Bullying has long been a problem for children, but many middle and high school students are now facing cyberbullying. This sort of bullying, which was just getting its name around the year 2000, can be defined as “the repeated use of technology to harass, humiliate, or threaten” (Holladay, 2010). Adolescents are spending an average of 17 hours per week on the internet, and some are even hitting 40 hours for the week. (Davison, Stein 2014) These numbers are very high, which helps to explain the prevalence, and increase over the last 15 years, of cyberbullying. The young people who are the bullies as well as the ones who are being bullied are some of the newest generation of digital natives, or people who have always had this digital technology;
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A low-context culture is a society “in which the media that are produced and consumed are generally straightforward,” while a high-context culture is a society in which “both the producers and the consumers (the audience) of a media content the actual words, images and stories heavily depend on a shared understanding of the context within which that media content is presented.” (Sterin, 2014) Using these definitions, cyberbullying can reasonably be considered high culture. Cyberbullying does require a shared understanding of the content as well as the context in which it is being presented, even at its most basic it can be a complicated thing, and be very nuanced. If we look at low culture as a clear-cut black and white, and at high culture as the shades in between, it becomes clearer as to how cyberbullying is high culture. If it were low culture, there would never be a question as to whether or not something was actual cyberbullying, but there are instances in which one can be uncertain as to whether the parties involved are taking part in cyberbullying or in playing messing around. (Davison, Stein 2014) If this designation of cyberbullying as high culture impacts societal views, it is only in that it can be harder to spot until it is too late. However, there does not seem to be a significant relation between the high culture designation and how society views cyberbullying. It is a problem that hits across both genders, a wide variety of ethnicities, and throughout different economic classes; society as a whole recognizes it as such and has proceeded to give it at least the same time and attention as traditional
A low-context culture is a society “in which the media that are produced and consumed are generally straightforward,” while a high-context culture is a society in which “both the producers and the consumers (the audience) of a media content the actual words, images and stories heavily depend on a shared understanding of the context within which that media content is presented.” (Sterin, 2014) Using these definitions, cyberbullying can reasonably be considered high culture. Cyberbullying does require a shared understanding of the content as well as the context in which it is being presented, even at its most basic it can be a complicated thing, and be very nuanced. If we look at low culture as a clear-cut black and white, and at high culture as the shades in between, it becomes clearer as to how cyberbullying is high culture. If it were low culture, there would never be a question as to whether or not something was actual cyberbullying, but there are instances in which one can be uncertain as to whether the parties involved are taking part in cyberbullying or in playing messing around. (Davison, Stein 2014) If this designation of cyberbullying as high culture impacts societal views, it is only in that it can be harder to spot until it is too late. However, there does not seem to be a significant relation between the high culture designation and how society views cyberbullying. It is a problem that hits across both genders, a wide variety of ethnicities, and throughout different economic classes; society as a whole recognizes it as such and has proceeded to give it at least the same time and attention as traditional