mass-communication-theory

334 Section 4 Contemporary Mass Communication Theory
primary, or dominant,
reality
In frame analysis,
the real world in
which people and
events obey certain
conventional
and widely accepted
rules
(sometimes referred
to as the
dominant reality)
Not only are they vulnerable to sexual advances, they signal their desire for them.
No wonder these ads attract the attention of men. No wonder they are useful in
positioning products. But could these representations of women be teaching or reinforcing
social cues that have difficult consequences? Feminist theorists have
made similar arguments (Walters, 1995).
We might be learning more than product definitions from these ads. We could
be learning a vast array of social cues, some blatant but others quite subtle. Once
learned, these cues could be used in daily life to make sense of members of the same
or opposite sex and to impose frames on them, their actions, and the situations in
which we encounter them. Or it’s possible that these ads simply reinforce the cues
we’ve already learned in daily life. But the constant repetition of the cues in the ads
leads us to give them greater importance or priority. As we’ll see later in this chapter,
some researchers would argue that media cues can prime us to frame subsequent situations
one way rather than another. For example, exposure to advertising could
prime men to be overly sensitive to playful cues from women and increases the likelihood
that they will upshift. Men learn such a vast repertoire of these cues that it
might be hard for women to avoid displaying them. Men could routinely misinterpret
inadvertent actions by women. Advertising might make it hard for women to
maintain a serious frame for their actions. If they smile, bend their elbows in a particular
way, or bow their heads even briefly, men might perceive a cue when none
was intended. The more physically attractive the woman, the more likely this problem
will arise, because most advertising features good-looking women.
Goffman’s theory provides an intriguing way of assessing how media can elaborate
and reinforce a dominant public culture. Advertisers didn’t create sex-role
stereotypes, but, Goffman argued, they have homogenized how women are publicly
depicted. This is the danger of hyperritualization. Goffman contrasted the variety
of ways that women are represented in private photos with their standardized (hyperritualized)
depiction in advertising. Marketers routinely use powerful visual imagery
to associate products with women who explicitly and implicitly signal their
willingness to be playful sexual partners. There are many subtle and not-so-subtle
messages in these ads. “Consume the product and get the girl” is one dominant
message. Another is that physically attractive women are sexually active and funloving.
Ads both teach and reinforce cues. They regularly prime us to frame situations
one way rather than another. The specific messages each of us gets from the ads may
be very different, but their long-term consequences may be similar—dominant myths
about women are retold and reinforced.
Compared with the other theories we have examined in this chapter, Goffman’s
is the most open-ended and flexible. He was convinced that social life is a constantly
evolving and changing phenomenon, and yet we experience it as having great continuity.
Though we have the capacity to constantly reframe our experience from
moment to moment, most of us can maintain the impression that our experiences are
quite consistent and routine. According to Goffman, we do this by firmly committing
ourselves to live in what we experience as the primary, or dominant, reality—a real
world in which people and events obey certain conventional and widely accepted
rules. We find this world so compelling and desirable that we are constantly reworking
our experience and patching up flaws in it, and we don’t notice when rule violations
occur.
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