Cultivation theory

In today’s lesson we watch the opening scene of ‘Top Boy’ which consisted of several positive and negative representations of youths in today’s society, as within the first minute there were 4 positive things and only a minimum of 1 negative representation. The positive representations were of when the boys came home after school, which showed they’re not “typical gangsters” or “street boys” as the majority of the public would refer to school boys as. Moreover, the way they were dressed was very relaxed, which is what is expected from kids when they arrive home from school. Furthermore, another positive aspect was when the boy tries to find his mum in the house, showing his concern and how worried he was. Furthermore think links in with Gerbner’s cultivation theory, as youngsters would watch this, and they would be able to learn how to behave. Furthermore, the more an audience watches or lives in a TV world, the likeliness are they’d believe the representations which are presented within the series. The cultivation theory is the argument that watching television may influence viewers’ ideas of what the everyday world is like. Cultivation theorists argue that television has long-term effects which are small, gradual, indirect but cumulative and significant. There was a scene were a group of boys met and using foul language and one guy giving drugs to another. This shows how negatively they’re portrayed through the use of their speech and actions, this is a dangerous representation of young people, as if you were to see them doing this on the road people would feel scared and feel as if they’re around dangerous people. Overall in the first 10 minutes of Top Boy, I had found 22 positive aspects of young people and 25 negative aspects of young people. This comes to show that there are roughly equal amounts of both sides,