Dominant Culture in America

A dominant culture is one that is able through economic or political power, to impose its values, language and ways of behaving on a subordinate culture or cultures. This may be achieved by monopolizing the media and means of communication.¹ I would say the dominant culture in America is the pop culture. Pop culture influences the way we dress and even the way we talk. A lot of young people talk with slang words that their grandparents wouldn’t even understand. Pop culture affects everything we do, even the way we learn.
We now have all these computers and gadgets to assist us in learning. Communicating with each other has been made so simple. We are constantly in touch with each other through Facebook and Twitter.
Cellphones and texting make talking to one another so convenient. There is even a new written text language. Through computers and the internet, with the push of a button we can communicate with the whole world. Pop culture rules through the media, we are constantly bombarded by a generalized idea of how we should be, and how we should act. The media leads people to think they should look a certain way or act a certain way even though they don’t necessarily want to or feel comfortable doing so. Young people, women especially feel the need to be a certain weight or wear a specific size. Pop culture has even influenced diet. There are many diet fads that become quite popular, such as the Atkins diet, that people turn to and try in order to change their physical body to meet the popular standard. On the flip side of diet, pop culture has even influenced what we eat in a negative way. Pop star endorsed fast food restaurants have made picking up food so appealing and so easy that many Americans have become overweight. We are so numb to the fact that pop culture is leading our lives whether we want it to or not. The popular culture is a dominant culture due to the fact that it overpowers other cultural values
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