Monday, February 9, 2015
The Rising of Popular Culture: A Historiographical Sketch
The article, "The Rising of Popular Culture:
A Historiographical Sketch", by Leroy Ashby focuses on the changes that have occurred throughout the history of popular culture, and how these changes have been viewed and scrutinized by both the general populous and in the world of academia. It does provide a good amount of historical insight and context, but what is most interesting about the article is the way it describes how popular culture is more than just a means to entertainment, it can also can be a way to define one's self or one's culture. It also describes how popular itself is not all that one-sided, being defined by both the producers and the consumers, as James W. Cooks is quoted in the article as saying, “Neither the producers nor the consumers of this culture maintained complete control”. Reading these articles and taking a more in depth look at popular culture does show how much pop culture does affect us more than we tend to think.
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I agree that popular culture is a very interesting way to define one's self or one's culture. Popular culture carries many different trends, styles and personalities. It is almost a scary thought to think about how much the media that promotes popular culture really affects us with us not even knowing it at times. I also believe that popular culture isn't one-sided. We all work together and need the producer and consumer together to function at all.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your thoughts. Pop culture is so big yet small that’s why it’s so valuable. It can define a society which makes it big or some people can feel it defines them as a person which is smaller. I like how you brought up the point about producers and consumers in the article. Both are valuable and without one, popular culture wouldn’t be what it is today.
ReplyDeleteThe point about neither producers nor consumers being in control is important. Even though sometimes it may feel like the producers are on an untouchable level, I think that it's not that way, especially in modern day. If we want to see more of what we like, or more of ourselves if we're underrepresented, we must become producers; writers, composers, painters, etc. We must create what we want in pop culture.
ReplyDeleteSo much information can be taken from studying popular culture. I totally agree that it’s “a way to define oneself”. To take one small section of the arts and say that it defines an entire generation or even an entire society is barbaric. Reading the beginning of this article and watching the first part of the culture wars movie was a little brutal for me for this reason.
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