Subalterns and Mainstream Media

When you turn on the T.V. what do you hope to watch. Is it Cops, MTV, CNN or some other type of entertainment. There are so many different things on television these days, but they all have one thing in common...they are entertaining. Without the factor of entertainment no one would watch them and they would slowly fade out. In our English class we watch a couple of videos that showed two very similar, and yet different types of entertainment. First was a concert involving both Paul Simon and a lady named Miriam Makeba, and the other was a music video with a lady names Brenda Fassie. I had never heard of either of these lady singers however Makeba is known around the world and Fassie is only known in her community and South Africa.

Something that I think entertainment is based on is if there is a powerful and/or important message being given. Fassie's message was concerning women getting abused in her home country. I think this is a very very important issue that does need to be addressed but it is hard to bring it out in today's mass Media. The media will put important messages on the television except sometimes people don't want to hear about the terrible things that are going on in other places. I think this is wrong but at the same time the truth.

Another important factor of entertainment is the aesthetic quality. Makeba's video was very uplifting. There were thousands of people there watching her and it just looked good. Fassie's video was a little lower quality and was in some aspects hard to watch. This plays a huge role in the effect their music has on the outside world and media.

The biggest factor that I noticed in Fassie's video was the fact that it was in a different language. The movements and acting did send the message across but it was very hard to relate to what she was saying due to the fact that I didn't know what she was saying. As a country I think that we are pretty closed minded when it comes to language barriers. In other countries it is rare to find someone who doesn't know more then four languages. That is just unheard of here. That is something that we need to work on as a country however I think it is going to go the opposite way. I feel that in our quest of globalization languages will be lost and English will become the universal language.

In all it is up to us to decide who gets put in the mass media. It is our opinion of those who put themselves out there to be judged. When all is said and done I don't think that Brenda Fassie will make it into our media. The one thing that will help her and has helped people like her is You Tube. It is a great tool for people to be heard, but I think the jump from You Tube to the the mass media is still a very big one.