Dialectics of domination and resistance in cultural studies

Abstract: In this paper we will deal with the way that cultural studies understand the role of
popular culture in establishing ideological domination and in creating resistance to it. In order
to research this we will divide the development of cultural studies in three periods: the period of
the Frankfurt School, the period of the founding of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies
in Birmingham and the mature period in which we will consider the work of John Fiske. In each
of these periods we will explore the ways in which the authors conceptualize the relationship of
popular culture to other social spheres, its role in creating ideological domination and its
possibilities in creating resistance. Our theses will be that the changes of conceptualizations in
each period are caused by authors reacting to social circumstances and that these reactions take
the form of gradual rejecting of Marxist theoretical positions. We will claim that this results in
the understanding of culture as more and more autonomous and also in a fragmentary
conceptualization of society. In the end we will claim that in their third period cultural studies
begin to correspond to ideological interests of neoliberal capitalism.
Keywords: ideology, hegemony, cultural studies, resistance, Frankfurt School, Stuart Hall, John
Fiske