Page 96 - Religion in the Media Age Media, Religion & Culture

Articulating culture in the media age 85

Studying media on the larger scale, of course, has certain advantages. It
enables social research to describe with some confidence how people in
larger social and demographic categories relate to the media they consume.
At the same time, the approach is limited in the kinds of questions it can
address. Research on media audiences conducted through survey or other
large-sample techniques suffers a relative inability to look at fine, detailed,
and complex social phenomena. Put in technical terms, the “measures”
that such research deals with must be “operationalized,” that is, the large
questions must be reduced to measurable data. For some kinds of ques-
tions, this is not a problem. For example, there is much to learn that is
interesting and significant in looking at gender and age differences in
media consumption. These are easily operationalized and can be studied
readily using quantitative techniques. 1
However, how would we measure the meanings that these various
groups derive from the media they consume? How would we formulate
questions focused on such meanings, without first understanding how and
where such meanings are made with reference to media? Do we assume
that media “creates” such meanings, or that meanings are made out of a
number of social and cultural resources, including those in the media? As I
have argued in previous chapters, there is reason to believe that media
reception is much more a matter of such meaning-making by its audiences
than it is a question of the media “creating” meaning. This is particularly
the case if what we are interested in are questions of identity and values
(social and cultural), in which the leading social theories would suggest the
matter is in the hands of the individual rather than social forces such as the
media, doing the “work” of identity.
It is important to recognize, further, that the reception of the symbolic
marketplace takes place in a specific context: the domestic sphere. We like
to think of the home and the family as bounded, protected spaces within
which the most fundamental and authentic relationships are formed and
shaped, the basic work of socialization and enculturation takes place, and
thus as the foundation of meaning, values, and identity. Further, we like to
think of the domestic sphere as – in Christopher Lasch’s well-known book
2
title – a “haven in a heartless world,” a space whose boundaries protect
us, and particularly children, from the potential influences of a world
“outside” that does not always have their – or our – best interests at heart.
The question about this domestic map has always been “where are the
media?” Are they outside the boundary, thus a potential influence on the
authentic articulation of love, care, values, meanings, and identities that
naturally occur within, or are they inside the boundary, part of the local
network of influences and resources for the making of meanings there?
A number of recent studies of television and other media have demon-
strated that, in important ways, the “boundary” between the domestic
sphere and the wider world is not really a relevant distinction in relation to