|
Researcher: |
Mike Carpenter E-mail: WALKAMNGUS@hotmail.com |
|||
|
Topic Description: |
Since the Industrial Revolution popular culture has served an important role in American culture and society. Popular culture is not limited to the American way of life, conversely it can be found in almost every other society. Although its form may vary, it still serves the same function. The goal of this project is to look at how a specific form of popular culture, cosmetic surgery, exists in almost all cultures, yet manifest itself in different forms and for different reasons. This project will look at how cosmetic surgery is not only manifested, but also maintained as part of popular culture in the United States, Japan, Brazil, and Sudan. There are countless reasons why a particular form of popular culture, in this instance cosmetic surgery, becomes inculcated into a culture. It is made even harder to discern what factors played a larger role in the acceptance of cosmetic surgery when looking cross culturally. After consulting the literature, I concluded that all four of the aforementioned societies had several of the same forces at work, and they are Economical, Religious, Medical, and Social. This project will look at how those four social forces, more so than any other, furthered the globalization of cosmetic surgery. |
|||
|
Discussion of Topic: |
Cosmetic surgery has been around for thousands of years, but with the recent boom in technological advances, the field of cosmetic surgery has seen unparalleled growth. The rapid growth of cosmetic surgery is not linear, while some countries have a high rate of cosmetic surgery, others have a low rate, if any at all. The countries in question here, (United States, Japan, Brazil, and Sudan), all have some form of cosmetic surgery, but what is most intriguing are the reasons why people have the surgery performed. This recent growth in the field of cosmetic surgery has been extensively researched and analyzed by a wide scope of experts, including but not limited too: anthropologists, medical doctors, sociologists, feminists, women’s rights activist, historians and so on. Although there is a plethora of articles concerning cosmetic surgery, they seem to be one-dimensional. The articles contain a great deal of valuable information, but focus only on one country in either a historical context or on contemporary trends in a country.
|
|||
|
Method(s): |
Since this project is a cross-cultural analysis of popular culture, it was important to consult the literature pertaining to this subject in order to do secondary analysis. The search for the literature was not easy, but rather an exhaustive and scholarly search of both the Internet and several major libraries in the Chicago-land area. |
|||
|
Findings and Data: |
The link to the chart below is an overview of the main points from my research. It should be mentioned that for this project, plastic surgery was defined as any medical means of altering ones appearance, which included breast enhancements, genital mutilation, face lifts and the like. The only information I could find on plastic surgery in Sudan pertained to forced genital mutilation, or female circumcision. |
|||
|
Conclusions: |
After consulting chart 1.0, it is evident that the four social forces vary in their degree of importance in maintaining and adopting plastic surgery as a form of popular culture depending on the culture in question. United States: In the United States the biggest social force in adopting and maintaining cosmetic surgery would be social. While this is a broad category, it is impossible to list all the reasons why a social force had a bigger impact than any of the others. In this case however, it is safe to assume that the social forces in the United States would most likely be the cultural definition of beauty, which is shaped by the media. The second most important social force for cosmetic surgery in the United States would be economical considerations. Seeing as how there is a vast discrepancy between the social strata in American society, it comes as no surprise than that only those who have a large amount of disposable income can afford such operations. Just recently, however, credit cards with the sole intention of financing plastic surgery were introduced to the market. It is to soon to tell if the credit cards have had any impact, but one thing is for sure that it will only add to the staying power of cosmetic surgery in the realm of popular culture in the United States Thirdly, would be medical issues. As illustrated in Chart 1.0, medical breakthroughs have enabled cosmetic surgery procedure to be done at a much lower cost than only a few decades ago. With these breakthroughs have come a reduction in the amount of pain the recipient feels. These two factors combined help to ease the mind of a potential patient who may be concerned about the recovery time and the cost for the procedure. The social force with the least noticeable impact would be religion. It isn’t clear why this is, but one might attribute it to the fact that the United States is so ethnically and religiously diverse.
Japan and Brazil: Although Japan and Brazil are drastically different countries, the weight of their social forces for cosmetic surgery are the same. For both cultures economical considerations ranked the highest, but for different reasons. Both Japan and Brazil differ only slightly from the United States in regards to the social forces. In Japan, young women are usually the recipients of cosmetic in hopes of getting a better job by gaining the attention of their perspective employer. Recently, Japan was in a recession, and people, (more so women), wanted to get an edge over other potential applicants and did so by having cosmetic surgery. Cosmetic surgery is most often performed on women in Japan who are in their late teens and early twenty’s. The surgery most often performed in Japan on people in this demographic is, "…(An) addition of a second fold to the eyelid which costs about $934. The aim is to make more of the eye visible rather than being hidden behind the eyelid" (Kubota). Where as in Brazil it is done because it is inexpensive. Brazil, on the other hand, is said to have a fascination with body worship, so much so that it is considered a national pastime. The government subsidizes plastic surgery, which enables lower income people to have any for of cosmetic surgery they wish. Most often it was liposuction or a face-lift, but with the recent inundation of foreign culture, TV, magazines, movies, etc., there has been a rise in breast implants. This is brings us to the second social force for both Japan and Brazil, social considerations. Like most countries around the world, Japans and Brazils market have been flooded by foreign products, such as TV, movies, magazines and the like. These products have already begun to alter and shape what once was considered beauty. Now many countries are finding women with larger breast, (which often time is disproportional and unobtainable to the native women), as cornerstone in the realm of beauty.
The third reason is exactly the same for both countries as it is for the United States. Due to the reduction of cost and pain, cosmetic surgery has become more attractive and viable for a larger part of the population. Just as in the United States, the recent medical advances ease the mind of the person considering the surgery, making it that much easier for them to decide. Just as in the United States, little could be found on the impact religion has had on cosmetic surgery in both Japan and Brazil. That’s not to say that it has not had an impact, but rather it is not as noticeable, or as well documented as the other social forces. Sudan: Putting ethnocentrism aside, Sudan differed immensely from the other three countries. This was the only country studied where the impact of religion could be clearly seen. What was also interesting was the fact that what ranked highest in the other three countries did not rate as high in Sudan. With that being said, religion ranked the highest out of the other three other social forces. This is due in large part of religion tradition/ritual, where it has been part of the country as far back as we can historically trace. Most religions at one time practice circumcision, some still do but it is not as prevalent as it was not to long ago. In Africa, however, female circumcision has been practiced as far back as we can trace. It was a religious custom, which has since been adopted as socially acceptable, which gives rise to the next social force. The only other social force that has an impact on cosmetic surgery in Sudan was the social force. Many girls want the surgery so that they won’t be ostracized by their friends for being different. In other countries the social force stemmed mainly from the media, but in Sudan that isn’t the case. A form of peer pressure and conformity are clearly a force of cosmetic surgery in Sudan. As far as Sudan is concerned, economical considerations and medical concerns were minimum if any at all. In doing the research, there was no mention at all of either of these social forces at work in Sudan. Medical concerns and economical considerations in Sudan then can be seen along the same lines that religion is seen in the United States, Japan and Brazil.
Conclusion: The goal of this project was to illustrate how the globalization of popular culture can occur, the forms it can take, and why the culture accepts it. I hope that this project illustrates that the process of globalization is not an easy area to study. When looking cross-culturally, trying to discern what social factors played a role in popular culture adoption into a given society further complicates the issue. The factors will vary from one culture to the next, but often time there are some similarities that must be further investigated in an attempt to give us a better understanding of this project. Like many social issues, popular culture is looked at one dimensionally, which is problematic. It has been mentioned through this paper that there are countless reasons for the inculcating of popular culture into a society, and by looking at only one of the reasons, limits not only our perspective, but jades the overall picture. Special Thanks To: Amber Clement, Joe Fleck, Dr. Sandage and Dr. Radosh
|
|||
|
References: |
Bibliography: |
Althaus, Frances. http://www.agi-usa.org/pubs/journals/2313097.html Brush, Pippa, "Metaphors of Inscription: Discipline, Plasticity and the Rhetoric of Choice," Feminist Review v. 58 (Spring 1998): 22-43 Hall, Kevin. http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/04/25/magazine/plastic25/htm Kubota, Coco. http://english.sohu.com/20001110/file/0887,242,100026.html Myers, James, " Nonmainstream Body Modification Genital Piercing, Branding, Burning, and Cutting," Journal of Contemporary Ethnography v. 21 No 3 ( Spring 1992): 267-306 Mynippon Team. http://www.mynippon.com/women/bsize.htm |
||
|
Links: |
http://www.agi-usa.org/pubs/journals/2313097.html http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/04/25/magazine/plastic25/htm http://www.mynippon.com/women/bsize.htm http://english.sohu.com/20001110/file/0887,242,100026.html http://www.medmedia.org/review/numero3/en/art2.htm
|
|||
Return to main globalization of popular culture site