Culture (n) The arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively.
(Source: The Concise Oxford Dictionary)
Confused? Don’t be. Culture is an incredibly difficult concept to pin down. You could say that culture is art, music, gossip, what’s high brow, what’s popular, what’s cool, and that culture is determined by nationality, socialisation, politics, the media, our own beliefs, peer pressure etc’
BBC General Studies website
Popular culture is a term much used in the media, quite often in a derogatory sense.
‘With so much of popular culture glamourising guns…’
‘Globalisation has spread American concepts of popular culture across the world , often at the expense of local traditions …’
‘The rise is popular culture has lead to a “dumbing down” of much television programme content….’
In this we cannot hope to cover all of the ground and answer all of the questions raised, but we can perhaps start to think about our topic and form some opinions
Icons
This idea is central to the our ideas of the nature culture. The concept that, in essence,some things encapsulate our ideas of what culture is all about.
This site has a growing list of English icons. But, look carefully at the specifically cultural ones.
Are these very ‘middle class/older people’s’ choices ? – The Archer’s are there but not Eastenders; Monty Python but not Little Britain. Is current pop culture underrepresented ?
Icons Quiz 1
Try this quiz how did you get on
Celebrity Culture
Handbag magazine is one of many publications which are devoted to the worship celebrity culture.
Does this do any harm ?, is it just a bit of fun ?
Do people know/care more about the lives of their favourite celebs than of their own families and friends ? Should this worry us ?
Celebrity Culture – Aspirations
This is an excellent , but worrying, article about the the impact of celebrity culture on children’s aspirations/career choices. Is this just harmless fantasy or does it cause harm.? . Think about X factor – many contestants can’t sing ; have bizarre personalities – but believe , despite these shortcomings, that they can be stars. Should society protect these people from their self delusion
Andy Warhol ( a famous sixties artist ) once said that in the future everyone would be famous for 15 minutes – is his prophecy coming true
Dumbing Down
The rallying cry of the middle aged is that society is dumbing down,-TV, exams, music etc. etc. That we are becoming less cultured. This links to series of articles about this wide ranging topic. Just pick a few to look at
The Dumbing Down Quiz
O. K. just how cultured are you ?. Should your score worry you ?. Will it make any difference to your life if you can name the Big Brother contestants but not the tragedies of Shakespeare?
My Score ? Well, I didn’t know who was in Euro 2000 or who Tom Paine is
And Finally…
You may think that this is just a UK debate, this article is one of many from across the world which proves otherwise
Set the Sky+/iplayer
Where to start, the T.V. schedules are full of so many pop culture programmes that you could video almost anything. However this week do try to watch an episode all of the main soaps – Eastenders, Coronation Street, Emmerdale , Neighbours, Hollyoaks, Home & Away. Do these in any way reflect real life ?; Do the way the characters interact have any influence on the audience
….and of course I’m a celeb; X factor; and Strictly Come Dancing all continue
Have a look at how the BBC has changed over the years – are the shows now less cultured than before
BBC Archive
Go Out
This week, try to go and see some cinema/theatre – low culture or high culture – your choice
Number 8 Pershore
Evesham Arts Centre
Palace Theatre Redditch
Artrix – Bromsgrove
