Group Response 2

The two sample blog readings – despite focusing on two completely different subjects – both share a common element: they function as a tool that analyzes culture and conveys ideas effectively to readers. The first blog, BitchMedia, states that its goal is to “provide and encourage an engaged, thoughtful feminist response to mainstream media and popular culture,” and the article “The Empowerment Cure: How Teen Sex-Ed Has Undergone a Brilliant and Rapid Revolution” explores the way in which the approach to sex education in schools is vastly changing – as a result of changing values and beliefs. The second blog article is a review of the movie The Conjuring, and it is posted on The Movie Blog – which explores values and beliefs by critiquing an important aspect of American popular culture: film.  

Both blogs explore culture; however, they explore different cultural phenomenon through two different cultural lenses. The first article seems to take a Post-Marxism approach, and seems to take into account the theories of Laclau and Mouffe. It looks at the issue of teen pregnancy within discourse in order to discover its constructed meaning. The “revolution” occurring is the change that comes when people stop subscribing to a particular value, which – in this case – is the traditional method of educating teens. The second blog article seems to take a psychoanalytic approach, and it takes into account the “subconscious” in order to explain why The Conjuring is very frightening to us in some sections, but less frightening in others. 

By looking at the genre of the “Blog” in terms of these two articles, it is easy to see how blogs are a highly effective medium of cultural analysis. To readers, they are easy to digest through their casual, conversational, and engaging language. Also, they are versatile; despite being considered the same genre, these two blogs employed separate lenses and critiqued two completely different aspects of culture. Personally, I thoroughly enjoy reading blogs, and I think they are an excellent (and creative) way of communicating thoughts and ideas.