Citizendia
Your Ad Here

Popular culture (also known as pop culture) deemed as what is popular within the social context — that of which is most strongly represented by what is perceived to be popularly accepted among society. Otherwise, popular culture is also suggested to be the widespread cultural elements in any given society that are perpetuated through that society's vernacular language or lingua franca. Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning "to cultivate" generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic A society is a Population of Humans characterized by patterns of relationships between individuals that share a distinctive Culture and Institutions Vernacular refers to the Native language of a country or a locality A lingua franca (from Italian, literally meaning Frankish language, see etymology under Sabir and Italian below is any Language widely It comprises the daily interactions, needs and desires and cultural 'moments' that make up the everyday lives of the mainstream. Personal life (or everyday life or human existence) is the course of an individual Human 's life especially when viewed as the sum of personal choices Mainstream is generally the common current of Thought of the Majority. It can include any number of practices, including those pertaining to cooking, clothing, consumption, mass media and the many facets of entertainment such as sports and literature. Cooking is the process of preparing Food by applying Heat, selecting measuring and combining of ingredients in an ordered procedure for producing safe and edible Clothing (also called clothes, accoutrements, accouterments, or habiliments) protects the Human body from extreme Weather In economics consumption is the primary motivating force in the wealth or utility maximizing paradigm "Popular press" redirects here note that the University of Wisconsin Press publishes under the imprint "The Popular Press" See also Entertainment (disambiguation and The Entertainer (disambiguation Entertainment is an activity designed to give people Sport is an Activity that is governed by a set of rules or Customs and often engaged in competitively Literature is the Art of written works Literally translated the word means "acquaintance with letters" (from Latin littera letter (Compare meme. A meme (miːm consists of any idea or behavior that can pass from one person to another by learning or imitation ) Popular culture often contrasts with a more exclusive, even elitist "high culture,"[1], that is, the culture of ruling social groups. Elitism is the belief or attitude that those individuals who are considered members of the Elite &mdash a select group of people with outstanding personal abilities intellect High culture is a term now used in a number of different ways in Academic discourse whose most common meaning is the set of cultural products mainly in the The term ruling class refers to the Social class of a given society that decides upon and sets that society's political policy In Sociology, a group can be defined as two or more Humans that interact with one another accept expectations and obligations as members of the group and share a [2] The earliest use of "popular" in English was during the fifteenth century in law and politics, meaning "low", "base", "vulgar", and "of the common people" 'til the late eighteenth century by which time it began to mean "widespread" and gain in positive connotation. (Williams 1985)

Pop culture finds its expression in the mass circulation of items from areas such as fashion, music, sport and film. Fashion refers to styles of dress (but can also include cuisine literature art architecture and general comportment that are popular in a culture at any given time Music is an Art form in which the medium is Sound organized in Time. The world of pop culture has had a particular influence on art from the early 1960s on, through Pop Art. Art refers to a diverse range of Human activities creations and expressions that are appealing to the Senses or Emotions of a human individual Pop Art is a visual Art movement that emerged in the mid 1950s in Britain and in parallel in the late 1950s in the United States. When modern pop culture began during the early 1950s, it made it harder for adults to participate. [3] Today, most adults, their kids and grandchildren "participate" in pop culture directly or indirectly.

Contents

Definitions

The meaning of popular and the meaning of culture are essentially contested concepts and there are multiple competing definitions of popular culture. Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning "to cultivate" generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic In a paper delivered to the Aristotelian Society on 12 March 1956 Walter Bryce Gallie (1912&ndash1998 introduced the term essentially contested concept to facilitate John Storey, in "Cultural Theory and Popular Culture", discusses six definitions. The quantitative definition, of culture has the problem that much "high" culture (e. A quantitative attribute is one that exists in a range of magnitudes and can therefore be measured. g. television dramatisations of Jane Austen) is widely favoured. Jane Austen (16 "Pop culture" can also be defined as the culture that is "left over" when we have decided what "high culture" is. High culture is a term now used in a number of different ways in Academic discourse whose most common meaning is the set of cultural products mainly in the However, many works straddle or cross the boundaries e. g. William Shakespeare, Charles Dickens, Puccini-Verdi-Pavarotti- Nessun Dorma. William Shakespeare ( baptised WikipediaWikiProject Composers#Lead section --> Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo Maria Puccini ( December 22, 1858 WikipediaWikiProject Opera#Infoboxes. Thank you--> Luciano Pavarotti, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI ( October 12, Nessun dorma (English edition None shall sleep tonight) is an Aria from the final act of Giacomo Puccini 's Opera Storey draws our attention to the forces and relations which sustain this difference such as the educational system.

A third definition equates pop culture with Mass Culture. This is seen as a commercial culture, mass produced for mass consumption. From a U. K. (and European) point of view, this may be equated to American culture. Alternatively, "pop culture" can be defined as an "authentic" culture of the people, but this can be problematic because there are many ways of defining the "people. " Story argues that there is a political dimension to popular culture; neo-Gramscian hegemony theory ". Antonio Gramsci ('ɡramʃi ( January 23, 1891 &ndash April 27, 1937) was an Italian Philosopher, Writer, . . sees popular culture as a site of struggle between the 'resistance' of subordinate groups in society and the forces of 'incorporation' operating in the interests of dominant groups in society. " A postmodernism approach to popular culture would "no longer recognise the distinction between high and popular culture'

Storey emphasises that popular culture emerges from the urbanisation of the industrial revolution, which identifies the term with the usual definitions of 'mass culture'. Postmodernism literally means 'after the modernist movement' While " Modern " itself refers to something "related to the present" the movement of modernism Studies of Shakespeare (by Weimann, Barber or Bristol, for example) locate much of the characteristic vitality of his drama in its participation in Renaissance popular culture, while contemporary practitioners like Dario Fo and John McGrath use popular culture in its Gramscian sense that includes ancient folk traditions (the commedia dell'arte for example). William Shakespeare ( baptised The Renaissance (from French Renaissance, meaning "rebirth" Italian: Rinascimento, from re- "again" and nascere Dario Fo (born March 24, 1926) is an Italian satirist, Playwright, Theater director, Actor, and Composer John Peter McGrath, ( June 1 1935 &ndash January 22 2002) was a Liverpudlian - Irish Playwright and theatre theorist Commedia dell'Arte ( Italian: "the comedy of artists" is a form of Improvisational theatre that began in Italy in the 16th century

Popular culture changes constantly and occurs uniquely in place and time. For other uses see Time (disambiguation Time is a component of a measuring system used to sequence events to compare the durations of It forms currents and eddies, and represents a complex of mutually-interdependent perspectives and values that influence society and its institutions in various ways. For example, certain currents of pop culture may originate from, (or diverge into) a subculture, representing perspectives with which the mainstream popular culture has only limited familiarity. For the term in biology see Subculture (biology. For the song by New Order see Sub-culture (song. Mainstream is generally the common current of Thought of the Majority. Items of popular culture most typically appeal to a broad spectrum of the public. Public is of or pertaining to the people relating to or affecting a nation state or community opposed to private; as the public treasury a road or lake

Institutional propagation

The news media mines the work of scientists and scholars and conveys it to the general public, often emphasizing "factoids" that have inherent appeal or the power to amaze. The news media refers to the section of the Mass media that focuses on presenting current News to the public A scientist, in the broadest sense refers to any person that engages in a systematic activity to acquire Knowledge or an individual that engages in such practices Scholarly method &mdash or as it is more commonly called scholarship &mdash is the body of principles and practices used by scholars to make their claims about the world as Public is of or pertaining to the people relating to or affecting a nation state or community opposed to private; as the public treasury a road or lake A factoid is a spurious — unverified incorrect or fabricated — statement formed and asserted as a fact but with no veracity. For instance, giant pandas (a species in remote Chinese woodlands) have become well-known items of popular culture; parasitic worms, though of greater practical importance, have not. The Giant Panda ( Ailuropoda melanoleuca, "black-and-white cat-foot" is a Mammal classified in the Bear family ( Ursidae) native to Intestinal parasites are Parasites that populate the Gastro-intestinal tract. Both scholarly facts and news stories get modified through popular transmission, often to the point of outright falsehoods.

Hannah Arendt's 1961 essay 'The Crisis in Culture' suggested that a "market-driven media would lead to the displacement of culture by the dictates of entertainment. "[4] Susan Sontag argues that in our culture, the most ". Susan Sontag ( January 16, 1933 – December 28, 2004) was an American Literary theorist, Philosopher, . . intelligible, persuasive values are [increasingly] drawn from the entertainment industries", which is "undermining of standards of seriousness. " As a result, "tepid, the glib, and the senselessly cruel" topics are becoming the norm. [4] Some critics argue that popular culture is “dumbing down”: ". . . newspapers that once ran foreign news now feature celebrity gossip, pictures of scantily dressed young ladies. . . television has replaced high-quality drama with gardening, cookery, and other “lifestyle” programmes. . . [and] reality TV and asinine soaps," to the point that people are constantly immersed in trivia about celebrity culture. [4]

In Rosenberg and White's book Mass Culture, MacDonald argues that " Popular culture is a debased, trivial culture that voids both the deep realities (sex, death, failure, tragedy) and also the simple spontaneous pleasures. . . . The masses, debauched by several generations of this sort of thing, in turn come to demand trivial and comfortable cultural products. "[4] Van den Haag argues that ". . . all mass media in the end alienate people from personal experience and though appearing to offset it, intensify their moral isolation from each other, from reality and from themselves. " He argues that mass media then lessens ". . . people's capacity to experience life itself. " . "[5][4]

Critics have lamented the ". . replacement of high art and authentic folk culture by tasteless industrialised artefacts produced on a mass scale in order to satisfy the lowest common denominator. "[4] This "mass culture emerged after the Second World War and have led to the concentration of mass-culture power in ever larger global media conglomerates. " The popular press decreased the amount of news or information that and replaced it with entertainment or titilation that reinforces ". . . fears, prejudice, scapegoating processes, paranoia, and aggression. "[4]

Critics of television and film have argued that the quality of TV output has been diluted as stations relentlessly pursue "populism and ratings" by focusing on the "glitzy, the superficial, and the popular. " In film, "Hollywood culture and values" are increasingly dominating film production in other countries. Hollywood films have changed from focusing on scriptwriting and dialogue to creating formulaic films which emphasize ". . . shock-value and superficial thrill[s]" and special effects, with themes that focus on the ". . . basic instincts of aggression, revenge, violence, [and] greed. " The plots ". . . often seem simplistic, a standardised template taken from the shelf, and dialogue is minimal. " The "characters are shallow and unconvincing, the dialogue is also simple, unreal, and badly constructed. "[4]

Folklore

Folklore provides a second and very different source of popular culture. History The concept of folklore developed as part of the 19th century ideology of Romantic nationalism, leading to the reshaping of oral traditions to serve modern ideological [6] In pre-industrial times, mass culture equaled folk culture. Popular culture (or pop culture) is the Culture — patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activities significance and importance — Folk culture refers to the localized Lifestyle of a Culture. It is usually handed down through Oral tradition, relates to a sense of Community This earlier layer of culture still persists today, sometimes in the form of jokes or slang, which spread through the population by word of mouth and via the Internet. See also Mathematics of humor A joke is a short story or ironic depiction of a situation communicated with the intent of being humorous. Slang is the use of highly informal Words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's Dialect or Language. Word of mouth, is a reference to the passing of Information by verbal means especially recommendations but also general information in an informal person-to-person The Internet is a global system of interconnected Computer networks By providing a new channel for transmission, cyberspace has renewed the strength of this element of popular culture.

Although the folkloric element of popular culture engages heavily with the commercial element, the public has its own tastes and it may not embrace every cultural item sold. Commerce is a division of trade or production which deals with the exchange of goods and services from producer to final consumer Moreover, beliefs and opinions about the products of commercial culture (for example: "My favorite character is SpongeBob SquarePants") spread by word-of-mouth, and become modified in the process in the same manner that folklore evolves. SpongeBob SquarePants is the main character of the Fictional Nickelodeon Animated series SpongeBob SquarePants. Word of mouth, is a reference to the passing of Information by verbal means especially recommendations but also general information in an informal person-to-person

Self-referentiality

Owing to the pervasive and increasingly interconnected nature of popular culture, especially its intermingling of complementary distribution sources, some cultural anthropologists have identified the use of "popular culture within popular culture" as a distinct phenomenon. Literary and cultural critics have identified this as following the well-recognized but variegated concept of intertextuality. Intertextuality is the shaping of texts' meanings by other texts

One commentator has suggested this "self-referentiality" reflects the advancing encroachment of popular culture into every realm of collective experience. "Instead of referring to the real world, much media output devotes itself to referring to other images, other narratives; self-referentiality is all-embracing, although it is rarely taken account of. "[7]

Many cultural critics have dismissed this as merely a symptom or side-effect of mass consumerism, however alternate explanations and critique have also been offered. Consumerism is the equation of personal Happiness with the purchase of material possessions and consumption. One critic asserts that it reflects a fundamental paradox: the increase in technological and cultural sophistication, combined with an increase in superficiality and dehumanization. [8]

Examples from American television

According to television scholars specializing in quality television, such as Kristin Thompson, self-referentiality in mainstream American television (especially comedy) both reflects and exemplifies the type of progression characterized previously. Quality television (also called "quality TV" is a term used by television scholars television critics and broadcasting advocacy groups to describe a Genre or style Kristin Thompson (born 1950 is a film theorist and author whose research interests include the close formal analysis of films the history of film styles and " Quality Thompson[9] argues that shows such as The Simpsons use a ". . . flurry of cultural references, intentionally inconsistent characterization, and considerable self-reflexivity about television conventions and the status of the programme as a television show. "[10] Extreme examples literally approach a kind of thematic infinite regress wherein the distinctions between art and life, commerce and critique, ridicule and homage become intractably blurred. An infinite regress in a series of propositions arises if the truth of proposition P 1 requires the support of proposition P 2 and for any proposition [8]

Examples include:

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Asa Berger, Arthur (1990). Fashion refers to styles of dress (but can also include cuisine literature art architecture and general comportment that are popular in a culture at any given time Low culture is a Derogatory term for some forms of Popular culture. High culture is a term now used in a number of different ways in Academic discourse whose most common meaning is the set of cultural products mainly in the Pop icon is a Celebrity whose fame in pop culture constitutes a defining characteristic of a given society or era A cultural icon can be an Image, a Symbol, a Logo, Picture, Name, Face, Person, or Building Pop-culture tourism is the act of traveling to locations featured in literature film music or any other form of popular entertainment Popular culture studies is the Academic discipline studying popular culture A general-audience description of a mathematical or scientific concept is one that can be understood by the average educated person Agit-Pop: Political Culture and Communication Theory. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 0887383157.  
  2. ^ Bakhtin 1981, p. 4
  3. ^ popeducation. org
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h dumbing down
  5. ^ Van den Haag, in Rosenberg and White, Mass Culture, p. 529.
  6. ^ On the Ambiguity of the Three Wise Monkeys A. W. Smith Folklore, Vol. 104, No. 1/2 (1993), pp. 144-150
  7. ^ McRobbie, Angela (1994). Postmodernism and Popular Culture. Routledge. ISBN 0415077125.   Cultural anthropologist and feminist discourse on cultural studies.
  8. ^ a b Ralph Dumain, Cultural Sophistication and Self-Reference On American Television. Retrieved on 2007-04-22. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 1500 - Portuguese Navigator Pedro Álvares Cabral becomes the first European to sight Brazil. An essay on self-referentiality and American television.
  9. ^ She is the author of Storytelling in Film and Television. Some of her other publications include Storytelling in the New Hollywood: Understanding Classical Narrative Technique (Harvard University Press, November 1999); Breaking the Glass Armor: Neoformalist Film Analysis (Princeton University Press, August 1988); and, as a co-author with David Bordwell; Film Art: An Introduction (McGraw-Hill College, January 2003); Film History: An Introduction (McGraw-Hill College, August 2002)
  10. ^ Thompson. David Bordwell (born 23 July 1947 is a prominent American film theorist and author Available at: http://www.kamera.co.uk/books/new_hollywood_cinema.html
  11. ^ Miley-Jeremy Not Willing To Confront Media About Romance

References

External links

Dictionary

popular culture

-noun

  1. The prevailing vernacular culture in any given society, including art, cooking, clothing, entertainment, mass media, music, and style
© 2009 citizendia.org; parts available under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License, from http://en.wikipedia.org
 Dapyx Software network: MP3 Explorer | Ebook Manager | Zenithic