SOC 202 Popular Culture Final
Exam (WITH Dale Shin)2025
COMPLETE UPDATE
Dale Shin
, Theories of Popular Culture
According to cultural studies scholar Raymond Williams, there are 3
meanings of culture:
1.Can refer to a particular way of life of a group at a specific moment in
history (the laws, customs, religious practices, languages, etc that prevail
in a particular place at a particular time)
- Ex. French culture vs. British culture, American culture vs Canadian
culture, or even the team or company culture at one organization vs.
another
2. Can also refer to any kind of creative or aesthetic activites, practices, and
output
-Ex. literature, sculpture and visual art, but also performing arts, music,
movies, and so on
3. Can also refer to a process of individual spiritual or intellectual
development and refinement
- Ex. when we describe someone as being “cultured”
There are 2 approaches to studying popular culture
Cultural Studies
Cultural Studies: an approach to studying pop culture that considers works
of pop culture (movies, music, etc) as “texts” and consumers and audiences
as “readers”
- draws upon concepts, languages, and tools from various disciplines
mostly in the humanities, like English and literary criticism,
anthropology, philosophy, film studies, and others
- all texts have many, and often implicit, meanings that have to be
interpreted by their readers (and sometimes the readers can read the
text in ways the authors didn’t intend or would oppose)
So, Cultural studies considers how the “texts” of popular culture (Ex. movies,
TV, video games, music) produce and are saturated with meanings - and
how the “readers” of popular culture, like audiences and critics, interpret
those texts
- looks at how popular culture shape and influence individuals to behave,
think, feel, fear, and desire in particular ways
- considers how identities - racial, gender, sexual, class etc - can be
formed through and organized around consumption of different kinds of
popular culture
- takes seriously examples and genres of pop culture that have often been
dismissed as unworthy of deeper, more sustained consideration and
analysis (Ex. soap operas, wrestling, hip-hop, comic books, video games,
fan fiction)
,Cultural Studies is also concerned with the question of p ower and inequality
- considers to what extent popular culture can serve (either purposely or
unwittingly) as a medium of values and norms that prof up the existing
social order and reinforce various inequalities and oppositions
,Cultural studies also tries to consider how culture can be a site of c ontestation
and resistance (Ex. audiences don’t just uncritically accept the messages in
newspapers, TV shows, or music, but also actively reject or attack them)
- some scholars of culture argue that these broader questions of power,
inequality, and ideology cannot be adequately addressed from the
perspective of cultural studies
- they argue that another approach to studying popular culture is required
Political Economy
Political Economy: an approach to studying popular culture that considers the
patterns of ownership, production, and sale of that culture as being most
important for understanding movies, music, etc today
- draws upon economics, sociology, psychology, and other disciplines
mostly in the social sciences
A political economy approach asks how the forms of ownership and c ontrol
of the institutions and organizations that produce pop culture shape and
influence the kinds of pop culture that we consume (as well as the ways in
which we consume them)
- like most goods and services in a market economy like our own, popular
culture and entertainment media are produced as commodities
- their objective is to produce profits - difference between the costs to
produce and distribute TV/ films/ music/ etc. and the total amount of money
generated by sale or liscensing (revenues)
In some of the largest entertainment media industries, like TV and film, a
certain set of relations has been established for the production and
distribution of movies and TV shows, between production companies,
financiers, distribution companies, and marketing companies.
Production Companies: conceptualize, produce, and sell TV, film, and other
kinds of popular entertainment. They organize and administer financial and
physical infrastructure for producing works
Financiers: individuals or organizations that invest money in entertainment
production to receive return on investment. Can exercise considerable
influence over production process through decisions to finance (or not to
finance) TV series, films, video games etc
- more and more financing today is handled “in-house” by media
conglomerates that “parent” production, financing, and distribution
companies (and therefore don’t have to depend upon external
financiers)
Distribution Companies: buy rights to distribute TV shows, films, etc from
production companies and then sell rights to exhibition companies (Ex.
Exam (WITH Dale Shin)2025
COMPLETE UPDATE
Dale Shin
, Theories of Popular Culture
According to cultural studies scholar Raymond Williams, there are 3
meanings of culture:
1.Can refer to a particular way of life of a group at a specific moment in
history (the laws, customs, religious practices, languages, etc that prevail
in a particular place at a particular time)
- Ex. French culture vs. British culture, American culture vs Canadian
culture, or even the team or company culture at one organization vs.
another
2. Can also refer to any kind of creative or aesthetic activites, practices, and
output
-Ex. literature, sculpture and visual art, but also performing arts, music,
movies, and so on
3. Can also refer to a process of individual spiritual or intellectual
development and refinement
- Ex. when we describe someone as being “cultured”
There are 2 approaches to studying popular culture
Cultural Studies
Cultural Studies: an approach to studying pop culture that considers works
of pop culture (movies, music, etc) as “texts” and consumers and audiences
as “readers”
- draws upon concepts, languages, and tools from various disciplines
mostly in the humanities, like English and literary criticism,
anthropology, philosophy, film studies, and others
- all texts have many, and often implicit, meanings that have to be
interpreted by their readers (and sometimes the readers can read the
text in ways the authors didn’t intend or would oppose)
So, Cultural studies considers how the “texts” of popular culture (Ex. movies,
TV, video games, music) produce and are saturated with meanings - and
how the “readers” of popular culture, like audiences and critics, interpret
those texts
- looks at how popular culture shape and influence individuals to behave,
think, feel, fear, and desire in particular ways
- considers how identities - racial, gender, sexual, class etc - can be
formed through and organized around consumption of different kinds of
popular culture
- takes seriously examples and genres of pop culture that have often been
dismissed as unworthy of deeper, more sustained consideration and
analysis (Ex. soap operas, wrestling, hip-hop, comic books, video games,
fan fiction)
,Cultural Studies is also concerned with the question of p ower and inequality
- considers to what extent popular culture can serve (either purposely or
unwittingly) as a medium of values and norms that prof up the existing
social order and reinforce various inequalities and oppositions
,Cultural studies also tries to consider how culture can be a site of c ontestation
and resistance (Ex. audiences don’t just uncritically accept the messages in
newspapers, TV shows, or music, but also actively reject or attack them)
- some scholars of culture argue that these broader questions of power,
inequality, and ideology cannot be adequately addressed from the
perspective of cultural studies
- they argue that another approach to studying popular culture is required
Political Economy
Political Economy: an approach to studying popular culture that considers the
patterns of ownership, production, and sale of that culture as being most
important for understanding movies, music, etc today
- draws upon economics, sociology, psychology, and other disciplines
mostly in the social sciences
A political economy approach asks how the forms of ownership and c ontrol
of the institutions and organizations that produce pop culture shape and
influence the kinds of pop culture that we consume (as well as the ways in
which we consume them)
- like most goods and services in a market economy like our own, popular
culture and entertainment media are produced as commodities
- their objective is to produce profits - difference between the costs to
produce and distribute TV/ films/ music/ etc. and the total amount of money
generated by sale or liscensing (revenues)
In some of the largest entertainment media industries, like TV and film, a
certain set of relations has been established for the production and
distribution of movies and TV shows, between production companies,
financiers, distribution companies, and marketing companies.
Production Companies: conceptualize, produce, and sell TV, film, and other
kinds of popular entertainment. They organize and administer financial and
physical infrastructure for producing works
Financiers: individuals or organizations that invest money in entertainment
production to receive return on investment. Can exercise considerable
influence over production process through decisions to finance (or not to
finance) TV series, films, video games etc
- more and more financing today is handled “in-house” by media
conglomerates that “parent” production, financing, and distribution
companies (and therefore don’t have to depend upon external
financiers)
Distribution Companies: buy rights to distribute TV shows, films, etc from
production companies and then sell rights to exhibition companies (Ex.
