Yu-Gi-Oh: The Cultural Fad
Many years ago in a place called Schuchard Elementary, there was a craze. A craze so huge, that pretty much the entire world was obsessed with it. That craze was Yu-Gi-Oh. Yu-Gi-Oh was everything when I was a student at Schuchard. Everyone, boys and girls, absolutely had to have a deck of Yu-Gi-Oh cards. People traded them and “dueled” with them. They were always the topic of conversation at my school. I also remembered fellow classmates going crazy for a piece of Exodia, a group of cards that were rare, and anyone who possessed all five of those cards, automatically wins the Yu-Gi-Oh card duel. This fad pretty soon thereafter, seem to have the entire world enthralled. Every where I looked, stores were selling Yu-Gi-Oh cards, Yu-Gi-Oh themed books, clothing, and toys, just flew off the shelf, and malls were hosting tournaments catering to the huge crowd of Yu-Gi-Oh “duelists”. This card game even spawned a TV show on WB 20 (now My TV 20). It took years for this fad to die down. By the time I reached Junior High, everyone seemed to have lost interest in their prized Yu-Gi-Oh cards, and forgot the franchise altogether. It seemed to me that the Yu-Gi-Oh craze gained an immense amount of popularity overnight, and then gradually, it dies. The things that make something like Yu-Gi-Oh, an obscure card game into a world phenomenon, raises a huge amount of curiosity and intrigue.
The beginnings of Yu-Gi-Oh's popularity is somewhat of a mystery. From what I can recall from my childhood memories, a fellow classmate brought in a deck of Yu-Gi-Oh cards, and soon enough, it spread through the school, and everyone had them. What forced me to conform to this fad was that my friends, who had their decks before I did, convinced me through peer pressure to buy a starter deck form the local store. So, not wanting to be left out, I persuaded my mom to buy me a pack. From there on out, I was hooked on Yu-Gi-Oh cards. The most obvious and logical reason for the start of the phenomenon that is Yu-Gi-Oh, is of course peer pressure. The trading card game and the television show were both targeted at young elementary school kids. So when one kid had them, the others had to follow suit, all wanting to become a part of the “in crowd” and essentially conform to the society of the classroom.
The next culprit to blame for the rise of this fad, is the mass media. Back when Yu-Gi-Oh was poplular say, in the early 2000s, Yu-Gi-Oh advertisements and product tie-ins were everywhere. First came the TV show that told a story to it's young viewers about the boy who is the descendant of an Egyptian Pharaoh, and is entered into a dueling tournament in which he plays for a cash prize, but then through a series of plot twists, is now in a card battle to save the lives of his friends and family. Then following the cartoon came the numerous advertisements for Fruit by the Foot fruit snacks, with its Yu-Gi-Oh shaped pieces, and not to mention the adertisements for the Yu-Gi-Oh toy line, and the Mcdonalds commercials that promised kids that if they were to buy a kids meal, they would get an exclusive Yu-Gi-Oh trading card, which I could never get my hands on as a kid, as no matter which McDonalds I went to, they were always sold out.
The rise of Yu-Gi-Oh would be best described as quick and unexpected. A relatively unknown Japanese trading card game, gained worldwide popularity overnight. The effects of peer pressure on the part of it's intended target audience, little kids, and it's aggressive media campaign both helped to launch the Yu-Gi-Oh brand into the social spotlight. Though, its cultural impact is nonexistent today, years ago, it had a significant impact on our social lives.
First!
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I LOVED Yu-Gi-Oh! as a child. I subjected to peer pressure as well when it came to buying a starter deck. I remember wasting (for lack of a better word) SO much money into collecting these cards to have like the perfect deck and become number one. But I digress. The way that you analyzed the hit fad was very accurate, with the whole rise and fall of the craze. I probably wouldn't have analyzed it any differently. Though you did not categorize this as high or low culture, this would be low culture, seeing as anyone in society could obtain a deck and start playing.
Christian,
ReplyDeleteYou make some good observations about this artifact, but I would like to have seen a slightly deeper analysis regarding what this toy represents in terms of our society/culture. On a side note, be sure to use academic language and avoid the first person voice in assignments like these.
Oh lord. I remember those cards. Back in the day, you little boys were obsessed! This would have been an artifact that I could have successfully analyzed because I grew up with these things. I remember my brother had gotten so into it that he made me battle him. I also remember watching this show Saturday mornings while eating breakfast; I loved it. I think I might have added a part about how the cards and show effected our society growing up, as Professor Rinke said. I also would have talked more about if you consider it as high or low on the culture scale. I think gender may have a big effect on how this would have been analyzed. I know this was popular among the boys and girls did not really get involved, at least they would never admit to it. If a girl analyzed this they most likely would describe the cards and show as annoying and pointless. In my opinion, this is categorized as low culture.
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