Deck 13: Leisure and Media

Question 1

In the premodern world,the line between work and play was not clearly defined because

A) religious beliefs prohibited this distinction.
B) too many people died young.
C) people had fewer recreational options.
D) people did not have adequate technology for recreation.

Answer 1

C

Question 2

A small child asks his babysitter if he can play "tag." The child means the simple outdoor game wherein one player chases the other players until he or she can "tag" one of them with his or her hand to trade roles.However,the babysitter is confused and goes to the entertainment center to look for a DVD or a video game named "Tag." What phenomenon could be responsible for this confusion?

A) the increase in leisure time spontaneity
B) the popularity of simple outdoor activities
C) the commercialization of leisure
D) the decline of public life

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Today,leisure is increasingly dominated by ________,"the 800-pound gorilla of leisure time."

A) the Internet
B) video games
C) shopping
D) television

Answer 3

D

Question 4

In the past,which group of people had the time and resources necessary to pursue recreational activities?

A) only the wealthy
B) almost everyone
C) the middle class and the upper class
D) only the clergy

Question 5

How are changes in technology changing the nature of recreation?

A) Recreation is moving into public spaces and away from the home.
B) Recreation is less likely to involve members of the immediate family.
C) Recreation has become safer.
D) Recreation is moving inside the home and away from public spaces.

Question 6

What is the shift from people making their own fun to people purchasing it as goods and services called?

A) the privatization of recreational activities
B) the commodification of recreational activities
C) formalizing recreation
D) conglomeration synergy

Question 7

What led to the increase in leisure time in the twentieth century?

A) changes in values and norms making leisure disappear
B) increases in industrial productivity and time-saving technologies
C) decreases in family size
D) increases in life span and better health care

Question 8

The terms "recreation" and "leisure" are both defined by their difference from

A) paid work.
B) family life.
C) sports and physical fitness.
D) shopping.

Question 9

The sociologist Richard Sennett argues that we have seen the "fall of public man" and have become much more likely to seek refuge in "ties of family or intimate association." Given this,what else would you expect Sennett to believe?

A) Few people can take pleasure in great cities, which are full of strangers.
B) Religious ceremonies are a great source of pride and meaning.
C) More Americans are participating in local politics.
D) In the future, there will be far more people with mental health issues than there are today.

Question 10

Because popular music is so strongly associated with leisure,what is the MOST underappreciated aspect of the work that professional musicians do?

A) how much they get paid
B) the conditions under which they work, particularly on tour
C) how long a career most professional musicians have
D) that it is work

Question 11

How did the rise of the suburbs affect the way people used their leisure time?

A) It encouraged them to join neighborhood groups and associations.
B) It encouraged them to take more vacations.
C) It encouraged them to spend their leisure time in their own homes.
D) It led to an increase in outdoor activities.

Question 12

What does the sociologist Richard Sennett mean when he says that modernity has seen the "fall of public man"?

A) People increasingly spend time with their immediate families or those with whom they have intimate associations and the home becomes the site of leisure activities.
B) The ideals of public service and civic duty are seen as much less important than they were in the past.
C) The government provides far fewer services than it has in the past.
D) There are far fewer celebrities than at any other time in history.

Question 13

What sort of activities can be considered recreation?

A) those that cannot be done for a wage
B) those that involve friends and family
C) those that are done on the weekend
D) those that are enjoyable

Question 14

How have activities that were once necessities changed as they have become recreational activities?

A) They now come with a wide variety of commodities.
B) More people do them than in the past.
C) They require more skill than before.
D) They no longer require us to spend money.

Question 15

Imagine that you have come across a woman rebuilding an engine.Which of the following questions would you need to ask to discover if this was a recreational activity as recreation is defined in your textbook?

A) if she had to take time off work to do it
B) if there was any way for her to benefit from the activity in an economic sense
C) how much time she spent on it each week
D) how rebuilding engines made her feel

Question 16

Which of the following sounds MOST like recreation as your textbook defines it?

A) a student's time between getting out of class and going to work
B) a guitarist on tour who sells T-shirts and CDs at a merchandise table after each show
C) the "recess" period given to children in primary school when they can spend unstructured time on the playground
D) someone computing the amount and type of fuel needed to power a model rocket he or she wants to launch in a park

Question 17

What is the difference between recreation and leisure?

A) Leisure is a kind of activity; recreation is a kind of time.
B) Leisure requires money; recreation does not.
C) Leisure is a kind of time; recreation is a kind of activity.
D) Recreation requires money; leisure does not.

Question 18

How has the Internet changed the way people use leisure time?

A) Older people are more likely to be in touch with younger generations.
B) There is increasing contact between people in different areas of the world, but sometimes individuals from the same family spend less time with one another.
C) There is increasing contact between family members and less contact between people in different areas of the world.
D) There has been a radical increase in the amount of time people spend shopping.

Question 19

In 2006,Nintendo released the Wii,its latest video game system.The system was widely noted for attracting demographic groups,including senior citizens,not often associated with video games.In fact,there were even reports of senior citizens forming leagues to play "Wii bowling" and other sports-related games.If true,these leagues would represent

A) the fall of public man.
B) spontaneity in recreation and leisure.
C) a return to a less commodified style of recreational activities.
D) a return of public life.

Question 20

What does your textbook cite as the ultimate example of the commercialization of leisure?

A) sports
B) video games
C) shopping
D) the Internet

Question 21

What is a media conglomerate said to have when it is able to market its products across a wide range of media?

A) synergy
B) a monopoly
C) consumption
D) antitrust

Question 22

Reading a book you checked out from the library might seem to be an example of a recreational activity that is totally uncommercialized,but it is still directly connected to commercial activity and work because

A) you had to eat and pay for utilities on the day you went to the library.
B) you might learn something valuable by reading.
C) books from libraries are expensive, as they have expensive bindings.
D) people were paid to write, edit, print, ship, and shelve the book.

Question 23

Americans seem to have much more choice about which media to consume than in the past.Why is this choice deceptive?

A) Many choices are owned by foreign companies.
B) Many choices are confined to small, marginal outlets.
C) Many choices are owned by the same company.
D) Many choices are not available in all areas.

Question 24

How does free time (nonwork time)differ from leisure time?

A) It does not count as leisure time unless money is being spent.
B) Leisure activities can also earn money.
C) Leisure time implies the ability to make choices.
D) Leisure time often happens at work.

Question 25

To which of the following trends is spectatorship MOST closely related given the ways it has changed in recent years?

A) increasing levels of conglomeration
B) the increase in third places
C) the decline of public life
D) the commercialization of leisure

Question 26

The Mall of America has more than 10,000 workers,occupies more than 4,000,000 square feet,and receives more than 40,000,000 visitors each year.However,the mall offers more than just shopping.Concerts,plays,story times for children,flight simulators,and an indoor aquarium are just a few of the elements of what the mall calls its "retail experience." What point does this illustrate?

A) Many forms of leisure and recreation seem to have shifted from organized and formal activities to spontaneous or informal activities.
B) Alternative media sources are driving Americans to consider new ideas and experience life differently.
C) Americans are increasingly less likely to go out for a dose of the arts and more likely to stay home and enjoy performances in front of their home entertainment centers.
D) Shopping is now as much about entertainment as it is about purchasing things.

Question 27

A flash mob is a sudden assembly of strangers in a public place for the purpose of performing some novel action (clapping for no reason,singing a song together,dancing,etc.)and then rapidly dispersing.Although they appear to be spontaneous to outsiders,in reality,flash mobs are organized through emails,social networking sites,and text messages.This is a good example of how technology can

A) shift recreation to the private sphere.
B) promote self-regulation and censorship in the media.
C) make it easier to organize people.
D) commodify recreation and leisure.

Question 28

A president knows that if he releases a statement to a newspaper,the newspaper will fact-check the statement,so instead the president posts the statement on his Twitter account.This an example of a politician

A) benefiting from antitrust legislation.
B) deregulating laws regarding the Internet.
C) creating synergy.
D) bypassing traditional media outlets.

Question 29

Leisure and work are complementary activities.What links them?

A) food
B) consumption
C) the weekend
D) children and the family

Question 30

Daily newspapers were in trouble all across the country during the first decade of the twenty-first century,many having closed and many others poised to do so.This worried some scholars who believed that newspapers are vital for maintaining

A) volunteerism.
B) censorship.
C) interpretive communities.
D) democracy.

Question 31

How has the principle of the free press as a voice of the people been watered down since the founders guaranteed it in the Constitution?

A) through blogs and zines
B) through conglomeration and media concentration
C) through the tabloid press
D) through the rise of celebrity gossip

Question 32

Little League baseball and other organized community sports are examples of what phenomenon?

A) the use of technology in recreation
B) expressions of inequality in leisure activities
C) the formalization of recreation
D) spontaneous recreation

Question 33

On ESPN.com,men's college basketball is presented as "college basketball," while women's college basketball is called "women's college basketball" and shares a web page with women's professional basketball.This is an example of

A) the concentration of media power.
B) inequality.
C) privatization.
D) commercialization.

Question 34

________ have made it possible for politicians to bypass traditional media outlets.

A) Social media
B) Newspapers
C) TV channels
D) Radio stations

Question 35

In the early days of country music,there were a number of "family" groups or family members who became professional musicians together.This happened often,in part,because many families made music together for fun.Today,far from singing together,the average family is more likely to have each member put on a pair of headphones and use an mp3 player to listen to music alone.What does this say about contemporary recreation and leisure?

A) We define leisure time in terms of public life and interactions with strangers.
B) Material goods that we seem to require in order to have fun mediate our recreation and leisure.
C) Our leisure time is much more formally organized than it was in the past.
D) Changes in recreation and leisure have produced a great deal of inequality.

Question 36

A typical media conglomerate is MOST likely to include which of the following?

A) a restaurant chain
B) a personals ad
C) a sports franchise
D) an international phone card

Question 37

Why should leisure be treated as a major and important topic?

A) Leisure is the opposite of work.
B) Leisure and recreation absorb a lot of time, energy, and resources.
C) The wealthy and powerful do different things with their leisure time than the poor do with theirs.
D) Leisure and recreation increasingly involve technology and media.

Question 38

How has technology enabled the shift from spontaneous to organized recreation?

A) It has made organized recreation more fun.
B) It has made organized recreation more competitive.
C) It has produced the tools necessary for recreation to even exist.
D) It has made it easier to organize people.

Question 39

Your hike might be considered part of the commercialization of leisure if you

A) do not use maps and instead navigate your way around a national park using a compass and the sun.
B) buy a $500 backpack with a solar panel to allow you to recharge your electronics.
C) use your BlackBerry to check your email every morning, even when you are away from buildings and computers.
D) bring along a camera and document your hiking trip for your scrapbook.

Question 40

Seagram's,a company best known for its gin,also owns Universal Records.This is an example of what trend in the media industry?

A) regulation
B) monopoly
C) inequality
D) conglomeration

Question 41

Wireless carrier Verizon bought Internet provider Yahoo.What describes the combination of these two companies?

A) synergy
B) merger
C) conglomeration
D) high culture

Question 42

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 reduced rules on cross ownership and allowed corporations to buy thousands of media outlets.The Telecommunications Act of 1996 is an example of

A) antitrust legislation.
B) deregulation.
C) encoding and decoding.
D) textual poaching.

Question 43

Today,four companies sell more than 80 percent of the music purchased in the United States,although this fact is not obvious because the four companies have purchased many smaller record labels over the years.What is this called?

A) synergy
B) the media and democracy
C) a monopoly
D) concentration of media power

Question 44

The assumption that media consumers automatically accept whatever meaning is in the "texts" they consume is called

A) the active audience model.
B) the encoding/decoding model.
C) textual poaching.
D) the magic bullet theory.

Question 45

When sociologists reject the hypodermic needle model,they tend to stop asking ________ and start asking ________.

A) what people do with media; what media does to people
B) what writers and critics do with media; what media does to people
C) what media does to people; what people do with media
D) what media does to people; what writers and critics do with media

Question 46

Jessica loves a new album for its message of female empowerment.Her friend Amal disagrees.Amal thinks the album objectifies women and doesn't do enough to condemn sexism.Which of the following describes Jessica and Amal's disagreement?

A) an example of a third place
B) an instance of textual poaching
C) an example of conflict theory
D) a split in the interpretation of a cultural text

Question 47

A sociologist who is concerned that people will uncritically accept political biases in the media they consume probably believes that audiences

A) are active.
B) seek out the same media to meet different needs.
C) can transform pieces of the media to suit their own needs.
D) are mostly passive.

Question 48

What does the uses and gratifications paradigm of media consumption assume about audiences?

A) They uncritically accept the messages encoded in media.
B) They are passive viewers.
C) They take a media product and manipulate it to tell their own stories.
D) They are actively engaged.

Question 49

Some lawyers working for the Department of Justice worry that Google is abusing its power and behaving like a monopoly in the way it charges for ads.What type of suit would it be if the Department of Justice filed a lawsuit?

A) commodification
B) prima facie
C) antitrust
D) synergistic

Question 50

Why do some argue in favor of increased censorship of the media?

A) They believe censorship will provide a voice for disenfranchised groups.
B) They believe it will protect American companies from foreign competition.
C) They believe it will increase sales overseas, especially in conservative societies.
D) They believe that violent and sexual media content has a negative impact on society.

Question 51

Sometimes teenage boys watch football games on Sunday only because they wish to be able to make conversation with their classmates on Monday.Which theory best explains this?

A) textual poaching
B) structural functionalism
C) the magic bullet theory
D) the uses and gratifications paradigm

Question 52

An advertisement company uses online data to determine that Kelly is a white twenty-two-year-old female who goes to church every week.The advertisement company uses that data to determine which media advertisements Kelly will see online.How is the company deciding which advertisements Kelly will like?

A) by fighting antitrust legislation
B) by sorting Kelly and others into taste publics
C) by promoting high culture over popular culture
D) by strengthening civil society and communal bonds

Question 53

If scholars assume that audiences are active rather than passive,what does this imply about the meaning of media "texts"?

A) Media producers manipulate audiences in order to sell goods.
B) Every media consumer experiences meanings in the same way.
C) The meaning of any particular media text is not important.
D) Consumers can alter and even invert meanings to suit their own purposes.

Question 54

What are taste cultures?

A) groups of people who share similar literary, media, recreational, and intellectual interests
B) laws designed to maintain competition in the marketplace by prohibiting monopolies
C) any satisfying, amusing, and stimulating activity that is experienced as refreshing and renewing for body, mind, and spirit
D) areas of culture that share similar aesthetics and standards of taste

Question 55

Some cell phone providers are now offering hardware,like small laptops,and media to play on it,like songs and TV shows.Phone companies believe that each product they offer will encourage and promote other products.For example,phones can easily send data to laptops,which can store media that can easily be watched on phones and so on.What is this called?

A) media concentration
B) conglomeration
C) bandwidth
D) synergy

Question 56

Early critics dismissed the work of director Alfred Hitchcock,but he later became one of the most revered filmmakers of all time.Why might the way that we categorize the work of artists like Alfred Hitchcock change over time?

A) Artists go to third places to actively promote their work over long periods of time.
B) The boundaries between high culture and popular culture are often permeable.
C) How an artist's work is categorized changes when audiences engage in
Textual poaching.
D) Artists who promote communitarianism are always eventually revered.

Question 57

A company that manufactures alcoholic beverages bought and then sold two smaller companies that produce film,television,and music.What is this process called?

A) introducing new voices in the media
B) encoding
C) conglomeration
D) spectatorship

Question 58

Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer believed that "the triumph of advertising . . .is that consumers feel compelled to buy and use its products even though they see through them." What might you conclude if this is all you know about Adorno and Horkheimer?

A) They accept that reinforcement theory explains the way advertising works.
B) They accept that audiences are nonexistent.
C) They believe in the hypodermic needle theory.
D) They rely on the uses and gratification paradigm to understand media.

Question 59

Why would media outlets impose self-censorship?

A) to compete with online blogs and underground publications
B) to avoid outside regulation by the government
C) to protect children
D) to increase subscriptions

Question 60

Net neutrality refers to the idea that

A) Internet speed should function differently depending on who is using it.
B) caps should be put on each person's data to limit his or her Internet use.
C) no Internet-based service or content should be privileged over another.
D) online content should only be available to customers who can pay for it.

Question 61

If,as Stanley Fish argues,an individual reader interprets a text and thereby gives it meaning,then there are an infinite number of potential meanings for any given text.Why,then,do so many people interpret things in the same ways?

A) People tend to look to a small number of critics to explain any particular piece of culture.
B) People have very little imagination and do not like to focus too much on any given text.
C) People who consume the same texts come from similar backgrounds and have similar interpretive frameworks.
D) People passively absorb meanings from the media that lead them to see the world in the same ways.

Question 62

For whom could celebrity stalking be seen as an obligation?

A) fans who are particularly devoted to a celebrity
B) fans who want to steal a physical object from a celebrity
C) members of the press
D) members of a fan club

Question 63

The producers,writers,and actors of Die Hard meant for the audience to cheer for the protagonist,a blue collar hero who defeats a team of German terrorists single-handedly.If you met someone who instead was rooting for Hans Gruber,the murderous leader of the terrorists,you could say that he or she was

A) being used by the mass media to influence other members of the public.
B) being more or less "brainwashed" by the effects of the mass media.
C) being informed and educated by the media.
D) decoding the movie differently than it was encoded.

Question 64

The mixed reaction to the 1998 motorcycle exhibit at the Guggenheim Museum is an example of

A) the uses and gratification paradigm.
B) high culture versus popular culture.
C) communitarianism.
D) structural functionalism.

Question 65

In 2008,to celebrate the release of Lawrence Lessig's book,Bloomsbury Academic Press hosted a competition called Remix the Remixer.Entrants were asked to find a video,interview,or written work of Lessig's,mash it up with another piece of Lessig's work,and create something new such as a video,photo,or text.What is this sort of artistic activity called?

A) a two-step flow model
B) textual poaching
C) magic bullets
D) uses and gratifications

Question 66

What are audience members doing,according to Henry Jenkins,when they manipulate commercially produced media products,often to tell stories or express ideas very different from the original?

A) textual poaching
B) encoding
C) gratification consumption
D) hypodermic media consumption

Question 67

Every year Project Censored posts a list of the twenty-five most censored news stories.These stories are "censored" not in the sense that the media are legally prohibited from covering them but rather in the sense that most major media outlets have systematically ignored them and,in the process,determined what the public will think about.What theory explains this?

A) agenda-setting
B) reinforcement
C) magic bullet
D) two-step flow

Question 68

In his study of British television,The Nationwide Audience,David Morley argued that the success or failure of a television program "in transmitting the preferred or dominant meaning will depend on whether it encounters readers" with "codes and ideologies derived from other institutional areas (e.g.,churches or schools)which correspond to and work in parallel with those of the program or whether it encounters readers" with beliefs "drawn from other areas or institutions (e.g.,trade unions or 'deviant' subcultures)which conflict to a greater or lesser extent with those of the program." Which theory of mass media consumption is Morley using?

A) the hypodermic needle theory
B) the uses and gratifications paradigm
C) the spectatorship paradigm
D) the encoding/decoding model

Question 69

Polysemy refers to the idea that

A) any given text may have multiple meanings.
B) foreign travel should minimize the environmental consequences of tourism.
C) celebrities should act as role models.
D) audience members are active participants in constructing the meaning of the media they consume.

Question 70

Which of the following activities is part of a fan's relationship with a celebrity?

A) reading celebrity gossip magazines
B) attending a book signing or other event
C) masterminding a fan-staged encounter with a celebrity
D) chatting about a movie

Question 71

What is a group of like-minded individuals called whose members share a similar sensibility and enjoy cultural products in similar ways?

A) an interpretive community
B) textual poachers
C) an active audience
D) producers

Question 72

What part of Stuart Hall's theory resembles the magic bullet model?

A) the assumption that specific ideological messages are loaded into cultural products
B) the assumption that individuals will respond to media messages in a wide variety of ways
C) the assumption that audience members manipulate cultural products for their own ends
D) the assumption that audience members will listen to "opinion leaders"

Question 73

A series of polls in 2003 showed that people who primarily got their news from the Fox News Channel were significantly more likely to believe that Iraq had played a part in the 9/11 attacks.Many people saw this as evidence of the way the media shaped public opinion,but some believed that those who already believed this simply gravitated to Fox.This is an example of

A) textual poaching.
B) encoding/decoding.
C) reinforcement theory.
D) agenda-setting theory.

Question 74

In the 1990s,kids who chanted,"I want to be like Mike!" to express their admiration for Michael Jordan had

A) an overidentification with media figures.
B) all been paid by Nike to do so.
C) a role model relationship with a celebrity.
D) a serious consumption addiction.

Question 75

When fans of the original Star Trek series edit recorded episodes of the TV show to make it appear that Captain Kirk and Mr.Spock are passionate gay lovers,they are doing all the following EXCEPT

A) textual poaching.
B) subverting the meaning of the original product.
C) being an active audience.
D) agenda setting.

Question 76

The English music star Morrissey got his start in the band The Smiths,singing about radical vegetarianism and bisexuality in the 1980s.He was effeminate,bleak,and sarcastic.Today,his fan base has expanded far beyond the disaffected English teenagers who bought his original records.In fact,some of his most devoted fans are Hispanics in Southern California.How is it possible that British teenagers in the 1980s and Hispanic Californians can appreciate the same music?

A) There are few differences between these two groups.
B) Even though members of the two groups have different experiences and perspectives, they understand Morrissey's music in the same way.
C) They bring different interpretive strategies to the experience of listening to Morrissey's music.
D) Music is universal and all people experience it in the same way; if one group can be moved by it, then any other group will feel the same way.

Question 77

Critics might see soap operas as brainwashing their viewers to accept a particular version of gender roles.Some sociologists would insist that the people who produce soap operas actually have to be constantly attentive to the desires of their audience and are,to some extent,responding to the audience.If you believe this,then you probably see soap opera viewers as

A) new voices in the media.
B) the bourgeoisie.
C) collectors.
D) an active audience.

Question 78

According to the two-step flow model,which of the following would be MOST likely to sway public opinion concerning the ethical treatment of farm animals?

A) a billboard with a famous actress and a slogan on it
B) a news story that makes the front page of a national paper
C) a short clip on the local news
D) a documentary aired on cable television

Question 79

Which theory of media consumption combines elements of both the magic bullet theory and the uses and gratifications theory?

A) Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding model
B) Henry Jenkins's textual poaching model
C) Stanley Fish's interpretive community model
D) Émile Durkheim's functionalist model

Question 80

Stanley Fish argues against older understandings of media and literature,which held that a text is unchanging and universal.He argues that each member of an audience can interpret and so "create" a work,but he does not claim that each audience member has absolute freedom to interpret in unique ways because

A) each member of an audience is part of a larger interpretive community.
B) the author or creator of a work imposes his or her own ideas on the audience.
C) the "texts" an audience consumes are transmitted unaltered and absorbed straight into their consciousness.
D) the mass media can influence the public by the way stories are presented.