The Reality of Everyday Life

I. The Social Construction of Reality

There are multiple realities in our life. But among all these realities there is one that tops all these and this is called the reality of everyday life. This consists of the “here and now” of our existence which is lived in constant interaction and communication with others.

The reality of everyday life is often taken for granted as reality. Why is this so? Maybe because we usually take for granted something or anything that has been there all along, being part and parcel of our day to day existence. Such attitude is also true with how we regard things or people around us. We take for granted that these things or people are there for us. We become aware only of their existence or importance in our lives when we need them, or something happens to them, or they suddenly disappear from the axis of our worldly existence.

Social interaction is very much part and parcel of the reality of everyday life. Such interaction gives us the opportunity to develop relationships and allow us to discover the reality of ourselves and of those with whom we come in contact with everyday. Through interaction we enter into an ongoing cycle of life’s exchanges through ideas and opinions using language expressed in words, signs and symbols.

Social experiences, whether they are individual or shared, become a part of existing knowledge that we have of ourselves, and of the society we lived in. Eventually, it leads us to develop a keen perception of who we really are, in relation with our environment and what we can do as our contribution to the society of which we are a part.

Our life becomes meaningful when it is lived for others. It means it is not myself alone at the center of the universe, but there are many others there that occupy the same space. Each person, each thing, each experience creates meaning and make up an entire story of my own meaningful existence in the world.

Life’s realities

It has been said time and again that actions speak louder than words, or the eyes being the window of the soul. I would add to this yet another saying that is very true to me, the face being the mirror of emotions or feelings. My face has betrayed me so many times to people who really know me. People close to me can easily gauge what I am feeling just by looking at my face.

I have met so many people in the course of my religious ministry; some have left indelible mark in my life because of what I have learned from them, lessons that can only be learned from persons who have really lived life in its real essence. One particular incident that I can’t forget happened years ago, when I met this woman who shared with me her life story. From the outset, it was a life full of misery, heartaches from failed relationship with husband, disappointments from children who have gone wayward, and financial difficulties. Her sufferings touched me so much, that before I knew it, my tears started to flood my face. I noticed that she stopped talking and looked at me in wonderment. She probably was at a loss on what to do with me. Anyhow, I was really touched by her strong faith and conviction, and this, without her knowing had rubbed on me. Indeed, my life’s existence is intertwined with that of others. Their experiences contribute in shaping my own way of perceiving the world, just as mine help them to accept the reality of their own existence.

II. Discourse and Construction

In this chapter of Discourse and Construction, language (along with descriptions and practices) is introduced by way of metaphor of construction. The author stated that the metaphor of construction works on two levels when applied to descriptions. The first is the idea that descriptions and accounts construct the world, or at least versions of the world. The second idea is that descriptions and accounts are themselves constructed, assembled, put together. Reality is very much a part of these human practices of assembling and putting together. In other words, reality is also constructed. And this is constructed according to our own view of the world around us.

Benjamin Whorf, a linguist-constructionist, developed a hypothesis stating that the language they used determines people’s perception of the world. This he explained by way of example of the Eskimo tribes who have different names for snow, whether this snow has just fallen, wet, or frozen; simply because they have a wide range of words available to describe it.

Language constructs our perception of the world. This perception is clearly mirrored at the way we make descriptions of things and people around us, and the events that happen in our lives.

There are three elements discussed by the author that are very important for the understanding of facts and descriptions in language constructionism. These are anti-cognitivism, discourse and rhetoric. The author discussed the cognitivist notions of representations as inner mental entities as opposed to practices in which these representations are used. The focus on discourse is with talk and texts as part of social practices while rhetoric is seen as a pervasive feature of the way people interact and arrive in understanding.

What do I think?

I remember a story that I have read about a Scottish girl who left home against the wishes of her father. After many years, she came back, although with much hesitation since she did not know how her father would react towards her. It was getting dark, and she stood for a long time outside the gate, debating whether to go in or turn back. Finally, her father came out because of the barking of the dog and saw her standing by the gate. He ran towards her, embraced her and spoke to her in Gaelic (Scottish dialect). Later, when she told her friend about it, she said: “You should have heard my father that night calling me ‘darling’ in Gaelic. There are about fifty equivalent words of it in Gaelic and he used all of them to express his love for me.”

This beautiful story shows how language can create a lot of meaning in our life. It can heal or it can hurt. When we were still kids, for example, my siblings and I can easily gauge my mother’s moods the way she used words when talking to us. She normally used endearments when speaking to us. If we kids did not hear any endearments, we knew something was wrong and we would be in trouble.

Indeed, in whatever way language is used, either friendly or hostile, it will inevitably create for us a perception of the world and of the people around us.

III. British Cultural Studies and Television

British Cultural Studies is essentially drawn from Marxist tradition with other research ideas thrown in like structuralism and ethnography. This study tackles the close relationship between culture and social structure and brought into light the differences and ongoing struggle between the dominant classes or cultural elite, and the popular culture or subordinate group.

Cultural studies tradition introduces the idea that television programs do not have a single meaning but are relatively open texts that can be read in different ways by different people. Reading or viewing television, then, becomes a process of negotiation between the viewer and the text. The word negotiation implies that there is a conflict of interests that needs to be reconciled in some way and this shows that the viewer or reader of text is an active maker of meanings and not a passive recipient of already constructed ones.

Stuart Hall, who had done this study under the patronage of University of Birmingham’s Center for Contemporary Studies, developed his theory of preferred reading to explain well this conflict of interests. He explained the three broad reading strategies, the dominant, negotiated and oppositional. The dominant reading, according to him, is produced by a viewer who agrees and accepts the dominant ideology and the subjectivity it produces. A negotiated reading, on the other hand, is produced when the viewer who generally fits into the dominant ideology, takes into account his or her social position and thus reads the text based on his or her social experience. An oppositional reading happens when the viewer’s social situation puts him or her directly in opposition with the dominant ideology.

Various television programs were studied, and examples are drawn out of action and “muscle” drama. It was concluded that a dominant reader of the genre would find pleasure in it because it reproduces in him or her, a subject position that fits easily into the dominant ideology (ex. masculinity, individualism, competition, etc.). Negotiated readers, like young boys, (because of their social standing) will read the text as a means for them to boost their “masculinity”. Negotiated readers tend to match their social experience with the ideology in the text. Oppositional readers on the other hand, will go against the text to deconstruct the dominant ideology. Advocates of feminism will read this genre as a blatant display of patriarchal chauvinism.

Popular culture such as television and advertising often presents to viewers programs or ads that construct various ideologies such as masculinity, patriarchal chauvinism, women as the weaker sex, passive and submissive; men as intelligent than women, etc. Oppositional readers, by nature of their opposition to dominant ideology will deconstruct these messages by not giving them a second thought.

What do I think?

Cultural studies offer an interesting realization that indeed, popular culture, especially television, not to mention MTV and advertisements, offer viewers different programs that construct various ideologies, most of them falling under the category of dominant ideology.

It is a common practice in our communities whenever we see a movie either on television or in the theater to discuss among us the merits of the movie that was shown. It is also true with television programs and other media. In the course of sharing, it is to be expected that one or two will differ with the others in her view or perception of some particular scenes or the way the story developed. Sometimes what is positive for some will be seen as negative by others. It is indeed a fact that a lot of things contribute in the way we read the text. Our perception is often shaped by our family background, education, and experiences in life.

References:

1. The Social Construction of Reality, Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, Doubleday &
Company, 1966.

2. Representing Reality, by Jonathan Potter, Chapter 4, pp. 97-118.

3. British Cultural Studies, by John Fiske, Chapter 8, pp. 284 – 323, ed. by Robert Allen,
Channels of Discourse Reassembled, 4th ed.