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Published in the Slovak Republic Media Education (Mediaobrazovanie) Has been issued since 2005 ISSN 1994-4160 E-ISSN 1994-4195 2020, 60(2): 333-344
DOI: 10.13187/me.2020.2.333 www.ejournal53.com
Suggestive Impact of Linguocultural Phenomena in Media Communication
Olga Verbitskaya a , *
a Irkutsk State University, Russian Federation
Abstract
This article considers the level of development of contemporary mass communication means and the specificity of their all-round impact on a person. Media culture influences society values, different social groups' way of thinking. However, in the conditions of mass introducing of informative and computer technologies, not only positive but also negative methods of mass communication impact both on a separate individual and on the society on the whole are being extended. Media culture is a unique social institution of information age, and such landmark fragment of American conceptosphere as linguocultural type (LCT) "the Hollywood Star" is media culture product and is analyzed in this work from conceptual, figurative and evaluative aspects. The specific trait of this linguocultural concept consists in its involvement into historical and cultural context, the ability to associate with verbal, symbolic and event-trigger phenomena known to all members of linguistic and cultural community. The work reveals verbal and semiotic characteristics of LCT under review, analyses its ethnocentric essence. Close attention is paid to psychological, linguistic and discursive aspects of suggestion of audiovisual means of mass media, to their communicative role. On the basis of linguocultural signs their suggestive impact on mass consciousness is shown in the process of media communication. The conclusion is drawn that subjective senses of the media culture products are actualized at the level of intellectual, evaluative and ideological text's implications.
Keywords: linguocultural type, manipulative potencies of mass media, suggestive informational impact, media discourse.
1. Introduction
The recourse to the study of mass media impact on public consciousness within linguistic and cultural studies at present moment is an urgent and perspective task in the context of permanent globalization and due to the fact that the main channel of mass information spreading are electronic mass media. Mass media are social institution established for collection, processing and dissemination of information on massive scale. These include the press, publishing houses, radio, television, films, videos and sound recording, and Internet. Mass media is used for a broad and comprehensive messaging, throughout society. Their product, the information is addressed not to the individual but a large audience. In modern society there is an increasingly growing penetration of the mass media in all spheres of life. Definition of the press as "the fourth power" (along with the legislative, executive and judicial one) rightly applies to all media indicating their importance in the system of power relationship. It's closely connected with the role they play in the formation, operating, evaluation of public opinion, the political consciousness of the citizens, their value
* Corresponding author
E-mail addresses: verba-helga@mail.ru (O.M. Verbitskaya)
orientations and preferences. Due to the omnipresent media culture the system of spiritual reproduction is being transformed. Taking into account all above said, we consider the study of media influence on people's minds of utter importance.
2. Materials and methods
Numerous monographic explorations and articles by Alexander Fedorov, the main expert in the field of media literacy education in Russia (Fedorov, 2007; 2009; 2011; 2019), served as materials of our research, the works by Russian media pedagogues were used for the same purpose (Barsukova, 2012; Fedorov, Levitskaya, 2017; Ivanova, 1999; Lukasheva, 2017). The tasks of analysis are consideration, precision, and concretization of the notion "linguocultural type", its essence, nature, definition of suggestive impact executed by media culture as a phenomenon of information age.
Research methods which allowed to analyze the state of domestic scholars' views in the area of media education and linguocultural studies are the following: semiotic, descriptive, comparative, discourse analysis, the method of targeted selective observation, dictionary definitions analysis, terminological unification etc. The author also resorted to the methods of decoding stylistics during authentic text interpretation (Kukharenko, 1987).
3. Discussion
As a preamble, it would be appropriate to mention such an important sphere of human activity as art. On the one hand, artistic works themselves perform an independent communicative function and significantly affect the non-verbal communication of people, and on the other hand, the basis of many types of art (such as stage performance, ballet, music, cinema, and especially fine art) is precisely non-verbal communication. And if a word is addressed to human consciousness, the rational-logical sphere, then art, first of all, appeals to the emotional-figurative sphere of a person and his/her subconscious. Many scholars underline that on this important psychophysiological regularity, the huge suggestive power of media culture is largely based upon (Jolls, Johnsen, 2018; Petranova, Hossova, Velicky, 2017; Tayie, 2008).
A logical question arises - to what degree are we actually free and autonomous? To what point do we always consciously manage our mental process, our attitudes, our behavior, our actions and emotions? Maybe most of our decisions are influenced by outside? It is not so difficult to do this and, by no means, it is not always reached through tough coercion, but sometimes due to a gentle, deliberate shift of the focus of our attention, of our thought process, our beliefs, and judgments in the direction which someone needs - and respectively, your actions there too. It is quite possible to quietly persuade us imperceptibly, to convince us discreetly - in short - to manipulate us. Experts say that, unfortunately, humans are suggestible creatures. And there can be no doubt about that. Each person is exposed to daily manipulations in various areas of life. And not only through words and pictures, that is, visually and cognitively, but also through latent impacton any sensory organs.
How it is frighteningly simple to bypass the controlling authority of the human brain has been described by the psychologist Daniel Kahneman in his book "Thinking, Fast and Slow" (Kaneman, 2011). Kahneman says that the most reliable way to make people believe even the falsest statement is to repeat it often. Moreover, these repetitions must be multiple, because in this case they are absorbed by the brain as thoroughly memorized knowledge, and as a result, is accepted by consciousness as the truth. Manipulative techniques are so sophisticated and veiled that it is very difficult to spot them (Hobbs, 2011; Seoki, 2016). When reading these lines, many people have an association with the advertising business. We unwittingly catch mass consciousness stereotypes which fill all the space around us (Kacinova, 2018). An aggressive stream of specially designed advertising and imposed emotional states constantly flows to the mass recipient through news and advertising fragments (Munoz-Leiva et al., 2015).
An example of this widely used manipulative technics is the endless discussion by all the news channels of the coronavirus epidemic (COVID19), which puts the viewers in a slightly zombified state of mind in which we are all now. Thus, our reaction to events is controllable. Any advertisement is designed in such a way that it imperceptibly, in the background, shifts a person's internal priorities from what he/she wants to what the advertiser needs (Robinson, 2017). In this connection, further in our study we will talk about such significant fragment of the American conceptosphere as "the Hollywood Star". The relevance of the problem under consideration also
lies in the fact that, despite the impressive number of works devoted to the study of the problem of the linguocultural character "the Hollywood Star", the problem of the impact of this American national concept on the mass consciousness is not sufficiently investigated.
Linguocultural type (LCT) is a recognizable image of a representative of a culture, typified on the basis of sociocultural criteria, as well as certain specific characteristics of verbal and non-verbal behavior (Karasik, 2005). It should be noted that in terms of its cognitive essence, the linguocultural character can be considered a kind of concept, since it is localized in the mind as a complex multi-level mental formation. Following V.A. Maslova, we propose to consider the concept of "mentality" not as philosophical, scientific or aesthetic systems, but the level of social consciousness at which thought is not separated from emotions, from latent habits and methods of consciousness (Maslova, 2004).
When studying the linguocultural type, priority is given to establishing "the cultural and diagnostic significance of the typed personality for understanding the corresponding culture" (Karasik, Dmitrieva, 2005: 10). Since we are dealing with a generalized image of a representative of Hollywood show business and cinema, this image is determined by the deduced value orientation to the propaganda of lifestyle in American society.
Based on the studied theoretical material, LCT "the Hollywood Star" is presented by us as a model person, that is, a sociocultural type that is imitated or opposed by representatives of the same culture. It should be noted that the main characteristic of any model personality is the establishment of value guidelines for behavior (Karasik, 2005). Consequently, the value component of LCT "the Hollywood Star" that we are analyzing represents certain value dominants of an individual belonging to a certain linguocultural society in any period of being, and is reflected in the culture of a native speaker. It must be emphasized that the axiological aspects of LCT are its pivotal element, its basic component and, at the same time, a striking carrier of ethnocultural information. This element is objectified in the aggregate of a generalized, stable idea that meets some needs, interests, intentions, goals, plans of a linguistic personality (Huseynov,1998) "primary, higher principles" (Petrov, 2009: 30), which force people to act in a certain way by defining typed behavior. Also, outwardly, values act as properties of an object or phenomenon, however, they are inherent in it not by nature, not simply because of the internal structure of the object itself, but because it is involved in the sphere of human social life and has become a carrier of certain social relations.
Based on the above said about the axiological parameters of the linguocultural type "the Hollywood Star", we confirm that everything that has value potential always has an impact on society, on its mapping of the world, on public consciousness. And after V.P. Shestakov we attribute the film industry, show business and everything that is associated with these social phenomena called "mass culture", which expands the cultural values of celebrities not only within the United States, but also in the cultures of other countries to a greater or lesser extent on the strength of its originality. Why is this happening? For the sole reason that any culture has a "tendency to generalization, to adaptation and assimilation of other forms of culture" (Shestakov, 1988: 54).
LCT "the Hollywood Star" itself has a powerful hypnotic effect on the minds and public consciousness.
So, in confirmation, we find the response of the frantic desire of an individual to Hollywood "goods" in illustrative artistic material:
1. "I wanna make money, I wanna live in glamour,
I wanna have a big house, I wanna drive a sports car.
But you know that I don't got it, probably never have it
God was playin' a joke when he made me
I don't have any money, I don't even have a job
I'm not a movie star, and I'll probably never be.
I wish I was a hunk, I wish I was muscular
Why can't I be good looking, why can't I be taller?
I wish my teeth were white, and wish my butt was tight
I wish I had a big chest, you know I wish I was the best.
And you know that I don't got it, probably never have it
God's got a sense of humor, just look at me" (Calibretto, 2008).
2. "' Why don't I look like that woman (from Penthouse magazines)?'And then it struck me. The truth is, that woman doesn't even look like that woman. Her body has been painted to create
hollows and shadows and curves. Her gravity-defying breasts: supported by transparent sticky tape. The photos: air-brushed to remove any wrinkle, dimple, pimple, crinkle" (Lette, 2007: 179). At the syntactic level, a contrast is revealed (that woman - I) and (that woman - that woman, the women on the cover are opposed to themselves, their real image and quasi-real).
3. "...Frieda had known that one day he (Toby) was going to become a famous and important man» (Sheldon, 1997: 26). «'.God meant you to be a big man, Toby. You'll go to New York, and when you're a famous star, you'll send for me'" (Sheldon, 1997: 30).
The model under consideration embodies the full range of such values of American society, as riches (material/tangible wealth), glory (fame), chance (success), possibility of self-realization (self-actualization), public position (condition /social status), all that combines in itself the American dream. Taken separately these elements of the valued picture of the world do not carry the negative coloring, but their pragmatic meaning varies from neutral to the negative sense. Also, some dominants correspond to status descriptions of the Hollywood star, so it is necessary to add to all above-mentioned characteristics publicity, the idea about a star as about the mass product of consumption, dependence on the Hollywood hierarchical system, the notion about the work of stars. Analyzing the valued constituent of model, we examine its status descriptions: pernicious habits (bad habits), depravity (perversity), corruption (venality), external beauty and youth (beauty and youth) (Seliverstova, 2007).
On an extensive empirical material, we conduct a parallel between the concept "American Dream", and typecast "the Hollywood Star". It is no coincidence that Hollywood is metaphorically called the Dream Factory, that is the place where the American dream is created as a product of mass production: "Hollywood ...was the film capital of the world, a magnet for the talented, the greedy, the beautiful, the hopeful and the weird. It was the land of palm trees and Rita Hayworth and the Holy Temple of the Universal Spirit and Santa Anita. It was the agent who was going to make you an overnight star; it was a con game, a whorehouse, an orange grove, a shine. It was a magical kaleidoscope, and each person who looked into it saw his own vision" (Sheldon, 1997: 55). The concept of "Hollywood" is not just a toponym, it is a state of mind, a mental picture, giving birth to a large number of associative images: a vicious night life, cinemas, unusual, bright, flashy lights and stuff.
On the whole, the concept of "American Dream" is used to describe a kind of nation wide ideology that unites Americans. A star career is nothing but embodiment of the American dream into reality: "The word "Hollywood" had become a lode-stone for miracles, a trap that seduced people with wonderful promises, siren songs of dreams fulfilled, and then destroyed them" (Sheldon, 1997: 77). The italicized word "Hollywood" in this example is suggestive graphical tool of the author, which implies anaggravated perception of the word "Hollywood" that has a hypnotic effect on dreamers.
4. Results
Taking into consideration all above-mentioned, we find it appropriate to oppose the objective (typical) symptoms and subjective (stereotypical) characteristics of the studied type. So, on the one hand, the objective signs represent categorical features, allowing to speak about the hallmarks of Hollywood stars, it is possible to do typecasting. On the other hand, the subjective symptoms reflect a standardized view about celebrities, which is not inherent in all stars in the film industry, the world of entertainment and show business. In other words, our research is based not only on the typecasting of the celebrities' image, but, in a sense, on standard views about the image of the star itself, its lifestyle and modeling moral character of the linguistic and cultural type "the Hollywood Star".
A huge number of interpreted songs about Hollywood, the Mecca of cinema, contain one major thought, embodying a negative value judgment. The considered image of the conqueror of Hollywood appears before us as a victim of star fever, as vicious (wanton/ vicious), ambitious (arrogant/high-flying), venal (venal/mercenary), lying (false, fake), as in many literary works: Charles Bukowski "Hollywood", Jackie Collins "American Star", Hemy Denker "The King Maker", Edmin Gilbert "The Beautiful Life", Sidney Sheldon "A Stranger in The Mirror", etc. For example, one of many songs about the thirst for a Hollywood life is presented in the work of Michael Jackson "Hollywood Tonight", manifesting the American dream of fame, popularity and riches:
Lipstick in hand Tahitian tanned in her painted on jeans She dreams of fame She changed her name To tinsel town
To one that fits the movie screen
She's headed for the big time, that means
(chorus)
She's going Hollywood
She's going Hollywood tonight (3 times)
It's true, that you, may never ever
Have that chance again
(that chance again)
West bound greyhound
To tinsel town
Just to pursue her movie star dreams She's giving hot tricks to men Just to get in
When she was taught that that's not clean She's headed for the big time, that means (chorus)
She's going Hollywood
She's going Hollywood tonight (3 times)
It's true, that you, may never ever
Have that chance again
(that chance again)
[Spoken words:]
She gave up her life, to follow her dreams
Left behind everything, for the movie scene
Nothing more she could want,
When she was taught that that's not clean
She wanted Hollywood, she wanted it bad
Now that she got her dream, she became a star
It all looked so good, but only good from a far
Imprisoned in every paparazzi's camera,
Every guy wished they could
She's going Hollywood
She's going Hollywood tonight
She's going Hollywood...
She's going Hollywood tonight" (Jackson, 2006).
The anaphoric use of the pronoun "she" not only in this song, but also in many similar ones creates an implication of precedence - a subtext in which a part of events and facts is hidden. Analyzing the text of this musical composition, we focus on repeatable word combinations: 'the movie screen', 'the big time', 'dreams of fame', which characterize the principal heroine's dream of the song - the world of Hollywood, and represent an associative series of nominative units describing Hollywood Star typecast. We observe a similar associative array not only in this song, but also in a great deal of other ones:
1)"Itfeels so good to be in Hollywood,
Hollywood, Hollywood, Hollywood.
I am gonna find my star on the walk of fame
Everywhere I go everybody knows my name.
It feels so good to be in Hollywood" (Scherzinger, 2006).
"I'm leaving this place and I'm never
looking back again my friend.
Cause I'm going to Hollywood.
I'm chasing my dreams again.
I'm going to Hollywood,
and I'll never be the same" (Scherzinger, 2006).
2) "She gave up her life to follow her dreams left behind everything, for the movie scene" (Hollywood undead, 2011). Returning to Michael Jackson's song, it should be noted that its refrain carries only one meaning, "if you have a goal, then there is the means to achieve it" and the multiple repetition of one sentence reinforces the meaning of the substantive "chance". Attributive unit of "tinsel - tinsel, sham, to cheat" in the song is a predicative combination "to tinsel town" (literally: to cheat city)." She dreams of fame" (first verse) (Jackson, 2006) - creative self-realization is inferior to the vanity; "She's giving hot tricks (second verse) to men Just to get in [there]". - "Hot tricks" is a slang set phrase with clearly negative connotations, meaning sexual immorality of the inhabitants of Hollywood. The listener is faced with the manifestation of willingness to moral and moral fall only in order to "to get in", to achieve its goal; "She changed her name (the first verse), She gave up her life (recitative), Left behind everything (recitative)" (Jackson, 2006).
These lines are interpreted as the rejection of the previous life. The birth of a new personality is expressed by predicates in the past tense. The meaning of the utterance "When she was taught that that's not clean" (Jackson, 2006) is expressed through the passive voice, implying a certain impact on the consciousness of the heroine from the outside, and any other person would like to occupy her place. The negation phenomenon is "not clean" (the end of line) gives the feeling of a direct assessment of the song's author. The negative particle "not" reinforces the idea of the utterance at the grammatical level.
The way to fame and fortune full of dirt and monstrous cynicism, it is fraught with moral degradation. The tremendous influence of Hollywood is felt through advertising a glamorous lifestyle, great fees and luxury: "I wanna be popular, I wanna be a movie star, I wanna be noticed, I wanna go far. I wanna make money, I wanna live in glamor, I wanna have a big house, I wanna drive a sports car" (Calibretto, 2008). As we can see from the above example, semiotic characteristics such as huge mansions, limousines with personal drivers, cruises and travels, unnecessarily huge expenses are all indispensable attributes of a Hollywood star's lifestyle - all that chic life implies. «All American boy with big dreams of glamour life Bright lights and boogie nights. The hype is everything could be yours if the price is right grab your nothing and hold it tight. The first chance you get your heading out to the west this decision is one you won't regret move to the place where everybody knows: Like Hollywood, Los Angeles, California» (P.O.D. "Hollywood", "Live Las Vegas", 2020).
Artists appeal to the image of Hollywood through the epithets (adjectives and substantivized adjectives): popular, famous, and glamor (romantic halo), magic, enchantment, luxury, chic. In this connection it's very curious to read the autobiography by a brilliant Irish actor, the Hollywood star, Gabriel Byrne, where he depicts his perception of the great of this wonderful world of real theatre. It is hard to believe that this iconic person used to be one of us and the stellar world was unattainable for him at the beginning of his actor's career:" Besides the picture houses of the town, I was drawn inevitably to the theatres. Some of them overwhelmed me, made me feel inferior, as if I had no right to be there. An upstart from Walkinstown. At any moment, a stern-faced usher might come and ask me what my business was and escort me shamefaced to the doors. My heart always beat faster as I climbed the carpeted steps of the Gate. MacLiammoir, Edwards, Orson Welles, James Mason and other luminaries glaring at me from photographs with undreamt of elegance and haughty inaccessibility" (Byrne, 1994: 73). He lived in a slightly altered state of mind due to this magic impact of mass culture world: "So I divided my solitary nights crossing the lines between fantasy and reality, moving from picture-house to theatre as the mood took me, feeling alone but part of a crowd, enchanted and seduced by shadows, in love with unattainable actresses and imitating my favourite actors. I could never have believed that one day I would appear on these very stages and come to know these people I had worshipped from afar and be proud to call them colleagues, and in some cases dear, dear friends" (Byrne, 1994: 75).
Back to our analyzing the text of the song by Michael Jackson in the context of stylistic organization, it is necessary to note that the song genre is obviously marked by the use of such stylistic device as the distant repetition: "She's headed for the big time, that means" (Jackson, 2006).
The hidden meaning of the text implies the obsession of the heroine's idea of becoming popular. "She wanted Hollywood, she wanted it bad "(Jackson, 2006) - a repetition within the
syntactic structure also characterizes the generalized image of "she" as a woman, mesmerized by the career of a movie star.
At the lexical level the woman's desire is actively enhanced by the use of the adjective "bad" acting as an emotional intensifier. Like Jill Castle, the heroine of many songs not just wants, she madly wants to conquer Hollywood: "She gave up her life to follow her dreams left behind everything, for the movie scene. Nothing more she could want. She was determined to follow her plan. She wanted Hollywood, she wanted it bad. Now that she got her dream, she became a star. It all looked so good, but only good from a far. Imprisoned in every paparazzi's camera, every guy wished they could" (Gilbert, 1996: 33).
The path of the heroine's generalized image is defined by the plan for the conquest of Hollywood, and her obsession with fame is expressed on the grammar level of the text through the use of infinitive form of the verbs "to pursue", "to follow" and a compound predicates in the sentences beginning with "wanna be", "wanna have", "want to live". "Movie star dream" is coming true, but in the overwhelming majority of cases the recipient does not find the confirmation of optimistic denouement.
In this article, we draw an analogy with the content of American performers' songs with the work by a well-known American writer Sidney Sheldon. His famous novel "A Stranger in the Mirror", which touches upon the theme of Hollywood conquest, as well as possible reveals the essence of American values. Here we find such characteristics as: availability of talent, fame, success, material possessions, viciousness, willingness to go over corpses to achieve one's goals: "After that first experience, the rest was easy. Jill began to work regularly at all the studios... expect at Disney, where sex did not exist (Sheldon, 1997: 193)". LCT under question most often chooses the path of least resistance to realize its dreams, thereby losing its human dignity. An integral partof Hollywood life style, undoubtedly, is maintaining a perfect appearance (attributive unit LCT) through sport, diet, and plastic surgery. Like stars who are obsessed with the idea of eternal youth, the average man in the street of the USA is also chasing an ideal appearance, which leads to not always positive results, and sometimes to the tragedy of the individual or the absurdity of the situation: "It all began with Barbie. The Breast Yearning, that is. Ever since I was a little girl, I wanted to grow those two pneumatic melons which adorned my favourite plaything (Lette, 2007: 177)". "Looking back, it seems bizarre that I wanted to grow up to look like my dolly; do little boys grow up wanting to look like a piece of Lego? ... There are logical drawbacks to a Barbie role model? A bit of moulded plastic between the legs for starters (Lette, 2007: 178). "Jogger's Nipple is an unknown ordeal to women like me. Sleeping on your stomach, something Louise could only achieve by digging two holes side by side in the sand at Bondi" (Lette, 2007: 179).
One of the invariable characteristics of celebrities is a chic (glamorous) appearance. It's quite difficult to endure high competition on the Olympus of show business, so it's quite natural for Hollywood to afford a little surgery: "In a very reasonable attempt (it's Hollywood, after all) to stay youthful - and keep Ashtonl - it looks like 43-year-old Demi Moore has gone under the knife to lift her aging knees! <...> Demi had reportedly already shelled out more than $ 100,000 on cosmetic surgery (including breast implants and liposuction) in the quest for a perfect body!" (Star, 2006: 42).
The obsession with plastic surgery and the amount of money that the stars spend annually on the beauty industry are understandable, because the celebrities live "inside a camera". Not only old age scares screen stars, but, as a result of it, the lack of demand from the audience. To be forgotten is to lose: "Everything seemed geared for a big beauty race and unless you ran fast you would lag behind. More and more women were pressing, straining to win that race: the hair, the eyes, the lips, the skin, the race for the youngest skin, the slimmest bodies, the firmest bosoms, the tints and shades, even the dimension of heels you wore"(Hollywood undead. The song "Bad town" 2011: 92). Hollywood stars are directly manipulated in their turn and forced to improve their looks by their producers and film-directors about what G. Byrne tells in his diary: " February 23rd
Today R said, 'Can I say something personal'? and I said sure. He told me not to get offended, that I had a good face, but I would have to get something done with the wrinkles round my eyes. I asked him what he was talking about and he said he knew this guy in LA who would do a good job for me. He is only twenty-one, if he doesn't cut this out I tell him, he'll be in some mess by the time he's fourty. He really thought he was helping me. Later he apologized. I said to forget it" (Byrne, 1994: 105).
Competition in Hollywood resembles a real race for the slenderest bodies. It is especially difficult for a woman to survive in these conditions. High demands are put forward to her looks: "She looked in the mirror and received Time's message: Hurry. Seeing her reflection was like looking back into layers of the past. There were still traces of the fresh young girl who had come to Hollywood seven endless years ago. But the fresh young girl had small wrinkles near the edges of her eyes and deeper lines that ran from the corners of her nose to her chin, warning signals of time fleeting and success ungrasped, the souvenirs of all the countless dreary little defeats. Hurry, Jill, Hurry!"(Sheldon, 1997: 191-192). "
Women as a result of such propaganda have horror of their wrinkles, feel shy of their age. Unfortunate women turn to plastic surgeons who pull on their skin, make all kinds of face-lifts and injections that dull facial emotions. Thus, in the pursuit of beauty women forget the fact that all artificial things are imperfect and they eventually turn into creepy dolls. The following fragment illustrates the above: "Jill sat in front of her dressing table and studied her face in the mirror. She saw a barely perceptible wrinkle at the corner of her eye and frowned. It's unfair, she thought. A man can completely let himself go. He can have grey hair, a pot belly and a face like a road map, and no one thinks anything of it. But let a woman get one tiny wrinkle... " (Sheldon, 1997 : 199).
The concept of "ideal appearance" is one of the most topical and longed-for value orientations in American society. Hollywood stars aren't allowed to have flaws, they are idols, no matter what sacrifices they do (the rejection of traditional family values, from the perception of yourself of who you are from the very birth's moment in the name of career): "Every human blemish, weakness, and flaw was banned as stars were fabricated with the help of props and plastic surgery: Gable with his pinned-back ears and false teeth; Alan Ladd perpetually on boxes to make him appear as tall as the women in his films; Errol Flynn's bobbed nose; Fonda's face-lift and a toupee (Star, 2006: 42)". "Women in Hollywood are afraid of getting older. When you are a celebrity, you live inside a camera," explains Alex Kuczynski, the author of Beauty Junkies: Inside Our $ 15 BillionObsession with Cosmetic Surgery (Star, 2006: 42).
On the one hand, the stars themselves are victims of stereotypes of beauty, but, on the other hand, due to the blind race for perfect forms and proportions of the body they serve themselves as a propaganda of unhealthy lifestyles. So, in addition to alcoholism and drug addiction in the circles of "the chosen", excessive recourse to plastic surgery and various diets (which are triggers of such common in Hollywood disorders like bulimia and anorexia, various disorders of the gastrointestinal tract) has led the stars themselves, and their stupid followers among ordinary people, to undesirable and sometimes disastrous consequences. But reality proves again and again that plastic surgery is a sign of success of those who reached the top of social ladder:
"The doors opened and we saw the party, heard the band playing "Moonlight Serenade". Two party-going couples stepped into the elevator. They looked like real estate people: the men silver-haired and distinguished looking, the women pretty and slightly tacky. One woman said, "She's smaller than I thought.
"Yes, tiny. And that...was that her boyfriend?"
"I guess. Wasn't he the one in the video with her?"
"I think that was him".
One of the men said, "You think she had her boobs done?"
"Hasn't everybody?"
The other woman giggled. "Except me, of course".
"Right, Christine".
"But I'm thinking about it. Did you see Emily?"
"Oh, she did hers so big."
"Well, Jane started it, blame her. Not everyone wants them big" (Crichton, 1992: 43-44).
By the way, if we mentioned all sorts of surgical interventions in women's appearance, let us express our purely personal point of view. In our humble opinion, when plastic surgery helps injured people after accidents and in the end the surgeon contributes to recover from trauma, restores patients' faces - it is noble and necessary, and absolutely understandable. But when a woman uses the services of a surgeon solely in order to come close to Hollywood standard, it is extremely unwise. In the domestic "show business", the slang word "mukla" appeared, which carries negative connotations and serves to nominate a limited woman who has the main attributes of a "doll" image, such as rhinoplasty, silicone bust and face, brown skin color, grotesque makeup, etc. Instead of developing their inner world, the beauty of the soul, broadening their horizons, such
women turn into miserable creatures filled with silicone. It's one thing to correct somebody's appearance defects and that's a whole different kettle of crawdads to turn into silicone monsters, which happens today as a result of the negative impact of the media.
Hollywood is periodically accused of promoting the image of an extremely slender celebrity ("extreme skinny celebrity"). Images of thin stars flooded the covers of magazines, instilling a new ideal of beauty and encouraging adolescents to exhaust themselves with diets and exercise. The problem of obsession with weight and appearance in general led to a series of protests among the stars themselves: "I'm so tired of people being obsessed with their weight,"she [Kelly LeBrock] sighs. "I'm going to be making movies that are important because frankly, I'm sick and tired of all these Hollywood actresses who can't even frown. I love my lines; they are a part of my life. And it's just a great feeling to be empowered within, without having to be gorgeously fabulous ... I'd rather be happy and fat than slim and stupid. I took my kids out of a very bad place" (Hello, 2005: 19).
According to most examples, a stellar career tends to awaken in people not their best qualities, such as, for example, rudeness, being scandalous, debauchery, moral licentiousness: "However he learned not to provoke Joan when she was in such condition in restaurants, at receptions, in the streets of Beverly Hills, where the whole city could hear them. Career rise made her more boisterous, more prone to heated scenes, during which words alien to the image of a pure innocent girl kept raining down"(Denker, 1980: 108).
Hollywood lets fantasies go free, gives birth to hopes and fears, making dreams come true and breaking hearts. Fame, money and Hollywood are inextricably linked in the minds of Americans in a single associative chain. On the strength of their genre specifics songs are supposed to have a lot of metaphors, as they paint vivid images of Hollywood where the country's wish fulfillment or frustration takes place. Country of illusions and the great American Dream, where dishonest business, alcohol and immoral lifestyle flourish. That is the face of Hollywood, drawn by Fitzgerald: "Fitzgerald died before he completed this mastery study of Hollywood in its heyday. From the daily routine of business, alcoholism and promiscuity of this never-never land, he draws a bitter-sweet love affair and bids his own final, poignant farewell to the Great American Dream" (Fitzgerald, 1965: 84).
This picture of Hollywood continues to evolve in songs - "painted faces", "sun burnt skin", "fixed expressions", "smiles worn thin", "caught in the blink of neon of Hollywood", "bending battles", "maneuvering schemes", "false expressions", "washed up dreams", "everybody makes belie". As it becomes evident from the song "Hollywood" of the group Aerosmith, in Hollywood nothing is strange, the only criterion by which people are evaluated is "being cool": "Don't be mesmerized what goes on here ain't no surprise as long as you'll be cool in Hollywood" (Aerosmith, 2020).
Hollywood style of clothing and behavior are designed to impress the mass recipient by its theatricality and elegance, creating mesmerizing visual effect: "Looking up, I saw that the man wearing the trousers was dressed entirely in black: black shirt, black tie, black satin jacket. He had white hair and a dramatic Hollywood manner" (Crichton, 1992: 111).
Summing up the above-mentioned information we will note that the stars of Hollywood were and still are "heroes and heroines" of American culture as they embody all hopes and aspirations that every American secretly wants to implement. And mass interest for the lifestyle of stars and the power of entertainment industry, which are observed in the United States now, once again confirms the relevance and importance of the explored typecast for the American national consciousness.
In conclusion, it is necessary to say that we live in the world of pseudo-and false ideas, in the world of so called plastic values. Businessmen from show business constantly attack psychologically immature youth with false ideals. TV, glamour magazines, internet sites are permanently programming millions of girls and women by questionable notions of beauty. From morning till night people are inspired by glamorous lies. Every single day unnatural and weird standards of beauty are being created, and they are completely unacceptable from the point of view of common sense, for thinking people. The notorious glamorous life which is increasingly imposed on society, has nothing to do with happiness. On the example of analyzed LCT and its imitators, we have seen that behind the glossy facade of Hollywood success there is malevolent fate, broken hearts, and tragic premature death. The worst thing about this manipulation of public consciousness that the viewer sincerely believes television glossy lies. Millions of beautiful women
are exposed to false standards of beauty imposed by the media. Such propaganda causes them an inferiority complex. Unfortunately, the LCT "the Hollywood Star" penetrated in Russian conceptosphere too, forcing millions of our compatriots to change not only their appearance, but also the "price list" of their values. Thus, the investigation of LCT "the Hollywood Star" leads to the conclusion that it occupies a special niche in the American national picture of the world. This concept is embedded in the collective consciousness and is cultivated with the help of new technologies. Distinct accentuation is aimed at the symbol of feminine sex appeal, which serves as an ersatz of genuine physical attractiveness. Nowadays civilization has thrown the camouflage on the audience's susceptibility to mass media audiovisual effects, and more often than in past centuries, the masses have the opportunity to communicate only with the dazzle paint image, skillfully woven mask, not a real individual. The true beauty of a woman is her personality. The true beauty of a woman has nothing to do with the glamorous environment, as was proved by the authors of analyzed works.
To summarize, we would like to quote the opinion of A.V. Fedorov, who expressed his point of view in the interview, taken by M. Tselykh, that today "it is media education which is the key to understanding the contemporary information society, the urgent need of every person to be media competent, otherwise media illiterate person will be not only an easy victim of multiple media manipulations, but she/he would not be able to fully enter the differentiated world of media culture"(Tselykh, 2019). We fully share this view and we are firmly convinced that media education should be the main vector of training for all human sciences.
We would like also to give a brief overview of the current state of the skill to use video in the classroom. We also want to encourage those English teachers who are hesitant to integrate songs into the syllabus to find a niche that suits their particular needs best. The efficacy of using songs and music for teaching purposes is now widely recognized by foreign language teachers. Songs are said to easily lodge in our short-and long-term memory, and we are all familiar with "the song stuck in my head" phenomenon. Moreover, mere repetitiveness - either within a song or of the song itself - doesn't seem artificial; songs, part and parcel of our life, accompany us almost everywhere in our daily routine, so it is but natural to bring them in the classroom.
It cannot be denied that songs often contain poor quality language, including incomprehensible accents, bad and unusual grammar and slang. But a media competent teacher will be always able to do the option of a proper choice which, apart from the "language correctness", a great variety of topics to be selected to meet the demands of practically any audience. Some songs supply examples of everyday language, ranging from conversational to more complex, involving complicated philosophical reasoning. And the choice here cannot be separated from the underlying topic, so that you can extend teaching beyond the boundaries of the language proper to sustain culture, beliefs, patriotic feelings. Songs also prove to be an invaluable source of teaching material bringing up "taboo" topics which for this or that reason seldom appear in print and are to be dealt with delicately. Dealing with the song proper, students are engaged in performing tasks (often parallel, like "listen and find") connected with the detailed exploitation of the song. Listening to answer comprehensive questions of different types, or to take phonetic dictation, as well as gap-filling exercises are quite common. At this stage visual aids might be a regulating factor for different levels of students' preparation. The final stage of follow-up activities commonly involves practicing the productive skills of speaking and writing. Watching musical video clips in the classroom and the ensuing chorus singing is a valuable aid for removing mental barriers against language learning some students might have - it contributes to break the routine and assists in overcoming shyness and boredom, and in establishing the atmosphere of interest and cooperation.
5. Conclusion
The electronic media are relatively young, but its impact is extremely strong. It changes our language, stimulates our emotions, alters our state of mind, gives food for thinking, and influences our ideas, values and attitudes. The mass audience of mass media are programmed to buy, consume, vote, contribute, believe and support other beliefs, policy and interests - interests which may be commercial, political, charitable, philosophical or educational. Sometimes, its interests will coincide with your own, sometimes they won't. Some of the media output had long lasting value and worth; some is not only cheap superficial stuff, but physically, emotionally and intellectually harmful, it can disturb the recipient' s mentality as it was proven by our investigation. This article
is a sort of warning and appeal to media literacy which will prevent the viewers from negative impact on their minds and bodies, from moral and physical degradation.
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