Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Task:
What is “cultural” in your life?
Theater, music, food, traditions, books, habits, TV, beliefs,
attitudes/points of view, religion, language, education,
clothes, law, family, art, advertising, origin, traveling,
stereotypes, hairstyles, everything, economic aspects,
corporate culture, buildings,
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Not „cultural“: ???
Nature, climate ???
Cultural studies
“ _______________ culture”:
Which words can be found in the blank space?
youth
high
subculture
heritage
mass
pop / popular
black culture / African American
English / British/ ...
Culture: examples
example:
Matthew Arnold (Great Britain, 19th century)
culture = the “best that has been thought and said”
Culture
example:
Raymond Williams (1950s-1980s, Great Britain):
example:
Raymond Williams (1950s-1980s, Great Britain):
- cultural products:
“high” culture: opera, concerts, literature, ...
mass culture: Hollywood, pop music, pulp fiction, ...
“low” culture
popular culture
- culture as a process (the cultivation of something; a
development)
- intellectual, spiritual, aesthetic activity/processes/products
- a particular way of life of:
- … a particular historical period
- … a country (nation)
- … groups within a country/society/nation
etc.
Example: food and eating
Raymond Williams:
“culture is a description of a particular way of life which
expresses certain meanings and values not only in art
and learning but also in institutions and ordinary
behavior.”
(qtd. in Paul du Gay, “What is ‘culture’?”)
Cultural studies: definitions of culture
Raymond Williams:
“culture is a description of a particular way of life which
expresses certain meanings and values not only in art
and learning but also in institutions and ordinary
behavior.”
(qtd. in Paul du Gay, “What is ‘culture’?”)
Raymond Williams:
”The analysis of culture ... is the clarification of the
meanings and values implicit and explicit in particular
ways of life, a particular ‘culture’.” (or: particular
cultures)
(qtd. in Paul du Gay, “What is ‘culture’?”)
Cultural studies: definitions of culture
Reader p.6
“… the shared practices of a group, community or society,
through which meaning is made out of the visual, aural,
and textual world of representations.” (Sturken and
Cartwright 3)
“… the production and exchange of meanings, the gving
and taking of meaning, between members of a society
or group.” (Sturken and Cartwright 4)
Meaning and representation