Media and Society

Written by Biju P R, Assistant professor in Political Science, Government Brennen College, Thalassery, Kerala, India.

Certainly, complex relationship resurfaces between media and society. How and what we see, hear and read are of course, in some ways the product of our society and its particular political, economic, and cultural landscape.  This also shapes our understanding of ourselves, our community, and our world. in the process media is significant. it is obvious that society and its politics are largely created, sustained and modified through communication.

R Williams (1962) in his book Communication, writes that what we call society is not only a network of political and economic arrangements but also a process of learning and communication. here author correlate communicative space with the socio-economic configuration of social architecture.  

 
Habermas (1978) in his book Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action, says that democracy can best be understood as a form of communication in which citizens inform, educate and became reconciled to each other in a process of reaching collective agreements.

We live in a society that depends on information and communication to keep moving in the right direction and do our daily activities like work, entertainment, health care, education, personal relationships, traveling and anything else that we have to do. The media shape our attitudes about everything from soap to politics. In today’s world, media has made a very special place for itself in our lives.

It is not exaggeration if you say it has become our food, clothes, shelter, ideas, companion and even our graveyard. There is no denial that media is playing a very significant role in making the world smaller. Through various platforms,  whether radio, television, newspaper or internet, we are able to connect with large number of people around us. Especially internet has truly become the need of every individual both for our work and to connect with our friends and well wishers.

Besides connecting with our friends, media also informs us what happens around the world. In one line let us say that media is like a mirror of the society which reflect each and everything about the society to us. Media people from television and print takes the risk of their lives to inform us about important news.

But one also can not overlook this fact that slowly commercialization is coming on to media. Media has a huge responsibility of conveying the truth and relevant information to the common man. But somewhere this seems to be taking a back seat for media people, as they are focusing more on commercialization. Now a days, hot news which can help in increasing the 'TRP' rates of the TV channel becomes the priority for them. 


But there are still some ethical people in media who are struggling to maintain the real purpose of it.  Media is not just confined to informing us about the world happenings and serving a means to connect with people, in fact it also affects out thinking patterns as well. The way we think and perceive various issues about the world is also shaped up by media. Today everyone especially youth is growing so aware about his responsibilities towards society is because of media.

When it comes to media, how can one forget to talk about the entertainment industry? Entertainment is something that one can not live without. Be it movies, radio, internet etc., media is just everywhere in our life. Today entertainment is so easily available that every common person is able to afford it. Music and movies are so easily available to us through the internet that one does not have to spend loads of money on them.

If we just look around then we would find that there is no aspect of our life which is not touched and affected by media. Be it our work, relationships, education or entertainment, media is seen everywhere. And there is no denial that we can not live without media. 


Our attitudes,values, politics, free choices, free will are widely mediated by media. In short in contemporary life people became mere consumers of news, entertainment and choices. Media mediate our social life extensively.