Demassification. Concentration. Convergence. Interactivity. Globalization. What are these words you ask? Trends; trends found in mass communication. But what exactly do these words mean? Let’s start off by defining demassification since this will be a major part of my discussion. Demassification is defined as “media’s focus on narrower audience segments” (Vivian 11). The other trends listed above are pretty self-explanatory. In mass media, these types of trends are extremely important. They allow a company, or in my case, the political realm to become invested in their audience and gain the support needed to be sustained.
Let’s look at an example. In an article titled “The Uses of Polarization” by Thomas B. Edsall, he discusses that “a primary goal of a presidential campaign is to incrementally increase margins of support among volatile and persuadable demographic groups…" We can see that it is all about the audience and use of trends like demassification. In the online article he begins to explain the ethnic groups that the Republicans and Democrats tend to advertise towards.
In order for a candidate to gain the attention of the voter, several measures must be taken. There are about 3 that I can think of:
1) Pick a cause to support.
2) Make said video or advertisement about the cause to draw in the voter.
3) Travel around the country trying to gain the respect and interest of as many
voters as possible.
These steps seem appropriate, right? On YouTube you can find many
political ads that are linked to a certain "group" of voters. Let’s take a look at one: Can
you guess what "group" he is talking to?
In an essay by David C. King, Associate Professor of Public Policy at Harvard University, he outlines “Congress, Polarization, and Fidelity to the Median Voter.” He describes the notions that politicians go through and makes known the difference between the stages of voting and the dedication of the politician to each voter in that stage. Does that make sense? Here is a better way to put it: “This paper tracks the relationship between a congressional district’s two-party competition and a member’s fidelity to voter interests.” According to the Clerk of the House of Representatives website, during the 2010 US Representatives Election the state of South Carolina had a total of 1,318,794 voters and the country total was 86,784,957 voters. No wonder trends such as demassification and concentration have to be used to gain the attention of such diverse and large audiences.
In my next blog I will draw on the topic of globalization and interactivity in relation to the political spectrum.
Sources Used:
The Media of Mass Communication by John Vivian
"Congress, Polarization, and Fidelity to the Median Voter" by David C. King
"The Uses of Polarization" by Thomas B. Edsall
Statistics of the Congressional Election of November 2, 2010 by the Clerk of the House of Representatives: Karen L. Haas
I never realized how important demassification in other aspects besides the entertainment sector of media. It makes sense now, after reading your blog entry, how demassification has become a tool for political candidates to use in their favor. If they want to gain the votes of Republican Christians, like Rick Perry did in his video, then they can target their campaign ads just for that group. It becomes advantageous for them to target these niche audiences. It goes beyond just targeting one of the two main political parties in our country. I recently read somewhere that most Americans rather than being an extreme leftist or an extreme rightist, are moderate in their political views. Since so many of us consider ourselves moderates, if a candidate is in favor of something we can relate to and agree with, they will gain our vote.
ReplyDelete- Carly Grieff
Demassification is what really makes media so effective in politics. Targeting specific audiences is the best way to gain supporters and build communities. People identify with specific points of view and consume information from sources they can relate to. Rick Perry targeted a Christian audience to gain support from their community. He presents himself in a way that is attractive to Christian voters. I agree with Carly's point that appealing to a niche audience is advantageous to increase appeal to a specific group which hopefully will increase overall public appeal. With voter awareness generally at such a low level, one ad could be a deciding factor in favoring a candidate because opinions can be easily swayed if they are mostly based on emotion.
ReplyDelete- Mary Beth Summerall
DeleteGood points! The concepts of demassification and narrowcasting has affected politics in that politicians and their campaigns must draw in their niche audience and create a platform that they relate to. The Rick Perry commercial is just one of thousands you could probably find to represent how politicians are using the idea of a niche audience to group together voters and appeal to them as a whole. As well as shape their public image in a particular way. -Jordan Sandwick
ReplyDelete