Assignment 1-2

Popular culture can be anything from a trend, such as in the 1980’s when wearing leg warmers were the thing to wear, to a tangible item, such as the popularity of the Cabbage Patch Kids.

Popular culture affects everyone. Your own wants and your family’s wants are influenced by popular culture. It changes the way we live our lives. We are now almost addicted to our cell phones. We cannot get away from them. You are now able to be reached anywhere. This is great for emergencies, but not for when you are sitting in a movie theater and you receive a call. People now have a harder time getting really away from the office while vacationing. They can now access the internet from their cell phone, which means they can check their work email. This has lead to the elimination of real down time for many.

The understanding of popular culture in the business environment is necessary for keeping up with trends. When online classes were first started, they were not widely accepted as being like a traditional class. The acceptability of obtaining a degree online is now much greater. As with a lot of new technologies, it takes awhile for the general population to become comfortable with the it. In my own career, the idea of employees doing forms online was foreign. Now the use of online forms is becoming more acceptable. I foresee in the future that paper will become a thing of the past and most things will be done on-line via an employee self service platform.

I would consider Cabbage Patch Kids to be an example of a popular culture artifact. The Cabbage Patch Kids was a creation by Xavier Roberts. He hand crafted the dolls starting in the 1970’s and the dolls are now mass produced today. The dolls were so popular in the 1980’s that they were being sold for hundreds over their retail price. There were even fights that broke out in attempts by parents to purchase a doll for their child for Christmas. The popularity of the Cabbage Patch Kids is an example of how once an item is on the radar of the news media, the popularity can far exceed what was ever anticipated.