Spring Break in New Orleans:
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| http://blog.carnivalneworleans.com/?p=2742 |
These are not uncommon pictures to see of college student's Spring Breaks. In fact, these images and sterotypes are a commonplace. It is generally accepted that during Spring Break, college students take trip to warm and beachy parts of the world like Florida or Latin America and party for a whole week as a way to celebrate the near-end of the second semester and to welcome the warm weather.
However, although this sterotype is very common, how many college students actually do this? I know that I went home this break, most of my friends did as well and we all did not break out our bikinis and margarita glasses at the beach while we were there. It seems that very few students actually do celebrate Spring Break as the pictures above portray.
My theory is that travel companies and even certain states and countries want to make it appear that this is what everyone does and you should too. How many times have we seen pictrues or commericals advertising a group of people enjoying themselves at the beach? Spring Break is a very big money-making time for companies and they want to advertise as much as they can and therefore we subconciously think that this is what everyone does during the week off of school.
Truth is most of us cannot afford these type of trips and many of us rather visit our families and friends back in our hometown rather than go to Mexico or Miami. So the lesson that can be pulled from the hyped of image of Spring Break is that not all stereotypes are true and that many commonplace ideas can be fabricated by the media and by companies.
I comepletely agree. I hardly watch MTV or channels that target young adults to people in their mid 20's, but when I do I see these stupid sweepstakes for spring break packages like this one to exotic places like Vegas or Cali. I mean I think the hot thing to do is to go out to the beach if you can on Spring break, but How many people actually do this, if they go to the beach?
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your premise that the amount of people who go to Florida or Mexico for Spring Break is inflated. I'm sure that travel companies and other large corporations use vehicles such as MTV to promote the idea that to have a real Spring Break one must go to a sunny place and drink their face off for a week.
ReplyDeleteBoth of my roommates went to glamorous places(South Beach, Vegas), but I chose to stay home mostly out of a want to save money and to spend time with my family, who I hadn't seen since December.
I definately think there is a huge misconception about Spring Break. Personally, my goal is to always go somewhere exotic or just travel in general. The reality, though, is that I visit my family. I also think this applies to other students especially in college because they live far from their families. I agree with the commercials or channels that target college student's. I think they do this because we are very adventureous and careless when it comes to money. Because most of us don't have bills to pay, we spend it on trips like these to live life while we're young.
ReplyDeleteCouldn't agree with you anymore. I feel like that usually this type of propaganda is put out in a way as not to show what truly happens but instead to persuade college students to do this. I also went back home for spring break and literally had an awesome and relaxing week with the family. The truth is that though there might be some college students who do this, most don't have the time or money to go off and party their ass' off for a week in Miami or Cancun.
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