This past semester, as part of my Master's degree and New York University, I have the awesome privilege of studying with Marita Sturken in a class called Interpreting Popular Culture.She is the editor of American Quarterly - The Journal of the American Studies Association, and has written numerous books and articles including the following: Practices of looking: An introduction to visual culture; the British Film Institute's Modern Classic Series' edition of Thelma and Louise; Tangled memories: The Vietnam War, the AIDS epidemic, and the politics of remembering; and Technological visions: The hopes and fears that shape new technology
It's been a fantastic journey through this past semester studying with someone of this calibre. Here's a description of what we explored:
Description
This course examines popular culture as both a producer and reflector of cultural meaning, and a means of communication. It provides an introduction to the fundamental theories and methods for understanding the construction of meaning in film, television, popular music, and advertising, tracing the study of popular culture through film theory and mass media analysis to cultural studies. Recent theoretical analysis of popular culture has examined the notion of the popular, spectatorship, methods of reading audiences, global popular culture, and the concept of cultural practices. This course surveys methods of analysis such as structuralism, semiotics, genre analysis, psychoanalysis, socio-historical analysis, ideological analysis, discourse analysis, political economy, reception theory, feminist method, and ethnography as tools through which to understand popular culture in depth. It will include screenings of excerpts of film and television in class.
Models & Methodologies Explored include:
1. Models for thinking about popular culture
2. Structuralism and semiotics
3. Cinema, genre, and ideology
4. History and popular culture: Socio-historical analysis
5. Spectatorship and psychoanalysis
6. Postmodern culture, irony, and camp
7. Culture, race, and nation
8. Taste, fashion, and consumerism
9. Popular sentiment and structures of feeling
10. Reception theories and everyday practices
11. Ethnographic audiences
12. Tactics, strategies, resistance
13. Political ecnonomy of culture
14. Cultural memory and popular culture
Texts read for this class include:
(e) = excerpts
1. Roland Barthes - Mythologies
2. Sarah Benet-Weiser - The most beautiful girl in the world (e)
3. Elizabeth Bird - The audience in everyday life: Living in a media world (e)
4. Pierre Bourdieu - Distinction: A social critique of the judgement of taste (e)
5. Lawrence Cahoone - From modernism to postmodernism: An anthology (e)
6. Michel de Certeau - The practice of everyday life (e)
7. James Clifford - The predicament of culture: Twentieth century ethnography, literature, and art (e)
8. John Corner - Critical ideas in television studies (e)
9. Stephen Duncombe - The cultural resistance reader (e)
10. Umberto Eco - The role of the reader (e)
11. Thomas Frank - The conquest of cool: Business culture, counterculture, and the rise of hip consumerism (e)
12. Herman Gray - Cultural moves: African Americans and the politics of representation (e)
13. Stuart Hall - Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices (e)
14. Dick Hebdige - Subculture: The meaning of style
15. Eva Illouz - Consuming the romantic utopia (e)
16. Koichi Iwabuchi - Recentering globalization: Popular culture and Japanese transnationalism (e)
17. Fredric Jameson - Postmodernism: Or, the cultural logic of late capitalism (e)
18. Henry Jenkins, Tara McPherson and Jane Shattuc - Hop on pop: The politics and pleasures of popular culture (e)
19. Ernest Larsen - The usual suspects
20. George Lipsitz - Time passages: Collective memory and American popular culture (e)
21. Eric Lott - All the king's men (e)
22. Judith Mayne - Cinema and Spectatorship (e)
23. Anna McCarthy - Ambient television: Visual culture and public space (e)
24. Anne McClintock - Imperial leather: Race, gender, and sexuality in the colonial contest (e)
25. Toby Miller - Global hollywood 2
26. Tania Modleski - The women who knew too much: Hitchcock and feminist theory (e)
27. David Morley - Television, audiences, and cultural studies (e)
28. Chandra Mukerji & Michael Schudson - Rethinking popular culture (e)
29. Patrick Murphy - International communication, ethnography and the challenge of globalization (e)
30. Dana Polan - Pulp fiction
31. Janice Radway - Reading the romance (e)
32. Erica Rand - The Ellis Island snow globe (e)
33. Salman Rushdie - The wizard of Oz
34. Jeffrey Sconce - Irony, nihilism, and the American smart film
35. Jeffrey Sconce - Trashing the academy
36. Ellen Seiter - Television and new media audiences (e)
37. Barry Shank - A token of my affection: Greeting cards and American business culture (e)
38. Kaja Silverman - The subject of semiotics (e)
39. Lynn Spigel - Welcome to the dreamhouse: Popular media and post-war suburbs
40. Marita Sturken - Tangled memories (e)
41. Marita Sturken & Lisa Cartwright - Practices of looking: An introduction to visual culture
42. Raymond Williams - Structures of Feeling (e)
I am going to be progressively posting a paper over the next few days which I am writing on 'Essentializing the Evangelical? The Representation and Reception of Evangelicals in Popular Culture."
My hope is that you will have an opportunity to interact with it and provide feedback as I work through the journey of writing something which is close to my heart.
What I am finding interesting about this subject, is that it represents the convergence of my world as an academic and my worldview as an evangelical. My goal will be to dialogically engage these two worlds - drawing on material from both areas - with the intention of helping to clarify some misperceptions on both sides. More to be explained on that later.
In the meantime, I chose to post some aspects of this particular course I am taking so that you will be able to familiarize yourselves with this part of my academic world.
Enjoy!
Steve
2 comments:
Note to Steve Bussy, MA student at NYU
Hello Steve,
I happened upon your paper on essentializing evangelicals today. I was very interested to see the ways in which you were attempting to bring together a critique of evangelical representations and a culturally-informed understanding of reception processes.
I found the analysis of Ned Flanders very interesting, along with the exploration of "Saved" and the typology of Kooks, Kons, and Konquistadors (that's an especially catchy way to characterize evangelical representations - I will definitely quote you on that!).
I have a suggestion or two if you'd like to strengthen the paper. My main concern is that there seems to be some understandable defensiveness in its tone, e.g., that you are seeking to say, 'evangelicals aren't all kooks, kons, and konquistadors!' Yet the problem with your defense is that (1) we don't get clear examples of tensions within evangelicalism that contribute to the negative as well as what you'd argue are the more positive sides (e.g., to take Flanders as an example, why *is* it appealing for so many evangelicals to want to see themselves as distinct from others who should be converted, encouraged, 'love the sinner but hate the sin,' etc.? There are theological justifications for this that simply don't fit well with an ethic of tolerance and plurality - hence why they're so easily parodied, and yet also why these rep's ring true. And, I'd add, those theological justifications seem to me to be what distinguishes evangelicals from less evangelical, and more progressive, Christians). And (2) we also don't get clear counterexamples of where evangelicalism is not-white, not-middle class, not-heterosexist, etc. Both of these issues would help the reader to have a better sense of why the representations resonate, and where they are lacking.
On the second point, I'd encourage you to consider how you'd talk about counterexamples. For instance, would Barak Obama identify himself as an evangelical? Why or why not? He certainly espouses much of what white evangelicals embrace, yet he also emphasizes differences. What about U2's Bono? He too voices some things in common with evangelicalism - yet would vehemently reject the label. And as I attempt to think about a prominent evangelical woman, well - I guess that your friend Steve's point about evangelicals tending to lift up white males as their leaders/spokespersons/representatives comes to mind. I'm thinking of Patricia Raybon, an African American woman who's author of a book on prayer called, "I Told the Mountain to Move," a book that was well-received in the evangelical church I attend. Yet I think she too would be hesitant to identify herself as evangelical. I guess that even as I'm sensitive to the fact that evangelicalism truly is a mosaic, these experiences lead me to wonder who you have in mind when you are protesting that evangelicals don't fit the stereotype.
By the way, I would also resist the evangelical label for myself. I'm a progressive Christian who attends an evangelical church because I'm interested in dialoguing with evangelicals. Personally, I'm frustrated less by the media's portrayals of evangelicals, and more by what I see as the evangelical penchant for right belief over grace for others. I'm frustrated that evangelicals want to talk about "the family" but they usually only have a certain kind of family in mind. I'm frustrated that they don't want to talk about divisive issues like getting out of Iraq, human rights for homosexuals, reduction of poverty in AIDs-torn Africa, because they don't want to offend - as if these are somehow issues less about morality than issues of not lying or cheating or swearing in our personal lives. I think too often, evangelicals take the easy way out when it comes to these things - and that's why it's easy to parody them in places like "Saved." When evangelicals stump for human rights in Darfur, when they join in requesting debt relief for poor nations, when they go into urban areas and offer after-school programs as it looks like you do - that's probably the best counter-example to the negative stereotypes. It doesn't erase them, but at least it contributes to a public view of a more compassionate, and ultimately a more complicated picture of evangelicalism.
Best wishes,
Lynn Schofield Clark, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
School of Communication
University of Denver
2490 S. Gaylord St.
Denver, CO 80208
blog: lynn-s-clark.livejournal.com
email: lynn.clark@du.edu
Hi Lynn,
Thanks so much for your post on my blog. I was surprised to see your comments! I have a great deal of respect for your research and writings - both as a media anthropologist and as a Christian trying to make sense of how those two worlds connect.
At NYU, I have been studying part-time. The majority of my study focus has been on issues relating to media as an agent for positive social change, but when I took this class with Marita, I found this paper deep within myself - and had to get it out!
Thank you for your (too!) kind words. Personally, I think the paper needs a LOT of work still, but I decided to put it out there in its' raw form to at least contribute a little bit to the conversation. I actually ended up posting about 3/4 of the paper on my blog - at which time I found out that my wife and I would be directing our youth work school. Since then, my life has been swamped with administrative responsibilities! I am attaching the complete paper for you, if you'd like to see it in its entirety.
I would have to agree that I didn't do justice to offering alternative examples of evangelicals how exemplify alternatives to the essentialized representations I mention in the paper. I would certainly agree that Barak Obama (who recently visited Rick Warren's Saddleback Church) abd Patricia Raybon are great examples. I would also add folk such as John Perkins from CCDA and Shane Claiborne from the new monastic group, The Simple Way as alternative models of evangelicalism. I also think of Jim Wallis, the emergent church folk, etc. Maybe I could add these when I get a chance!
I have recently been caught up in the Sundance Channel show, "One Punk Under God" recently, which follows Jay Bakker, the son of Tammy-Faye Messner and Jim Bakker. He is the first representation I have seen (in a long time) of an evangelical who doesn't fit the mold and is engaging the grace-over-truth model you speak about. He offers a fresh representation to the dialogue of evangelicals in the media. http://www.revolutionchurch.com/.
I sadly have to concur that unfortunately these stereotypes are rooted in an undeniable history of bigotry and intolerance - I wish I could alter our history! I also find my head in my hands all too often when I see friends and family continue to confirm these attitudes in my own everyday world... in fact, I often see it in my own life! I think that a lot of this comes because people assume that tolerance is bifurcated with truth. To embrace a spirit of plurality, to respect another persons choice, to listen honestly to people without pre-meditated responses - none of this is contradictory with the core values of evangelicalism!
I would rather argue that in America, there is a syncretism between Christianity and - I don't quite know what to call it, but almost - a weird, Ayn Rand-ish, libertine, egoist ethic. I guess we evangelicals are blind to how we have been seduced with power and the good life! When you are sitting shotgun in the power-wagon, it's hard to get off - kinda like a rich man getting into heaven story!
I would have to agree that morality stems far beyond issues of family and birth! Again, this blindness comes from the innoculated form of Christianity that seems to resonate with so many! My own sister and brother-in-law live in Qwa Qwa on the border of Lesotho where they work with city of orphans who are raising themselves because of the HIV epidemic in Africa. This past Friday, I sat with eight juveniles who are awaiting trial for minor crimes that come with living in oppressive conditions in inner-city New York. Most of these kids are completely off the moral rights radar because evangelicals have convinced themselves that they are the great defenders of morality! I wish the giant would awaken and realize the amount of opportunities for justice that are being missed out on because of our own hegemonic cooptation to what we think morality is!!
I take confidence though, because people are changing. I notice this with the 19 and 20 year old youth workers I am working with. I notice it in Africa, Asia and Latin America - where most evangelicals live. I notice it in my own two daughters... maybe we need to earn the right to have alternatives represented in the media. My hope is that these other stories will one day be told.
A few years ago, I took some of my students down to Washington Square Park where they did a "Spirituality and Culture" survey for a class I was teaching. I told them the major objective was to LISTEN to people - this wasn't to be some ridiculous, subversive attempt and proselytism! My intention was to help my students realize what people really think of evangelicals. One student, after the exercise, walked away hopelessly defeated. She said to me, "they all hate us!" I mentioned to her that that might be because of what we Christians/evangelicals do or don't do. - and that this action or inaction ends up crystallizing in the minds of many people.
However, I suggested, our job is to recognize that, and not be that way. Maybe being graceful, loving, accepting... i.e., being like Jesus, would help to shatter that impression.
While I am concerned about the KKK representation in the media, I am personally more interested in the how the integrity of Christ is represented or misrepresented in my own, everyday life - and I have enough work there to start!
Thanks for listening to me ramble - and for reading my paper. I am encouraged.
Keep up the great work you are doing!
Best regards,
Steve Bussey
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