time. Working at emerging patterns can be a useful method in analyzing cultural evolution and its outcome. Upon identifying what patterns could have been emergent, it is possible to review the factual information and background of culture.

What is considered as "pop culture" mostly refers to various elements in society that are most often portrayed in art, music, and television. These elements reflect the predominant culture - the language, desire, needs, attitudes, and behavior of the general population. Sometimes, these are deliberately infused but most of the time it is done unconsciously. Pop culture is not permanent. It changes constantly depending on the general trend of a specific place and time. The pop culture during the 80's is vastly different from the 90's. A lot of factors can affect it: religion, the economy, and current events. Although a society can have various sub-cultures, "pop culture" is the one that appeals most to the general public.

One of which is the birth of various reality TV shows. Sensationalized by mass media, reality TV has always been appealing to the public. "Reality Television" is defined as follows:

genre of television programming which presents purportedly unscripted dramatic or humorous situations, documents actual events, and features ordinary people instead of professional actors" (Wikipedia, 2007)

Reality TV was mostly popular beginning 2000. Many shows were created wherein participants compete with each other in real-life situations. Other shows just simply displayed the daily home activities of an individual or group of individuals. Such shows are not scripted and do not involve professional acting. Thus, what the participants portray on the screen are real and spontaneous. Because of this, Reality TV became a hit because it portrays attitudes or behavior and actions that are reflection of what is being practiced in the real world. The fact that viewers patronize the show, it could lead to a conclusion that they can relate to what they see on their television screens. This could be an indicator of the public's familiarization of patterns of culture which is found in these reality television shows.

An example of one of the most popular television show is American Idol. The American Idol is "an annual American televised singing competition which seeks to discover the best young singer in the country, through a series of nationwide auditions." The show is engaged with real people with real emotions. Contestants of the show may belong or may come from different age groups or different race, or either they came from different towns or cities, thus defining what culture or way of life they have.

In a specific episode of the show, a controversy arose during the semi-finals during the season three that involved the three highly praised African-American contestants, Jennifer Hudson, La Toya London and Fantasia Barrino. There had been an instance where everybody was been surprised because of the elimination of Jennifer Hudson. During the elimination, a guest judge for that season, Sir Elton John criticized the voting as "incredibly racist" (Yahoo, 2004). This statement that arose from such occurrence can be associated as a repeating pattern of culture. Take for an instance in the Westernized world; they have a notion that there is such an inferior and superior culture. Racism is an excessive and irrational belief in the superiority of one group over the other. This belief must have evolved from the way of living of certain groups or classes of people. People inherit the beliefs, the attitudes, the perceptions and they practice it in their everyday lives which are then passed on to their generations.