Autor Concept uitleg
Otherness Pop culture always defined in relation to what it’s not
Raymond Williams Culture: 3 def 1. General process of intellectual, spiritual and aesthetic
Marked by relation of power and development
politics ~ Canon, best what have been said
2. Particular way of living connected to time, place and
communities
~ food, holidays, traditions (postmodern vision)
3. Works and practices of intellectual and artistic activity
~ films, books, opera
Graeme Turner Ideology: 5 def 1. Body of ideas expressed by group of ppl
Ideology usually supports the 2. Masking, concealing, distortion
powerful and maintains their ~ Marxist interpretation, false consciousness, fake reality,
worldviews ideology formed by power relations
Often represented as common
sense, universal truth
3. Ideological forms
~ Marxist interpretation: each text is political, presents a
particular image of the world, society as conflictual
4. Ideology operated at the level of connotation, texts carry
unconscious meanings
~ Barthes interpretation: culturalism
5. Ideology not only body of ideas, also material practice
~Althusser: practices of everyday life, reproduced through ISA
Popular culture: 6 persp 1. Liked by many (quantitative)
Not historically fixed 2. What is over after decided what high culture is
Social conflict: taste, values, norms & Culture & civilisation
morals
3. Mass culture
Culture & civilization: Leavisism
4. Originated from the people
Culturalism
5. Site of struggle
Culturalism: Hall & Whannel
6. Postmodern culture no longer recognizes the distinction
Sontag
Context - Set of presuppositions, which provide a framework for our
analysis
- Other texts, historical or geographical frame
, - No text in itself, meaning is created in a particular context
Situating Main ideas Author
Industrialization & urbanization Culture as a binary category Arnold (1822, England)
More communities, lived - High culture = elite culture, - Culture = body of knowledge + study of perfection
& consumed together culture Becoming smthng, knowing whats best, whats best and
Changing relation - Low culture = mass culture, the pursuit of whats best
employee and employer anarchy - Workingclass lived culture = political danger, anarchy
Fear of a revolution Culture as political (nostalgia for past)
Emergence of pop - Nostalgic for pre-industrial Use culture in its social function & policing the mass
culture, cultural space society - Division of society
outside influence of - Top-down: ppl are passive & 1. Barbarians
dominant class absorb anything that comes to 2. Philistines
Ideas mainly in England, later them 3. Populace
US & West-Europe Policing culture Working class is less evolutioned
19th century – 1950 - Pop culture social disorder Uneducated for power given (voting) & no respect
Cultural critics, intellectuals (not - So suppressing class identity Culture to guide 1 & 2 from working culture & create
working class ppl!) through culture (education) respect for authority from 3
- Only support for culture that By education
supports dominant ideology - Not abt culture, but fear of social disorder, working class
Pop culture as uncontrolled form of as evidence of decline
leisure - Goal to police unruly forces of mass society
- Threatens social order, morals - Rejection of protest
& religion
- Threatening culture and
civilization
- Homogenous, not original
Response to cultural crisis of Changed status minority: no longer Leavis (1930)
1930 culture authority for elites Problem
Fascisism: Mass culture more threatening to - Addiction to entertainment: fiction, cinema
Cinema, mass production create chaos - Popular press as de-educator of public mind
Increasing mobility Collapse of traditional authority & - End of critical thought, does not contribute to ppl
threat of rise of mass democracy - Passive consumers
Training in schools to resistance to - Main symptom of cultural decline = advertisements
mass culture (studied this)
Popular fiction addictive form of Consequences
compensation - Nostalgia golden age
Shakespeare: community who discussed books
- Worsening of quality of work: distraction of leisure time,
, addiction to substitute living (entert) now work to live
outside of work (not live in work)
- Control expansion mass culture in education
Fear
- Commercialization
1. Americanization: pop culture from US invades Europe
2. Massification: technology makes possible to distribute
pop culture to masses
Importance
- Empirical, but weak & seek for decline
- Action in education
- Critical towards import America
US mass culture Mass culture threatens folk culture Ross: 3 positions in debate abt mass culture
Post WWII and art 1. Aesthetic-liberal: mass chooses 2nd and 3rd rate texts
Debates on culture, political and Europe concerned abt 2. Corporate liberal: pop culture functions as socialization of
moral authority, intellectuals as Americanization, but Am argues that consumption
guards mass culture is not American (more 3. Socialist: mass culture as form of social control
Influence of Arnold and Leavis US) Rosenberg & White
- Dehumanizing effects of mass culture undermining
wealth and well-being of Am society
- Not American: more spread in SU, not door capitalism or
democracy but door technology
Mcdonald
- Mass culture undermines the vitality of high culture
- Deny that Am is land of mass culture (US more)
- Not folk culture (expression ppl) or high culture
(expression indiv artist) mass culture = expression of
audience maximalization
- Exploits instead of satisfies cultural needs
- Pessimistic: bad ill drive out the good: Am into infantile
masses, homogenized culture
Overall evaluation:
C& C created space to study pop culture
= Example of cultural decline & potential political disorder
Only seeking confirmation of decline, no detailed analysis of
texts or practices
Demanded difference and deference
Otherness Pop culture always defined in relation to what it’s not
Raymond Williams Culture: 3 def 1. General process of intellectual, spiritual and aesthetic
Marked by relation of power and development
politics ~ Canon, best what have been said
2. Particular way of living connected to time, place and
communities
~ food, holidays, traditions (postmodern vision)
3. Works and practices of intellectual and artistic activity
~ films, books, opera
Graeme Turner Ideology: 5 def 1. Body of ideas expressed by group of ppl
Ideology usually supports the 2. Masking, concealing, distortion
powerful and maintains their ~ Marxist interpretation, false consciousness, fake reality,
worldviews ideology formed by power relations
Often represented as common
sense, universal truth
3. Ideological forms
~ Marxist interpretation: each text is political, presents a
particular image of the world, society as conflictual
4. Ideology operated at the level of connotation, texts carry
unconscious meanings
~ Barthes interpretation: culturalism
5. Ideology not only body of ideas, also material practice
~Althusser: practices of everyday life, reproduced through ISA
Popular culture: 6 persp 1. Liked by many (quantitative)
Not historically fixed 2. What is over after decided what high culture is
Social conflict: taste, values, norms & Culture & civilisation
morals
3. Mass culture
Culture & civilization: Leavisism
4. Originated from the people
Culturalism
5. Site of struggle
Culturalism: Hall & Whannel
6. Postmodern culture no longer recognizes the distinction
Sontag
Context - Set of presuppositions, which provide a framework for our
analysis
- Other texts, historical or geographical frame
, - No text in itself, meaning is created in a particular context
Situating Main ideas Author
Industrialization & urbanization Culture as a binary category Arnold (1822, England)
More communities, lived - High culture = elite culture, - Culture = body of knowledge + study of perfection
& consumed together culture Becoming smthng, knowing whats best, whats best and
Changing relation - Low culture = mass culture, the pursuit of whats best
employee and employer anarchy - Workingclass lived culture = political danger, anarchy
Fear of a revolution Culture as political (nostalgia for past)
Emergence of pop - Nostalgic for pre-industrial Use culture in its social function & policing the mass
culture, cultural space society - Division of society
outside influence of - Top-down: ppl are passive & 1. Barbarians
dominant class absorb anything that comes to 2. Philistines
Ideas mainly in England, later them 3. Populace
US & West-Europe Policing culture Working class is less evolutioned
19th century – 1950 - Pop culture social disorder Uneducated for power given (voting) & no respect
Cultural critics, intellectuals (not - So suppressing class identity Culture to guide 1 & 2 from working culture & create
working class ppl!) through culture (education) respect for authority from 3
- Only support for culture that By education
supports dominant ideology - Not abt culture, but fear of social disorder, working class
Pop culture as uncontrolled form of as evidence of decline
leisure - Goal to police unruly forces of mass society
- Threatens social order, morals - Rejection of protest
& religion
- Threatening culture and
civilization
- Homogenous, not original
Response to cultural crisis of Changed status minority: no longer Leavis (1930)
1930 culture authority for elites Problem
Fascisism: Mass culture more threatening to - Addiction to entertainment: fiction, cinema
Cinema, mass production create chaos - Popular press as de-educator of public mind
Increasing mobility Collapse of traditional authority & - End of critical thought, does not contribute to ppl
threat of rise of mass democracy - Passive consumers
Training in schools to resistance to - Main symptom of cultural decline = advertisements
mass culture (studied this)
Popular fiction addictive form of Consequences
compensation - Nostalgia golden age
Shakespeare: community who discussed books
- Worsening of quality of work: distraction of leisure time,
, addiction to substitute living (entert) now work to live
outside of work (not live in work)
- Control expansion mass culture in education
Fear
- Commercialization
1. Americanization: pop culture from US invades Europe
2. Massification: technology makes possible to distribute
pop culture to masses
Importance
- Empirical, but weak & seek for decline
- Action in education
- Critical towards import America
US mass culture Mass culture threatens folk culture Ross: 3 positions in debate abt mass culture
Post WWII and art 1. Aesthetic-liberal: mass chooses 2nd and 3rd rate texts
Debates on culture, political and Europe concerned abt 2. Corporate liberal: pop culture functions as socialization of
moral authority, intellectuals as Americanization, but Am argues that consumption
guards mass culture is not American (more 3. Socialist: mass culture as form of social control
Influence of Arnold and Leavis US) Rosenberg & White
- Dehumanizing effects of mass culture undermining
wealth and well-being of Am society
- Not American: more spread in SU, not door capitalism or
democracy but door technology
Mcdonald
- Mass culture undermines the vitality of high culture
- Deny that Am is land of mass culture (US more)
- Not folk culture (expression ppl) or high culture
(expression indiv artist) mass culture = expression of
audience maximalization
- Exploits instead of satisfies cultural needs
- Pessimistic: bad ill drive out the good: Am into infantile
masses, homogenized culture
Overall evaluation:
C& C created space to study pop culture
= Example of cultural decline & potential political disorder
Only seeking confirmation of decline, no detailed analysis of
texts or practices
Demanded difference and deference
