I found this podcast interesting because my research paper is connecting leadership and popular culture. In my project, I’ve been researching how the leadership and influence of Jennifer Lopez has increased Latinx representation on screen, and in all aspects of entertainment. Before her, only 1% of stories told on screen were about Latinx people. Although representation has increased, there still isn’t enough representation of all races and ethnicities in entertainment today. Like Dr. Bezio said, representation of viewpoints matter. The average American audience is more than just middle-aged white men, and our shows, movies, and music need to represent that. Every young boy and girl should be able to see themselves in a TV show, and see that everyone from all backgrounds is represented.

While listening to the podcast, it was interesting to realize that something like Shakespeare, what we would consider old, was at some point pop culture. What is and what isn’t pop culture just depends on the context in which you are looking at it. Someone could study how Shakespeare’s plays were pop culture at that time, but not necessarily now. What is old-school or 80’s for us now was at some point the latest trend. That was a fascinating realization for me, and one day our current pop culture will be a thing of the past as well.

I had not necessarily considered the impact that popular culture has because we generally do tend to think of it as “low-brow,” despite the fact that is consumed and enjoyed by large numbers of people. People are invested in this culture, and because it reaches so many it has great potential to influence the way people think. Every time a movie comes out that pushes against norms or stereotypes, it raises discussions in public spaces that are extremely important. We can use pop culture to help change the way people see the world and we have neglected to do so for so long. Pop culture can spread ideas over large groups of people, thus influencing their opinions or outlooks on the world at large. For example, popular culture has shifted over time to represent more people, and to share more perspectives, and occasionally to “undo” the injustices that popular culture has presented as mainstream over the years. In today’s day and age we see more representation of people of color, more of their stories being told, but we also must remember that there was a time in which it was acceptable for films to include people with blackface, using hateful words, and people accepted that as the “norm.” Popular culture has a huge impact on shifting our ideas of the norm, so representation in film and telling the stories of those who have been silenced is important to changing the way groups of people are viewed in society. But even today we lack representation in recognizing people for their work. Each year awards shows end up under fire for the lack of nominations and recognition of the roles of minorities in media. Although I am not someone who watches award shows or actively goes to the movies, it is disheartening to see that we are still so far from where we should be. But in a way, opening the discussion to ideas about issues within popular culture is popular culture itself, allowing us to consider the implications using pop culture to shift the way we think about the world.

I really liked today’s podcast about popular culture and leadership. It made me reflect about all of the popular culture I see everyday and how often I don’t think deeper about what I am seeing and just take it at face value. Even when we just accept popular culture at face value the popular culture is making arguments about the culture around us. To just merely dismiss something as entertainment would be to lose those important arguments that provide commentary on our society and relevant issues. For example, I had obviously heard the Robin Hood story before where Robin Hood steals from the rich to give to the poor, however, I never knew the story behind it, the purpose it originally served in its creation, or the impact it had on society. That opened my eyes to how storytelling in popular culture is a powerful tool that can be used to accomplish goals or unit a group of people together. Especially in today’s society where exposure to popular culture is at an all time high, it is important to recognize how the popular culture we view influences our social and political opinions through the arguments it makes and how it could be used positively to unite people together over common issues.

Dr. Bezio ended the podcast with the idea that the stories that we tell matter because they shape our imagination which in turn shapes our world which resonated with me. Popular culture has a massive influence on what we accept as normal and what we believe an ideal society should look like. Representation in the media is very important so that in our ideal society everyone is included and considered valued members of society. If the entertainment we watch reflects a diverse society, we will be more likely to emulate what we see and want to copy what we are viewing, as Dr. Bezio mentioned in the Harry Potter example. It is important as a society that we have a commitment to continue making entertainment such as Hidden Figures and Black Panther that tell an important narrative of the viewpoint of people who have been largely underrepresented in entertainment and popular culture in the past.

After reading the Harvey paper I was left with a big question. Pop culture and all of its various forms of media create a lot of division and diversification. Because of how many different groups people are able to separate themselves into, how can you be an effective leader and align them all? Even within myself, I can pick out some hyper-segmented niches that I associate with, most of which didn’t even exist a hundred years ago. While it is very easy to separate people into different interests, I think it is very difficult to bring them together. I do not think there is a blanket solution, which is what I think a lot of leaders try to come up with. If you were to think about a large group of diverse people and then put all of their interests and needs into a venn diagram, the area where every single one overlaps would likely be very small, if it even exists. The problem with catering to everyone’s individual needs, however, is that it is usually very expensive and resource-consuming. I guess that just leaves a mix of the two, trying to meet everyone’s needs and interests in the most efficient manner. But then who do you decide who gets left out? I think differences and individuality are beneficial for many reasons, but it sure does create a lot of problems when it comes to decision making.

The importance of storytelling in leadership was one of the major points that Dr. Bezio discussed that I found most interesting.  I remember in LDST 101, Dr. Hayter discussed the tactics that leaders used to gain their momentum and influence society. Using stories, you are able to implement certain ideas and principles into a society that may be missed at a first glance. Additionally, stories have the ability to reach a wide audience and can influence most demographics in society. An example that Dr. Hayter and Dr. Bezio both mentioned was based around the propaganda that Hitler used in assembling his supporters. The methods that Hiter used to rise to power were identical to the tactics that hundreds of leaders throughout history have used in the past.

I wrote an essay based on leadership acquisition where I used Hitler and Martin Luthar King as a comparison. Although that essay was mostly based on individual traits, the use of storytelling was used by both individuals. Both individuals were extremely strong orators and often used stories as a way of establishing a sense of community within their movements. This was highly effective in making each other the figurehead of their respective movements.

I found Dr. Bezios podcast about popular culture in its relationship to leadership to be very interesting, and I have two main takeaway points from it. The first point being how impactful popular culture is on our society and can cause real change and conversations to happen outside of the fictional worlds or our television screens. When Dr.Bezio talked about Robin Hood, the only thing I really knew about the story was the “steal from the rich and give to the poor trope”. I did not know that because of Robin Hood, it caused riots and revolutions that changed the whole face of english governmental system and paved the way for the creation of parliament and the house of commons.It’s also amazing to see how this trope has been carried into our current culture today. Although I cannot think of any specific examples at this moment, it makes me think about what movies, tv shows, or popular culture of today has had a huge impact or may continue to have one in the future. This also shows the importance of what popular culture is put out there, as if one fictional story can cause a revolution, it shows both the good and the bad sides of popular culture in how impactful one story can be if we get attracted to the narrative and characters.

The other takeaway I have from the podcast is the importance of representation in media. Dr.Bezio says that media is the number one way we normalize behaviors, and how Entertainment has more influence over changing our mind than facts and we need to see representation immediately made me think of the films such as Black Panther, Hidden Figures, Us, Get Out, The Princess and The Frog, and many others before Dr.Bezio even mentioned them. These movies doing so well in mainstream box offices really shows how much our society is craving diversity and diversity heroes and main figures to look up to. We know that there has been tons of stereotyping and lack of representation in the media, so to see people of color painted as powerful, good people is so important. This discussion actually makes me think about my research topic I am doing for this class, as it relates heavily to this. I am discussing the power of media to influence their audience through the perspective of how powerful reality television has influence on the audience, specially looking at racial stereotyping in media and more specifically the TV competition show Survivor. Within this topic, an important point I am discussing is how the narrative can be manipulated by the media and tends to paint people of color, especially black people, in a bad light. This is made clear by dozens of black Survivor contestants speaking out because of the resurgence of the BLM movement this summer and discussing how they feel they were painted to look “angry” or the villain of their season, or overall were given a bad narrative that was not true to their personality or actions on the show. This relates back to Dr.Bezios point of the story the media tells (in tv, film, etc) is extremely influential to the audience and needs to include proper representation.

I think the podcast touches on how truly important popular culture is in our lives today. We discussed in a previous class the role that it plays in instilling implicit biases in our lives. The reading and the podcasts both touched on the relationship between leadership and popular culture. It is ignorant of a leader to ignore the impact that popular culture has on people’s decisions and opinions in general. For my research paper, I am examining Sleeping Beauty and looking at how its ideas (along with fairytales like it) can be harmful to people even at a young age. There have been countless studies showing that kids reflect the ideas that they are reading about and seeing on the screen. One of these studies for example showed that by these children watching Disney Princesses young girls began to play with the princess dolls following stereotypical female behavior – such as thinking that cookware, dolls, and tea sets were for girls only. With this sort of influence, it is essential to review what is being shown through popular culture regardless of what form it comes in. This obviously shows the importance of diversity and limiting stereotypes in all forms of popular culture which begins with large organizations transitioning their work to empower people. This is seen within Disney through the transition of princesses from being entirely dependent and helpless from Cinderella to Sleeping Beauty to then transitioning to independent strong princesses like Elsa.

I thought that Dr. Bezio’s point that people are more likely to be changed by entertainment than hard facts was incredibly interesting, especially with the amount of social unrest and change that we have seen over the past year. Personally, I know that when I am presented with a fact that supports the opposite viewpoint to mine, I immediately try to discredit it. I search for fallacies in its wording, unreliable sources, or anything else to prove that my belief is correct and the other is wrong. I believe that this is human nature, we want to support our in-groups and teardown our out-groups when we recognize them. There is something in a story (whether that be a movie, book, or music video) that is harder to argue with, forcing us to turn off our automatic discretion and allowing us to see the world from another point of view. Using sympathy and narrative tools, directors help to build the more personal aspects of a movement for change. Humans are built around individual and societal connections, and I think that entertainment fosters these connections because it makes us feel like we know the characters personally.

This is why diversity and inclusion in the media are so important, by showing different types of people in a positive light you can lessen the divide between races and other divisive characteristics. I often hear people talking about representation for people within their own race, such as a little black girl getting to see some of herself in the black Disney Princess Tiana, but an equally important fact is that increasing representation can lessen racism simply through exposure. Although someone in rural Maine might not know a black person in real life, they could watch Black Panther or Hidden Figures and form positive associations with the black characters that translate to a less racist view overall. I believe that most racism and hate are derived from fear of the unknown and negative depictions of others, so consistent exposure should (hopefully) help to minimize racism over time.

I found it very fitting that we cover the theme of leadership studies and the significance of works of popular culture given our campus environment. More than this, though, the readings and podcast provided me with additional tools to critically evaluate the messages both leaders and popular culture communicate to the larger society. From the Harvey reading, they identified and explained the seven fundamental questions groups and leaders must confront and answer to be insightful (starts on page 205). In reflecting on our Giving Games project, I remember seeing the answers to most of these questions on most charities’ websites. To an extent, as these questions become more ingrained into our global society’s culture, we can re-examine leadership, and the relationships leaders have with their followers. For instance, most of us grew up in households where we were told to defer authority- authority generally being men who held the most power in a group context. This also means that if we had any issues with how an individual in a high authoritative position was acting, we must keep those concerns to ourselves, or else we could face harsh reprimands or severe consequences. For all people who do not hold high authoritative positions in a group context, this means that we have internalized that our voice- our opinions, attitudes, and belief- and our identity as human beings is somehow unworthy of being recognized and addressed by leaders- this is especially true for communities of color. This inevitably keeps unfit leaders in positions of authority while marring the power each human being has when they speak out against systems of oppression and inequality.

So, I agree with Dr. Bezio that representation matters. While this question was not mentioned in the readings nor the podcast, I feel that it should be plainly stated: How can we, as the up and coming generation, influence popular culture today? Even though most of us are not- yet- qualified executives or civically engaged entrepreneurs, I feel that we all can start making a change in the spheres of our lives that we are the “experts” in. Whether that be speaking up and out more during our interactions with peers about the various -isms that plague our society or posting social media content that reflects messages meant to deconstruct systems of oppression and inequality, I believe that we all can start making a difference in the lives of others this very moment. This is not to say that change will happen overnight, but this is to say one thing: just because we’re young and at the moment, inexperienced in some elements of life, does not mean we have to wait to effect social change and justice.