In his article “Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century”, Jenkins defines Participatory Culture as one that has low barriers to entry and as a result, lowers the expression of the individual. In this type of culture, everyone has some sort of place, but they all, to some degree, only add their own twist to an old idea. Jenkins suggests that it is of more importance that children find their own way of doing things. In turn, the children will be able to change the way they think about themselves as well as the way others view them.
Minorities in America make up a large chunk of the demographics, yet even so, they still conform to the “white” way of doing things rather than branching out and embracing their own culture and ethnicity. This allows the white people to effectively control the media and instead of the United States being a melting pot, it is a place where minorities are forced to assimilate to the white way of doing things because that is how the media and Internet portrays things as.
As stated above, there are dangers to a Participatory Culture because it causes the minorities to lose touch with their roots. Personally, after living in America for my whole life, many friends tell me that I do not seem like an “Indian” and that I act “White”. When I hear these things I feel a little bit detached from my own culture. Just because I speak English without an accent and wear similar clothes to my peers does not make me any less Indian than I really am, but at the same time, being born and raised here in America has made me less like my ancestors and more like the person that media wants all children to be.
Minorities in America make up a large chunk of the demographics, yet even so, they still conform to the “white” way of doing things rather than branching out and embracing their own culture and ethnicity. This allows the white people to effectively control the media and instead of the United States being a melting pot, it is a place where minorities are forced to assimilate to the white way of doing things because that is how the media and Internet portrays things as.
As stated above, there are dangers to a Participatory Culture because it causes the minorities to lose touch with their roots. Personally, after living in America for my whole life, many friends tell me that I do not seem like an “Indian” and that I act “White”. When I hear these things I feel a little bit detached from my own culture. Just because I speak English without an accent and wear similar clothes to my peers does not make me any less Indian than I really am, but at the same time, being born and raised here in America has made me less like my ancestors and more like the person that media wants all children to be.