I recently went to
the USA to spend a semester on exchange in an American university. From
August 2012 till January 2013 I was in a country with a slightly different
culture to our own, and a very different university culture. But this
post is not going to explore the differences between Australian and American
universities. Rather, I’m going to
explore the way American universities are represented in movies and pop culture
and the real life experience I had.
College films
usually follow the same formula: lots of partying and drinking, not much actual
university coursework and plenty of girls everywhere. And although this is an obvious exaggeration,
it honestly wasn’t far off the truth.
I’ll start with the coursework.
It was on a whole another level of easy compared to Australia, and in
line with the lack of work done in pop culture films.
With the social
side of university in the States, pop culture movies have it pretty much spot
on. I attended many of the frat parties
over my time at the university, and some of the formats of these parties could
be part of any college film. The biggest
difference that I saw was there was a lack of sheer outlandish shenanigans of
the scale represented in film, but there was still plenty of ridiculous fun to
be had.
Here is an image from one of the parties I attended. The blurriness really adds to what sort of party it was, and the sort of events that were frequently being run by student organisations.
The popular
culture of the west – movies, television, music, books, newspapers and
magazines – have been increasingly flowing about the world (Hatchen &
Scotton 2002, pg. 4), and it is this form of globalisation that created my
awareness of how American university was represented. Now, after having gone over to the USA and
seen first-hand what it was like, I feel like I am a direct part of
globalisation. I had an initial thought
that American college was just the same as it was here. Then after viewing the movies through the
globalisation of entertainment and media I changed my view to those that were
represented in the films. And finally
after witnessing first-hand what it was actually like, I can see exactly how
globalisation changed my view, and just how accurate the representation really
was.
I like that you decided to write your blog on American universities form your own experiences. The comparisons you made between college and university life in Australia and America were an interesting revelation, as I’d always thought that American schooling would be harder. Your reference from the reading ‘popular culture of the west…flowing about the world’ was integrated into your blog very well and brought your concept together. The overall description of American college and how popular culture present it in films, books and television relates to the topic well. It was interesting to know that what we see in movies and read about in books is actually what college life is like for America. Although your source and image was good, I felt that maybe more of both would have been even more helpful. Maybe another picture of yourself at a party or of the campus. Other than that I thought you answered the topic well, how the popular culture of American collage life has changed your view.
ReplyDeleteHi Tim,
ReplyDeleteI think it would have been beneficial if there were more academic sources throughout your piece. Your reference used was highly relevant and clearly fitted into your discussion. Using your personal experience from an overseas trip made your post interesting and relatable. During your time away it appears that you really analysed your peers and surroundings and noticed similarities and differences between how they are portrayed in Australia through the media. It was slightly unclear towards the end exactly how your view changed towards those represented in films, however well done.