Identity through Covers

Today, I have been to Virgin Megastore at Landmark where all the awesome music and video games can be found. One thing that grabbed my attention was how each music genre has a way to express its music theme through CD Album covers. An example would be rock music . This type of music culture has many prominent and district features in its CD covers. The overall look of such covers is sort of gothic with skulls and people screaming and all. However, we can also see that rock music is divided into many subcultures such as metal, hard, emo and alternative. Each division has its own way of presenting its music and the overall look. I am honestly not suprised at how the identity fluidity had increased in the past couple of years given how music from all types of cultures is sold everywhere.

One of the interesting rock genres that should be touched upon is emo rock. Emo rock bands try to express their sorrowful way of life through singing. The emo fashion is getting more and more widespread especially these days. The performers usually have lengthy dark hair, with highlights, covering their eyes and wear tight fitted jeans. And whether the performer is a girl or a boy, the makeup is all over their faces. I think it is pretty interesting that this sort of subculture has local, translocal and virtual scenes almost everywhere in the world. Although emo is not very accepted in the middle east, there are some concerts that occur in Dubai in the “Dubai Rock Festival.” Below is a self-explanatory video of how emo people act and dress

Anyways, so back to Virgin, my friend showed me one pretty interesting thing. The cover of the Transformers Collector’s edition has the regular Optimus Prime character icon on it. However, when you flip the cover upside down, you can see Darth Vader from Star Wars. This is a very impressive form of product placement. Although the producers of the Transformers and the Star Wars movie franchise are not the same, this indirect form of advertisement happened. I find it amusing that companies find these indirect ways of advertising. This is much more interesting than watching a movie trailer about Star Wars on TV. This is mainly because people hate watching advertisements especially while they are watching their favorite TV series. It sort of feels like we are being interrupted somehow.

Of Queen and Masculinity

      This week's readings bothered me.

      While I fully understand that as a highly respected sociologist, this chapter's author is at the very least knowledgeable about issues of masculinity, I still felt that he was making countless ruthless assumptions about audience preferences in the 1970s. In truth, there is no need for me to further elaborate this point. I would just be wasting your time. All I need is a single word.

      Queen.

      ...They're that band with the really cool song.

      Well, they also had another equally cool song that will rock you. Among several other songs. You can't really stop them. They're true champions.

      Formed in 1970, Queen is a British rock band best known for their highly theatrical, complex, and innovative musical style. A single Queen song could incorporate several musical styles (as evidently shown in their revolutionary hit Bohemian Rhapsody, the really cool song in the video above), and therefore include several complex yet innovative transitions.

      One could go on forever about the history and the legacy of Queen, being a band that greatly revolutionized the rock genre with their daring and flamboyant style. In this blog, though, I will focus on their 1975 album: A Night at the Opera.

The tracklist for A Night at the Opera

      At the time of its release in 1975, A Night of the Opera was the most expensive album to have ever been recorded. The single Bohemian Rhapsody landed a then unprecedented success in music history, breaking a UK Singles Chart record by remaining as the top single for an entire nine weeks. A Night at the Opera's production was absolutely bizarre yet effectively innovative. For instance, can you believe that Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon was recorded out of...

Source

      A. TIN. BUCKET.

      My mind is blown.

      Rather than outlining how the image of masculinity is so carefully controlled in the media, I personally felt that this week's readings instead reinforced preconceived notions of masculinity. There was a significant disregard to exceptions to masculine portrayals typical of the 1970s. While the 1970s did indeed introduce the new notion of the "sensitive man" (albeit for only a short period of time), this renewed perception of masculinity was still not void of typical masculine traits such as physical strength and financial success.

      Queen dared to defy the then typical portrayal of masculinity through their flamboyant and theatrical musical style, styles that were typically adopted by most female singers as opposed to the typically stern yet enigmatic musical style of most male singers. Nonetheless, what most predicted as a surely controversial and highly risky musical style ended up as both a commercial success and musical legacy, as evident by the insane sales records A Night at the Opera achieved.

      Queen continued to defy such notions throughout the rest of their legendary musical career. Their most straightforward defiance of "typical" masculinity is most obviously seen on the music video for their single I Want to Break Free from their 1984 album The Works.

It's a girl! It's a mustache! It's Freddie Mercury...with a mustache...as a girl.

      
      It gradually becomes more evident that there is a gap in this reinforced belief of "typical" masculinity proposed by Michael Messner. How could Queen, a band so defiant of these social norms of gender, succeed so incredibly? Obviously, a large portion of the 1970s audience did not really abide by these reinforced social norms if they chose to support a rather "feminine" and theatrical band such as Queen.

Product Placement in the Arabic Music Industry

Product placement is advertising through non-traditional ways, especially by appearing in different cultural products of the media such as films, Television series, ...etc. In Hollywood, product placement is most famous for being used in almost every movie nowadays. On the other hand, in the Arab world, product placement in films is not a technique that is used as much. However, product placement has been highly associated with Arabic music industry for years. Product placement in the music industry has proved to be highly effective to the point that Rotana, one of the leading production companies in the Middle East, requires any singer that signs a contract with them to include product placement in his/her music video. Here are some examples for product placement in Arabic Music videos.  

Sony Xperia in Elissa's latest music video for her song "Ajmal Wahde"

Infiniti car in Elissa's latest music video for her song "Ajmal Wahde"

 

LG phone in Nawal Al Zoghbi's music video for her song "Aghla Al Habayeb"

It is also very common that certain companies would sign endorsement deals with famous singers or actors. For years, the most obvious endorsement deals were Coca-Cola's and Pepsi's deals with various super stars such as, Amr Diab, Nancy Ajram, Haifa Wahbi, Carol Smaha, Tamer Hosny, Cairokee, and many others. These deals end up in the production of different cultural products such as: programs, music videos, and films. All of these cultural products end up being an extended advertisement for these companies.

   

Coca-Cola's logo, cans, and red color all over Nancy Ajram's music video of her song
"Oul Tani Keda"

However, Coca-cola's presence in Nancy's music video isn't as ridiculous as Pepsi's campaign, as they produced an entire film and made sure they colored it blue. Bahr Al Nojoum or Sea of Stars is the name of the musical that Pepsi co-produced. Bahr Al Nojoum is the first Arabic promotional feature film. With no proper storyline, a lot of famous superstars, Pepsi made sure their logo would be on screen as long as possible. Here's a short clip from the film.

 

On the other hand, Coca-cola was smart enough to bring it's program, Coke Studio to the Middle East. A program they first launched in Brazil, then took to Pakistan, India, and lastly the Arab world. Coke Studio focuses on mixing two completely different genres of music in one song. The program puts more effort in presenting the audience with good music than rubbing Coca-Cola's logo in their faces. It's definitely a program that includes product placement, however, it respects it's audience way more than Pepsi's musical. Here's an example.

   

Localization of a Globalized Girls’ Night In

Movies,
Make-up,
Music,
Manicures,
Facials,
Food
and
Karaoke.

Put all the above together and you’ve got the perfect ingredients to an impressive “Girls’ Night In”. So, last weekend my sister and I had our cousins over to put this event together, but not in the way you’d expect. It’s common to see girls get together to stay in for the night and basically make fools of themselves in the privacy of their own homes.

The interesting part about the night in I had with my cousins is the fact that it was a localized version of a globalized “Girls’ Night In”. Let’s try to make that sentence a little clearer. The actual social get-together of young girls is popular around in the world. The way we see girls get together in movies seems fun and so we try it out. Not only do you see girls’ nights in acted out in movies you can also find it in commercials for facial products, or even food. It’s used in advertising that encourages the use of the product during the event.

This brings me to the first point of globalization. Multi-national corporations. There are several corporations that are involved in the different aspects of the event. Take for example the movies that we watched, these movies were made by the big western production companies. Chick flicks in particular are always a favorite. It’s not only the MNCs of movie companies that benefit from this particular event so does the music industry, food chains, and the make-up industry. Events like this are what help these corporations to gain a profit from them.

The ideology of capitalism works in here as well. Now that the corporations have got us “girls” to buy these chick flicks, and indulged themselves with the profit they have made they try to come up with new ideas to make more profit off us next year! For example there are actual box sets that you can buy especially for this sort of evening. This ties into the next point, which is the government. In this case the government are actually benefiting from the corporations selling in the country. The more the companies make, the more they do.

As with everything in life there is resistance and consequences. The resistance to a Girls’ Night In would be that it could cause people to think that it isn’t necessarily healthy to stay in and lay around doing nothing every weekend. Others might resist stating that they don’t want these “foreign” events to be part of society. The consequences of having things as such aren’t severe, but there are a few. Girls’ might become enticed by these things and deviate from the social norm here in Qatar.

As mentioned earlier this event was actually localized. Localizing this social event to this region meant adapting the actual layout, or format, and making it our own. Instead of music in the English language it was in Arabic, and so was the karaoke. The food was where East met West. All of the things that a group of girls would do in say France were done at this particular event, just with a Qatari twist. All the little details of the night are what localized it, everything from the language, the dress code, and the actual relationship between the guests.



The one thing that was definitely global is that everyone had a good time.

Globalization and Cultural Hegemony

Music is probably one of the most effective sociological and communication tools. Depending on the kind of music, it could appeal to individuals of almost every age group, gender and ethnicity. With the advent of the Internet and other means of telecommunication, music can also be appealing across boundaries. In short, music is now subject to globalization and this has been the case for the past several decades.


I love hip-hop music and closely follow artists like Eminem, The Game, Tupac etc, and thanks to the globalization of music, I am able to enjoy the same music that people from other nations listen to. Cultural globalization involves some sort of cultural exchange between different geographies that directly results in these countries enjoying foreign goods. These goods may not be solely materialistic goods, it could also be non-materialistic goods like music or lifestyles for instance. This process can take varying forms and produce a multitude of outcomes. According to some sociologists, this expanding transnational cultural exchange will in turn be profitable to certain countries, and in most cases, the United States seems to be yielding the most out of this cultural globalization. In fact, it would be right to say that the United States has established, knowingly or unknowingly, a cultural hegemony through its various music genres.

From fast-food culture to listening to hip-hop music, I believe that I am a part of America’s cultural hegemony. Although I listen to several American music artists, it is not necessary that an American should listen to Indian music (I am from India, FYI). Therefore, we see that cultural flow is only one-way, from dominant culture to peripheral culture, but not the other way round. By using tools like the internet and various applications, people around the world can tune in to listen to any music you want. I recently happened to learn about an application called Spotify, through which we can get access to almost all the music in the world even in your cellphone. I believe applications like these contribute a lot to the phenomenon of globalization.

So, is cultural globalization a positive phenomenon? Or is it just too overwhelming to know that you have been culturally imperialized? Something for the readers to think about.

Mama's Boy or Hybrid Masculinity?

Once again, Sociology has given me another chance to look things differently. What I learn in class can almost always be applied to everything around me on daily basis.

In today’s class, we learnt how masculinity is portrayed in cinema. During the early cinematic ages, men were portrayed as masculine, rough, tough, aggressive, powerful and competent. However, in the 1970’s, the embrace of feminism directly influenced the media industry. The “New Man” was more soft and sensitive. Following the feminist era, the reclaiming of traditional masculinity backlashed the feminist and the political state America was in during the 1980’s. This decade could be best described as “remasculinization”. Nevertheless, things changed. The end of 1980’s introduced hybrid masculinity. By hybrid masculinity, I mean the combination of sensitivity, compassion, and vulnerability with toughness, aggressiveness, and decisiveness.



Masculinity was not only portrayed in the cinema, but within stars and artists. The artist who stood out the most to me was Tupac Shakur, as his masculinity was constantly being questioned because of his songs such as Dear Mama. This may be because he expressed his sensitive side by dedicating some of his songs to his mother. On a social scale, rappers and men in general are expected to be tough, heartless and tough, but Tupac wasn’t. Tupac had more of a hybrid masculinity expressed within his music. He had sensitive songs such as Dear Mama and rough-aggressive lyrics such as Only God Can Judge Me.



In the song Dear Mama, he says, “Dear mama, Place no one above ya, sweet lady, your are appreciated, Don’t cha know we love ya?” Again, we get to see his sensitive side mentioning his mom in the lyrics of his song, Keep Ya Head Up. This is evident when he says, “And I realize momma really paid the price, she nearly gave her life, to raise me right.” On the other hand, he expresses his rough side in his song Only God Can Judge Me by saying “I’d rather die like a man, than live like a coward.



All in all, Tupac Shakur exemplifies the hybrid masculinity throughout his music by mentioning the difficulties he endured and the social problems his community had. He tends to be sensitive and compassion while being tough and aggressive.




“… They say I’m wrong and I’m heartless, but all along I was lookin' for a father he was gone… Dear Mama, you are appreciated...”

Diversity

We all share diverse cultures and traditions, come from a different race or ethnicity and communicate through assorted languages. Last Thursday, I went to the cultural village, Katara, with my friends Rana and Ola to see an African band from Nigeria perform. Although I didn’t know exactly where the band was from, I knew they were African because their physical features indicated their race. They were obviously distinct from everyone else because of the language they spoke, the way they dressed and the way they looked.





I didn't understand any of the words they were singing, but I was into it because I could sense their passion. Their music was lively and vibrant and captured a big audience. The band was playing with enthusiasm and they were breaking it down with their dance moves. The audience was a mixture of different races. I saw Qataris, Indians, Filipinos, Americans and other Arab nationalities. It was easy to distinguish the ethnicity of all these people because of their social factors such as language, dress and physical appearances. The majority of the people were appreciative of the art they were performing, however others were more critical and showed prejudice towards it. For instance, there was a group of rowdy Qatari teen boys that were flocking around the main vocalist and being rude to him and mocking him when he was introducing his band. They made racial comments and were making fun of their dancing, singing and clothing. This lack of respect is a result of ignorance regarding another person's culture and traditions.




After we enjoyed their music, we spoke to them they asked were we from and they guessed that Ola was Brazilian. Although both Ola and I are Sudanese, he thought she was Brazilian because she had a lighter skin tone than him and curly light hair. When he found out that we were both Sudanese, he said to us, "You are my sisters." Being Africans, he believed we had the same ethnicity, deeming that "share national origin; a common ancestry; a place of birth; distinctive concrete traits; or socially important physical characteristics." This really got me thinking of my own identity and what I view myself as. The physical and social characteristics that I inherit from my parents and family are by chance. I very much consider myself as African, but only in terms of context meaning the only thing that I believe makes me African is geography. I regard myself to be culturally and ethnically Arab; therefore I am Arab by choice , culture and ethnicity.

North Korea VS Qatar

The eye-opening documentary “A State of Mind” is centered on two North Korean gymnasts, Pak Hyon Sun and Kim Song Yun, who are preparing for the Pyongyang mass games, an annual event in NorthKorea. Throughout this documentary we not only see the ongoing struggles and challenges the girls face but also how their everyday life is, living in a communist run country that is extremely secluded from the rest of the world. After watching the documentary, the vast differences in culture between Qatar and North Korea were extremely apparent especially when it came to cultural diffusion, but regardless of North Korea’s ethnocentrism, some sociological similarities were visible as well.

The importance of family is a major one. Qataris and North Koreans share the same intense respect and love for family. For example we see Pak Hyon Sun is an only child living with her parents and grandparents under the same roof and Kim Song Yun is one of three girls in her family also living with their parents. Similarly, Qatari families have the same values when it comes to loved ones and express the same admiration towards elders. Mother daughter relationships in particular resemble each other in both cultures even in the smallest things, like mothers showing maternal affection and telling you to finish your food or go do your homework.

The mass games require an extreme amount of determination, skill and training especially in a sport as challenging as gymnastics however when compared to Qatar we see how similar that is with soccer in the region. Qatar has assembled a young team of athletes just over a decade before the event in hopes of reaching the impeccable standard it needs to win the world cup in 2022. This includes vigorous training sessions and ongoing will power, very much like what the two girls had to go through to be ready for the mass games.

The music and dancing portrayed in the documentary also shares the same essence as Qatar’s in that it’s very tradition oriented. During celebrations such as the mass games we hear patriotic music played by an orchestra and each dance or performance is telling a story. Qatar also has traditional dances and music originating from Bedouin times, in particular a sword dance called the Ardha, usually performed by men. Qatari music revolves largely around percussion and string instruments such as drums, violins and oud.

Qatar and North Korea are widely different from each other when it comes to most things, there’s no denying that. North Korea is definitely one of the more secretive countries in the world so their way of life might look strange to foreigners, but no matter how different a culture is to the other, there are certain aspects that they all have in common no matter how ethnocentric they are.

The Punk Movement

With the appearance of a shaved porcupine and the attitude of a badly behaving Rottweiler, the punk had a major impact on the vanilla attitudes of the British population. It developed as a counter-culture, completely going against the values and norms of the general public; they were the bad boys and girls of the day. Mothers probably made up nasty stories about punks just to keep their children in line.

The punk movement came up as a way to show the world that there were those who simply would not succumb to the folkways and the mainstream scene, be it fashion or music. A typical punk wore torn or recycled clothes that no decent Brit would look at twice, held together crudely with safety pins. Body piercings too were very common.

The punk movement also brought about a genre of music known as punk rock. The music is very aggressive, played with distorted guitars and loud drums. The singer practically screams at the audience. Mostly, punk rockers sing about their ideologies and their views of the world. Some famous punk rock bands are “Sex Pistols”, “Minor Threat” and the American sell-out band “Green Day.”

The punk movement gave rise to various other factions, sort of like a culture within a sub-culture. Goth and Emo are both off-shoots of the punk rock movement. As are “hardcore punk,” and “anarchy punk.”

Punk rock isn’t only isolated to Europe and the Americas. There are punk rockers in the Middle-East as well. Musicians like Rachid Taha are heavily influenced by punk rock. Bands like Mazhott (Damascus), Creative Waste (Saudi Arabia) and Slumpark Correctional (Syria) are also quiet popular in the region.

Latino Dance Culture in Qatar

The World in A Cultural Village!

On the 6 of March, I attended a very unique event that was held in Qatar University, and which was more like a celebration of different cultures, uniting a wide range of diverse countries and nationalities into a small village, called as “The Cultural Village.”



The Cultural Village is a great student event that enriches the audience with activities representing the variety of cultural heritages at Qatar University. It takes place annually and is organized by QU Students under the supervision and guidance of the Student Activities Department.



The event’s main objective is to introduce its audience to the different cultures of QU Students who come from various parts of the globe. The village will include a number of booths, exhibitions, and several cultural activities that reflect the uniqueness of each culture as perceived by the participants through folkloric shows, music, traditional customs, and plays. The best of all, this event is open to the public.





According to sociology, such event as considered a multi-cultural activity can be described using the Interaction Theory. It helps create cultural diffusion, which is the spreading of cultural traits, products, ideas, or behaviors from one culture to another. It is also a great opportunity for people coming from different countries to reflect their cultures by doing interesting and fun activities. Cultural village allows social and cultural interaction with a large, diverse audience and prevents any kinds of cultural gaps or stereotypes.



In addition to that, the Cultural Village is a great chance for the students to introduce themselves and know each other. It allows you to live between cultures and experience different countries’ norms and traditions by just setting there and having the spirit to observe and cheer.





What is also special about this event is that it is a great environment for the students to show off their talents and special capabilities, which helps enhance their self-confidence and leaves positive impressions on their community. I was really impressed by the students’ potentials as some of them were casting poems and speeches that they wrote by themselves. Others were acting, dancing, singing, and playing different musical instruments. In short, I can describe the Cultural Village as a fun and exciting way to travel around the world and explore different cultures and identities.

This video is one of the great performances done in the event, which is a Palestinian traditional dance called "Dabkeh."

It's Fryyy-day Fryyy-day

It's Friday, Friday. You know you love it. And apparently the world agrees. 13-year-old Rebecca Black has come out of absolutely nowhere to become the biggest YouTube sensation of the moment, demonstrating the power of social media. She's already got more hits than Lady Gaga's latest song.

I can't decide if I love this or hate it. The inane lyrics ("gotta have my bowl, gotta have cereal"), the cheesy video production values, the overuse of Auto-Tune (for "singers" who can't sing in pitch), the earnest performance, and even the way Black sings the words "Friday."

Sure, it's grating and annoying, but it's also goofy and winning. It's easy to hate and hard to hate, all at the same time. To quote Black, it's fun, fun, fun, fun. Sociologically, you can go in a million directions with this. It certainly demonstrates the democratic use of the Internet, the power of social media (the song went viral in less than a week), the sexualization of young girls, the media's ongoing fascination with youth culture, cyberbullying, the infectious thrill of corny-yet-awesome pop music, the explosion of the prosumer, and the fact that industry manufactured stars like Beyonce may not be offering what people really want. Opinions are decidedly mixed, but you have to admit, this is a darn catchy song. Play it once, you'll probably play it again -- whether you want to or not.

Like all viral videos, "Friday" immediately spawned a host of parodies, covers, tributes, and other hilarious responses. This one is particularly great.


And if you hate that, there's always the super slowed-down version that sounds like some art-rock madness cooked up by Radiohead.


Or the chipmunk, fast version. Aw yeah!

Use your finger to stir my tea, and for dessert I’ll suck your teeth.
Be too sweet and you’ll be a goner, yup, I’ll pull a Jeffery Dahmer.
Listen to the track on the official Kesha channel on youtube.



Those were words from the second verse of Ke$ha’s Cannibal from the Extended Play of the same name. Of course, after hearing the disturbing lyrics, ignoring the catchy beat, I decided to simply search this unfamiliar name. Of course, I understood the rest of the lyrics; she wants to eat boys for breakfast and lunch and she’s proud of calling herself a cannibal that she shouts "I am cannibal." That at first didn’t disturb me as much. On the contrary, I thought it was creative for the EP to be called Cannibal since it’s kind of a step higher in her diet from her debut album Animal, but that’s not the point. The point is that she used the name in her song and I simply had to Google it; Jeffery Dahmer.

It turns out that Jeffery Dahmer was a real cannibal, before he was ironically murdered in jail the same way her killed his fist victim. Enjoying his secret activity as a cannibal and a necrophiliac (someone who satisfies his pleasures over corps and dead bodies) and especially bodies he kills himself. With more research, I found out that there’s an influence from the surrounding society to this created monster. He grew up in this environment where he picked up the habit of dissecting dead animals when he’s young, and it’s only natural that he’d want to progress to something bigger as he grows old; something bigger here being the human bodies.



Now, I’m seeing that pop music is spreading things I didn’t know because with it I learned more about the cannibal culture, as an example. There are different movies and books which are inspired by real life societies and culture of cannibals. The scariest productions of all are TV documentaries about the real cannibals. There’s obviously a real social aspect and a taboo that can’t be denied, or where would those songs, movies and books have their inspiration from? And I guess the way pop culture deals with this horrifying act is by making it part of it. In Ke$ha’s case, she made this image of cannibalism somewhat acceptable. When something becomes part of the pop culture, even out of another culture, it seems familiar and therefore we’re not afraid of it anymore. Why? Because it connects to us and becomes popular within us as well. I’m not trying to say we’ll grow to be cannibals, but we won’t fear it until we witness it.

Read this blog post to see the association of pop culture and societies acceptance of taboos.

Taboos and Popular Culture

Your heart is closed and in my hand I’ve got so many keys.
Which secret key will ever let me open your heart?
Once I open your heart, tell me, will you accept me?
I can’t stop this TABOO, that undeniable TABOO.


Those words were written by the Japanese lyricist and artist Koda Kumi that simply shows how some of our instincts are incontrollable or to vulgar that the society can’t accept. TABOO, reaching number one in the Japanese Oricon Charts, is also the strictest and most highly regulated norm of all the norms. In this case, Koda Kumi lyrics clearly states that even though there are a lot of unaccepted sub-cultures in one’s society, there mighty still be some part that will open the society’s “heart by a key.” That is not true to all cultures because it’s affected by the history, the religious beliefs and other factors. With popular music, movies and culture, other cultures around the world start to accept these forms of taboo and might have an influence on the today’s and future generations.

Photo on the right: CD single of the #1 song TABOO by Koda Kumi.

Some of these cultures include people who believe they’re vampires; groups of homosexuals; groups of drug dealers; or groups that enjoy an unusual form of pleasure, like Rihanna likes to say it “but chains and whips excite me.” There’s a strong message in that song. It became popular and Rihanna has a huge fan base ranging from adults to teenagers to kids. The reason this is shown to the society now without having a lot of conflict or controversy is because it’s already accepted. How? By the over exposure of music videos and movies that contain such themes.
Picture on the left: Rihanna on the Cover of a 2010 G.O. Magazine issue promoting sexual images and themes.



The Simpsons, Ugly Betty, Family Guy, Six Feet Under; these are just a list of popular TV shows and top rated that shows either hidden or exposed themes of sexual jokes and humor, drugs, drinking and homosexuality. People become more addicted to this and keep watching while their subliminal mind starts to slowly accept taboos.

So, back to Koda Kumi’s song, TABOO, the media holds a lot of keys that slowly unlocks the “closed-minded” society’s heart. Not all societies are accepting yet, and some are still strict and reject but not as 3o years ago. More promotion happens and generations are affected. So the question is, how far will this acceptance go? Until when will this norm breaking habit continue? We don’t know but we can observe and witness the spread of acceptance and tolerance thanks to popular culture and popular media.

PS. TABOO is capitalized because that’s the official way of writing the song through its official profile on the website.

The video below is the music video of TABOO, where the general story shows Koda Kumi's interest in a man who later on disappears and she finds him with, not much of an interest to the opposite sex. But, unexpectedly, she smiles and accepts it. This message makes her fans accept this along with her as well.

Hit me baby one more time?

Okay so mostly everyone living in the 21st century knows, or was once shamefully obsessed with, the one and only Britney Spears. Less than a decade ago she was a pop culture sensation and was known throughout the world for her talent.

Popular culture refers to the aesthetic products created and sold by profit-seeking firms operating in the global entertainment market (Grazian, p7). So technically britney is regarded as a "product" to be sold to the public, and profit is expected to be made out of her talent.

She started out as an innocent young country girl who just loved to sing but somewhere along the way she lost herself and became a lesser version of herself.

The worst part is that the whole world had to witness her breakdowns and her face was all over the magazines and tabloids.

Who could forget this phase of her life. The whole world witnessed as Britney went through a bad breakup and watched as her career went down to shambles compared to how it was before.

Enough about her past for now. What really got my attention this week was her new music video for her latest single "Hold it Against Me".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Edv8Onsrgg

I figured this would be the time for her to regain herself and maintain her initial claim to fame. The fame that came without the rumors and drugs; the fame that came out of respect for her talent.

But I couldn't be more wrong. The video was not the comeback we were all waiting for, it was more of a video promoting her products and enticing people to buy specific brands.

The video revolved around product placement. Each product was shown really quick but the audience could easily notice the brand and anyone would notice that it was no coincidence that the products were placed in the video.

Less than one minute into the music video Britney receives a perfume from one of the background dancers and of course it is "radiance" by Britney Spears, and the camera zooms in on the perfume and large bold letters are clear to the audience. She sprays some perfume and continues to look for other products to introduce next. Next there is a short pause on a make up packet, Make up forever, which she opens and applies to her eye lids. Then she is shown using the sony plasma touch screen, surfing the web on the the plentyoffish website, which was also seen in Lady Gaga's Telephone video (which is a whole other shameful story about product placement). After that there are plenty of other clips where the word Sony dominates the screen.

Even though the video looks like it would be a high budget project, I reckon it easily broke even and received profit from the ridiculous amount of advertisements in the video.