Elements%20of%20a%20Cultural%20Studies%20Approach

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Elements of a Cultural Studies Approach
?Production Political Economic Analysis
?Textual Analysis
?Audience/Reception Analysis
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Culture in Motion
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What is culture?
Culture is one of the most complex words in the
social theory. For our purposes, we will
emphasize culture as a narrative
process. Definition a culture consists of the
collection of stories people tell each other
about the meanings of their lives.
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Keywords in Popular Culture Analysis
NOTE Strangely enough, definitions are seldom
definitive. Rather, almost any important word has
multiple, often conflicting definitions. These
keywords will, along with the Glossaries in our
course texts represent working definitions to
give us a common vocabulary for discussion.
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text
Any unit of meaning isolated for the purposes of
cultural analysis.
The text in a given analysis could be a small
as a single image in one commercial, or as large
as a whole day of television programs. Texts
can include words, images, sounds, even touch,
in various combinations.
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ideology
1. Consciously held and systematic political
ideas.
2. Unconscious or hidden tendencies to offer
a viewpoint of that supports the self-interest of
a particular group of people Thus, the ideology
of a text is its unconscious or hidden
political bias in favor of one group over
another.
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ideological bias
All texts, whether intentionally or overtly
political or not, have built into them certain
views of how the world is or should be. Those
views are thus inherently ideological,
not simply neutral depictions or representations.
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hegemony
The process through which elite or dominant
groups gain consent to their rule from
subordinate social groups without force or
physical violence. Usually this is done by
convincing the subordinate group that the
dominant group knows best or is acting in the
best interests of the subordinate group. Hegemony
is largely an unconscious, social process, not a
conscious conspiracy.
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hegemonic processes
Hegemony is often achieved through saturation. It
is not that alternatives to the mainstream do
not exist, but rather that they tend to drown in
that main stream amidst so many messages
favorable to those with power (75 womens Fashion
magazines on the rack, versus one or two
feminist ones). Hegemony is never fully
achieved, never complete, always there is some
resistance, some counter-hege- monic process.
Sometimes the dominant forces use this to their
advantage by pointing to the freedom to dissent,
while continuing to control most institutions.
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Myth
Repeated stories that take on a central pattern
of significance in a culture by linking many
smaller stories together Myths are the narrative
form of ideology, the way ideology is turned into
stories that are taken for granted as truths
about the culture Myths are usually neither
whollytrue nor wholly false but rather
partial truths made to seem like absolute ones
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subculture
A subculture is a coherent, smaller collective
within a A larger culture, be an ethnic
subculture, a religious One, an occupational one,
or one based on media consumption (fan
subculture). Some subcultures can be
characterized as oppositional or alternatived
when they explicitly or implicitly (often through
style) challenge mainstream cultural values,
forms, ideas, or styles
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encoding/codes/decoding
Encodings are the meanings made by the producers
of texts
Codes are the material signs present in a a
text.
Decodings are the meanings made by audiences
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subject position
The socially structured positioning of an
individual vis-à-vis the wider culture according
to the key variables.
Production side the ideal receiver of a text
encoded into that text
Audience side the actual social position
through which a text is decoded
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Key social variables in popular culture analysis
Social class Race/ethnicity Nationality/Region Gen
der Sexual orientation Age Political ideology
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formation
A formation is a historically changing, but
relatively stable structure of practices and
ideas by which social categories of identity
(racial, gender, class, sexuality) come into
being and become dominant for a time. The term
formation, as we will be using it, was first used
in association with race as in racial formation
(Omi and Winant). We will generalize this idea to
talk about, gender formations, class formations,
as well as racial formations, among others.
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gender sexism
The system of meanings and representations attache
d in a given culture to sexed bodies as fixed or
natural identities
In U.S. cultural norms, gender is fixed as
masculine and feminine qualities attached to
male and female bodies Sexism is the practice by
which one gender is given systematically greater
social, economic and political power.
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race racism
Race is a socially constructed category by which
certain physical characteristics common to most
members of a group are ascribed to all members
and given positive (racial supremacy) or
negative (racial degradation) social value.
Race is a biologically insignificant fact given
great social significance. Racism is a power
relationship by which racial prejudice is
systematically structured to the advantage of one
group and the disadvantage of another.
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Racism vs. prejudice
Where prejudice has to do with
attitudes, Racism exists when attitudes have
been Systematically structured into institutions
(political, economic, social, and cultural) It
is possible to have racism without
prejudice When a no longer attitudinally racist
culture continues To be shaped by racist
structures and institutions.