Why is popular Culture relevant to a business environment?

 

Popular culture is relevant to me in a business environment because I work in a children’s hospital.  Our hospital needs to be aware of what kids like to make the décor and patient rooms as pleasant and enjoyable as possible.  These things make the patients and families want to return.  The hospital also uses social media, such as Facebook and YouTube, to show some of the great outcomes for patients who have been to our hospital.  These same popular culture tools may also be what attracts world renowned physicians to the hospital.  The hospital is always looking to improve on things such as how a patient is checked in, how much time they spend waiting for a physician and on what can be done to make the visit as short as possible.  The hospital needs to continue being up-to-date on what is popular to keep the décor’ fresh and enjoyable to patients.  The hospital also needs to make sure it’s using the most up-to-date technology in order to keep attracting the best physicians and remain competitive.

What popular culture means to me?

I find popular culture is to be a nuisance and also an enjoyable thing.  Many things that are discussed and shown on TV are an annoyance to me.  I’m horrified at what too many people will do to become part of popular culture, and more horrified at how many people believe these things are cool, which then makes it popular.   So called “Reality Shows” would be an example of this.  The most popular of these shows are the ones where people treat each other like crap and expose things about themselves that most people would be horrified if their nearest neighbor knew.  

The things I enjoy about popular culture are discovering a new great television show, a new musical artist, and news about things I might never have learned about from another part of the world.  In recent years, the thing I’ve most enjoyed is watching something previously considered folk culture, country music, now becoming popular culture. 

My Pop culture artifact!

 

I have picked Country Music as my popular culture artifact.  Growing up my mom listened to Elvis Presley, and country music singers like Conway Twitty, George Jones and Loretta Lynn.  I didn’t mind her music until I got into middle school and discovered pop music.  It was like discovering Christmas when I first heard the incredible beats in music from the likes of Michael Jackson, Journey and Def Leppard.  In my younger years, there weren’t many people that would admit to liking country music.  Do you remember that old joke?  What do you get when you play a country song backwards?  You get your house, your dog, your best friend and your truck back, because country music had a reputation for singing about loss and sad things.  I was of the same mind set until about 12 years ago.  All of the sudden I had CMT on my TV and discovered the likes of Keith Urban, Gary Allen and Blake Shelton.  And thanks to the show “The Voice” and Blake Shelton it is alright to admit to liking country music.  And thanks to Keith Urbans’ manly guitar playing it’s cool to like country music.  It’s so cool that country music award shows now have some of the largest viewerships ever.  Actors and actresses that would never have been presenters on these award shows years ago proudly show up and go on about the music stars they love.  Who would have ever dreamed there would be a country music artist judge on American Idol?  If that hasn’t turned popular culture on its head, what will?