George Gerbner Quotes

United States, Author
August 8, 1919 – December, 24, 2005.

George Gerbner was a professor of communication and the founder of cultivation theory. Of Jewish descent, born in Budapest, Hungary, he emigrated to the United States after Kristallnacht in early 1939. Gerbner earned his bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1942. He worked briefly for the San Francisco Chronicle as a writer, columnist and assistant financial editor.

Also known as Founder

If you can write a nation's stories, you needn't worry about who makes its laws. Today, television tells most of the stories to most of the people most of the time.

George Gerbner
- Stories
- Nation
- Laws
You know, who tells the stories of a culture really governs human behavior. It used to be the parent, the school, the church, the community. Now it's a handful of global conglomerates that have nothing to tell, but a great deal to sell.

George Gerbner
- Culture
- Stories
- Sell

Fearful people are more dependent, more easily manipulated and controlled, more susceptible to deceptively simple, strong, tough measures and hard-line postures. ... They may accept and even welcome repression if it promises to relieve their insecurities.

George Gerbner
On prime time entertainment television, scientists are most at risk. Ten percent of scientists featured in prime-time entertainment programming get killed, and five percent kill someone. No other occupational group is more likely to kill or be killed.

George Gerbner
Growing up with violence, with inescapable expertly choreographed brutality in every home builds not only a kind of desensitization for it, but it also creates a market for violent entertainment by people for whom even what they see on television is not enough, is not graphic enough, is not explicit enough, and some movie productions, some big productions really cash in on that market. What is peculiar about this is that as time goes on, a greater dosage is necessary to satisfy this need.

George Gerbner
The product is the delivery of the largest number of people at the least cost.

George Gerbner
- Cost
- Product
- Delivery