Emotions and Socialization - Essay Example

?Client’s Emotions and Socialization: How Film has influenced the Way Culture Engages in RelationshipsThe emotional context of films has changed the way in which people relate to one another. Seeing generations whose births occurred nearer to the beginning of the 20th century relate to one another is very different than the way that generations that have grown up with daily access to film style entertainment, which includes television and now the internet. It is likely that changes will result in the next decade as the type or relations that occur through social networking continue to shift how emotions are expressed. If one examines the period from 1950 through 1980, there is a change that can be seen in how emotions become increasingly volatile and expressed more overtly between characters. Culture has been developing through the influences of textual information since the availability of books became more easily access with the advent of the printing press. The influences of film has changed the nature of expectations that people have in emotional relationships with each other with emphasis on the way that emotions were shown in the latter half of the 20th century. The influence of film is evident through many different types of visual references. Fashion, home design, and the visual accessories of life are evident in every public place one goes to experience modern life. Modern life is filled with visual references and trends that have come out of film experiences. Steele relates how even something as simple as Clark Gable removing his shirt to reveal that he is not wearing an undershirt can affect the trends and fashions of a period of time (336). It is not only exterior and visible trends that are affected by the influences of film, however. The way in which people engage one another can be affected by the way in which individuals decide to emulate characters in order to define their relationships. As an example, Marlon Brando inspired not only fashion, once again concerning the men’s undershirt, but emotional context as well during his work in Streetcar Named Desire. The type of undershirt worn by Brando became known as the wife beater because of the nature of his performance. More importantly though was the way in which his emotions became a part of the way in which men related to women. The raw passions and emotions that were released by Brando created a population of men that wanted to feel that depth, to use their violence as a part of their emotions. Women wanted to have a man who wanted them so much they would scream their name in the street. Seeing this type of explosive relationship released a part of the human elements that were held in check within the cultural framework (Clurman 372). This does not suggest that these types of emotions did not exist within the human experience. Watching the way in which actors express the emotional content of that the writers put into the films and the directors draw out allows for emulation to take place. In looking at the emotions of actors, one can see how emotions are developed in life. O’Conner uses acting as methods of helping those with depression overcome their feelings through showing that the way one behaves is related to the way one feels (39). This theory can also be applied in showing how emulation of how people respond on the screen to others affects the way in which people have begun to relate to one another. What is not being suggested is that these emotions did not exist before films influenced them, but that they were not expressed in the same way and accepted as culturally understood behaviors. According to Gold, the way that emotional expression is learned is through socialization agents. Gold states that behaviors are learned in order to “express positive emotions such as happiness, as well as control negative feelings such as anger or frustration” (82). Gold goes on to say that children learn which emotions to hide and which emotions to express according to how their parents handle their own emotions (82). This emulation and acculturation, however, can be extended to an understanding of how culture can be affected by the way in which film expresses emotions. The gaps that are not filled in through the socialization provided by parents can be filled by external sources outside of the family. An example of this can be seen through the adolescent years when peers begin to fill in the gaps of socialization into the world outside of the family in more significant manner than experienced before this stage in life (Prinstein and Dodge 147). According to Gienow-Hecht, a good example of how emotions have changed since the 1950s can be seen through looking at how politicians have changed the way in which they engage the public. Because of the far more visual nature of politics, politicians have had to emotionally represent themselves through finely tuned visual expressions during their speeches. According to Magai and McFadden, aggression was commonly suppressed in the 1950s and through the research of Sears, Maccoby, and Levin, an identified suppression of aggression was actively a part of the acculturation within American society (183). During the 1960s, an upsurge in emotionally volatility in the film entertainment was realized, the restraint of popular films of the 1950s breaking away in independent films as they began to explore more widely expressive themes (96). This emotional volatility mirrored the extreme changes that were occurring during this time period, and films such as Easy Rider, directed by Dennis Hopper and starring Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda with an appearance by the then rising star Jack Nicholson, explored themes that were far more emotional, graphic, and violent. In the space of a decade, films had changed from the innocence of the 1950s to the use of nudity and drug use to express the frustration of the counterculture of the 1960s. Through the medium of film, the ways in which to engage the emotions involved in the changes of the period and how to respond was given a venue from which to understand how to feel and experience those feelings. The development of a new context in which to understand emotions can be seen through the parallel to the development of the concept of the teenager. The film, Rebel without a Cause, starring James Dean can be credited with starting the dialogue about the volatility of the period of adolescence. James Dean is often referred to as ‘the first teenager’, his angst ridden performance of the rebellious 17 year old James Stark giving the youth culture its first context in which to find a representative (Beath 63). Beath writes of the performance by James Dean that “the intensity and reality of his observation drew his audience wholly into yearning participation in an apocalyptic juvenile fantasy: the complete and violent reversal of adolescent torment and confusion into triumph over love, the need for approval, the fear of homosexuality, the police, and Mum and Dad” (63). It might be said that the youth culture began with this film, the new ways of seeing the world consisting of a shift in perspective which then changed the way in which emotions played a part in the human experience. The development of the myth, the mystery, and the legend of James Dean contributed to how emotions and film began to become tied to the changes within the culture. While Rebel without a Cause was a beautiful and well done film, it became pointedly significant when James Dean died from a car crash, an event that had the emotions and empathy of reckless youth. As popular culture began to shift its focus from adults to teenagers, creating a youth culture in which the idea of adolescence was romanticized and developed within a pressure cooker of emotions, culture began to explore these simmering emotions in ways that were both intended as explorations, or intended as exploitations of those emotions to engage both the youth and adults through the memories of those feelings in ways in which to make money through the film industry. The first film to explore the sexuality and the serious nature of adolescent experiences was Last Summer, released in 1969. According to Shary “It is one of the first films in American history to show teenage nudity on screen, and not for mere gratuitous arousal, but for the purpose of literally exposing the young audience to the both banal nature of sex and the potential damage by unleashed repression” (43). This film, unique to its time, actively engaged the audience in such a way as to create a change in the way in which they viewed their teenage emotional experiences. Just like Easy Ryder (1969), released the same year, the intent of the film was to create change within the cultural understanding of its own experiences. No longer was being young the time of Sandra Dee, Frankie Avalon, or Gidget, but a time of deep and important emotional experience in which the frivolity that was more associated with the childhood end of the teenage experience was replaced with the adult level experiences that were dark and more dangerous. While the characters of Easy Ryder were in their twenties, the ideas behind the characterizations were still youth oriented, thus creating a new way in which to engage emotions. The nature of the way in which emotions have been engaged has been through opening up the suppression of aggression that was prevalent in the 1950s and engaging the youth culture for the more serious side of the emotions that they experience during that time in life. The changes in culture have been through opening up Pandora’s box, releasing all of the suppressed emotions that had once been actively a part of the socialization of children by their parents as the film industry was telling them that those emotions and feelings were valid. As in evidence by the films released in the 1960s, the youth culture was developed through an empathy with the volatility of pent up feelings adding fuel to the desires for change. Films in the 1970s continued this trend, a ‘somber’ view of teenage love helping to create a more seriously understood youth culture. Films like Ode to Billy Joe and Summer of ’42 represented these feelings in ways that could be taken seriously. American Graffiti and the Lords of Flatbush began to reach back to the 1950s to rewrite the glossed over emotions and reveal an emotional state that was more ‘truthfully’ represented (Shary 46). However, if taken in context with the research done by Sears, Maccoby, and Levin, the aggression of youth was not a part of life, but had been suppressed through socialization by parents. It might be considered that by showing teenage angst in the way that it was revealed, the acceptance of these kinds of behaviors entered the culture. Magai and McFadden discuss the idea that these emotions, while existing were not expressed up until film culture began to show how to express them (183). As in the discussion by O’Conner, emotions become felt through acting in ways of expression. Through the examples of characters on film, and through the need to emulate those characterizations that best represent the way in which suppression has created a gap in understanding one’s own emotions, film has supported fundamental changes in how cultural expressions of emotions are experienced. Just as Brando’s look in Streetcar Named Desire became symbolic for a type of clothing, the way in which he expressed his emotions opened up that avenue of expression for men about the women they love. As the youth culture began to gain importance, so too did the exploration of those emotions open up the public to evaluations about how responses to emotions should be handled. The stoicism of earlier generations has been replaced by understandings of new ways in which to engage emotions and how to respond to emotions that are experienced during life. Love is a romantically dramatic event, aggression is best expressed rather than politely expressed, and culture has changed so that it emulates the drama of the cinema when gaps in acculturation have been left to the film industry to fill. Life has become a set of emotions that have been framed by the way I which film writers have re-envisioned the emotional context of life, their views on emotional response taking precedence over the natural development of emotions that would have been very different had not media intervened. Works Cited Beath, Warren N. The Death of James Dean: What Really Happened on the Day He Crashed. New york: Grove Press, 1986. Print. Bollen, Jonathan, Bruce Parr, and Adrian Kiernander. Men at Play: Masculinities in Australian Theatre Since the 1950s. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2008. Print. Clurman, Harold. Eds Marjorie Loggia and Glenn Young. Collected Works of Harold Clurman: Six Decades of Commentary on Theatre, Dance, Music, Film, Arts. New York: Applause Theatre, 1997. Print. Gienow-Hecht, Jessica C. E. Emotions in American History: An International Assessment. New York: Berghahn Books, 2010. Print. Gold, Dolores. Improving Competence Across the Lifespan: Building Interventions Based on Theory and Research. New York: Plenum Press, 1998. Print. Prinstein, Mitchell J, and Kenneth A. Dodge. Understanding Peer Influence in Children and Adolescents. New York: Guilford Press, 2008. Print. Magai, Carol, and Susan H. McFadden. The Role of Emotions in Social and Personality Development: History, Theory, and Research. New York: Plenum Press, 1995. Print. Morra, Joanne. Visual Culture: Histories, Archaeologies, and Genealogies of Visual Culture. New York: Routledge, 2006. Print. O'Connor, Richard. Undoing Depression: What Therapy Doesn't Teach You and Medication Can't Give You. Boston: Little, Brown, 1997. Print. Shary, Timothy. Teen Movies: American Youth on Screen. London: Wallflower, 2005. Print. Steele, Valerie. The Berg Companion to Fashion. Oxford: Berg, 2010. Print. Read More