7th Topic: Media Imperialism

The documentary entitled "The Power of Nightmares (Part 3 - Shadow in the Cave)" by Adam Curtis was shown in class on Monday. How do you relate the information given to you in the documentary to the theory of Media Imperialism



Here some definition of Media Imperialism to get some ideas what it is all about. Taken from wiseGEEK.com:

Media imperialism is a theory stating that smaller countries are losing their identity due to the force-feeding of media from larger nations. It can be equated to small community shops closing down due to large superstores moving in, taking over and having a monopoly. As the larger media corporations begin to take over, smaller media companies are either being forced out or swallowed up.

The media coverage of the larger nations has been criticized as having blanket coverage of the world's events. The media content may be affected by the ability to control the content and amount of media coverage on a particular issue. Many think that media imperialism has led to biased information and inaccuracy within news stories.

1st Critical Reflection
The documentary is about the Neo-Conservative movement in the United States of America and the radical Islamists. After the tragedy of 9/11, US Government use this advantage to accused the extreme islamist fault and have a reason to infiltrate other countries as an act of protecting their nation by bringing down the terrorist. But if we think of the matter more deeply, they really don't have any rights to infiltrate other countries and sly accusation without solid proof. They just use a theory of which will give the US Government a threat in time, but theory alone can't prove the real thing. This shows that media imperialism is so powerful which can easily influence our mindset.

2nd Critical Reflection
The power of media imperialism can be interpreted as hypnosis. As the politician said that he promised to protect us from nightmares which they called terrorist. However, we are really living in the world of fantasy and deception. Even though we realize that it is wrong to simply attack one land without further investigation, the media repeatedly trying to prove to us that the wrong is right and vice versa which eventually confused our mind in judging the truth and the lies. As the US Government controls the media, there will be biased information provided to us because they want us to think of what they want us to think and not the opposite of that.

Personal Reflection
I was absent on this week (sorry about that :p). But I was able to watch the documentary on my free time by asking my friends what we were supposed/told to do in the class. The documentary entitled "The Power of Nightmares (Part 3 - Shadow in the Cave)" by Adam Curtis. Since the length of the documentary is almost 1 hour, I almost bore myself. But I must say it is an interesting documentary which reveals the truth of the US Government that creates an imagination on the people's mind to let the government do whatever they want to do.


with passion,
~Fadhil~