Unit G325: Critical Perspectives In Media

Media In The Online Age

Cultural Hegemony, Cultural Ideology And The ‘Bottom Up’

Verses ‘Top Down’ Model
Cultural Hegemony1 is a concept that derives from political history and
refers to the power of one country over several others. In Media Studies
the term is associated with the Italian theorist ◄Antonio Gramsci
(1881-1937). He emphasised that the control of society by one group or
one set of political ideas was not necessarily achieved by force or
control of arms, but by persuasion and ‘consent’ – the basis of
democracy. The rulers manage to convince the mass of the population
that they are ‘better off’ accepting current government policies.
Maintaining hegemonic control is thus a process of constantly
reinforcing the message and developing the argument.

The concept of hegemony allows for substantial change in ideas over time, even though the
same groups remain in power. These groups constantly adjust their ideas and find new ways
to gain the consent of those they dominate. Hegemony is a useful concept because it
suggests that people try to understand how the dominant ideas (ideologies) remain dominant.

Dominant Ideologies are the set of common values and beliefs shared by most people in a
given society, framing how the majority think about a range of topics, from art and science to
politics and economics. Dominant ideologies include religions, legal systems, shared moral
codes, etc.

In media terms the Mass Media both perpetuate cultural hegemony and are a cultural
hegemony in themselves in that a relatively small number of big companies, e.g. News
Corp., The BBC, Time Warner, Sony etc., control most of the world’s media, and this in
turn allows them to control most of what we see, hear and know. This, in turn, allows
them to control what we think, selecting only ideas that serve its interests, i.e.
bourgeois capitalism. This is known as a ‘Top Down’ model of dominant ideologies.

The world’s largest media conglomerates are:

1. The Walt Disney Company,

2. News Corporation,
3. Viacom
4. Time Warner.

1
ANON, 2007. Cultural Hegemony, Wikipedia: The Free Encylcopedia [Online], 30/07/07,
Available At: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony, [Last Accessed: 31/07/07].

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 Unit G325: Critical Perspectives In Media
Media In The Online Age

Top Down Model Of Media

Top Down Model Of Media

The Web 2.0, however, represents a ‘Bottom Up’ model of dominant ideologies. Cheap
technology and the interactivity of the Internet allow ordinary people to create their
own ‘Grassroots Media’. As such, they have just as much power to create media
content, and therefore dictate the dominant ideologies of culture, as the major media
corporations do. This is a much more democratic model of media production.

Caution!
It should be noted, however, that most Web 2.0 sites are owned by media
conglomerates and so may not be as democratic as they first appear, MySpace, for
example, is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s NewsCorp. Even when they are not, however,
we still have to rely on Internet Service Providers, to provide us with Internet access
and these are usually owned by conglomerates as well.