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In an earlier section we talked about the [br]principle of cultural relativism.

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In other words, the idea that different cultures [br]exist at the same time.

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Even though all of these cultural realities are [br]equally valid,

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some are more popular than others.

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Popular cultures are communicated on a large [br]scale and both through personal

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and mediated communication.

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The umbrella term for these types of cultures is [br]pop culture.

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Scientists are, for very different reasons, [br]interested in the study of pop culture.

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They study carriers of pop culture,

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like songs, movies, literature, game shows, [br]video games

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basically everything that is deemed popular and [br]communicates

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mainstream values, ideas and ‘truths’.

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Interest in the field of popculture has increased [br]since the sixties.

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I want to briefly discuss this research theme [br]with you.

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Why are we actually interested in pop culture?

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Well, for many different reasons.

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I’ll name a few without any particular order:

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Pop culture is often seen as a reflection of [br]mainstream society.

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The idea is, if we study pop culture we learn how [br]society works,

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which rules and truths are in place and where [br]power resides.

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Do you recognize the influence of social [br]constructionism here?

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To continue this line of thought,

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pop culture is considered a building block of a [br]shared social reality.

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Some scholars oppose to the reflection thesis.

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They argue that pop culture is actually artificially [br]created.

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It is in fact a fake culture, or a fake [br]consciousness.

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It is not a reflection of mass society but in fact

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something created by powerful members of the [br]elite,

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who control the media landscape.

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These powerful few created pop culture to keep [br]themselves in power.

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that’s – according to this theory - the main [br]function of pop culture,

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to maintain the current power structures.

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So pop culture is designed to keep the masses [br]ignorant.

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To distract the audience

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and keep their thoughts away from the unfair [br]distribution of wealth and power in the world.

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Pop culture is used to teach people to obey the [br]law and obey powerful institutions.

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It is used to screen us from reality, to keep [br]some knowledge from the public agenda

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and keep people’s mind on other [br]inconsequential things

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like scandals involving actors or rock stars,

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or what’s going to happen on tomorrow’s soap [br]opera.

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This also explains why pop culture according to [br]many scholars

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does not provoke thought, is unoriginal and of [br]low quality.

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This theory was first developed by members of [br]the Frankfurter School.

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A group of loosely affiliated scientists

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that were particularly active in the nineteen [br]twenties, forties and sixties.

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They were not only scientists but also very [br]politically active.

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Their theories and findings were often used to [br]show the need

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for social change and emancipation.

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Frankfurter scholars were often accused of being [br]Marxist.

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And not without reason.

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Indeed, the Frankfurter School tried to explain [br]why the revolution that Marx had predicted,

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where labourers of the world would revolt, hadn’t [br]happened.

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Their answer in a nutshell:

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because pop culture, communicated through [br]mass media, is specifically created to prevent it.

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To keep us docile.

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In a way, the media serve as ‘opium for the [br]people’,

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creating a passive audience that is unlikely to [br]start a revolution.

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If you want to connect theories, this Frankfurter [br]approach actually fitted nicely

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with the old mass audience paradigm that we [br]covered in week 3.

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This traditional audience paradigm saw the [br]masses as

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passive and unable to select and block [br]messages.

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Even though the Frankfurter School does not [br]have many supporters today,

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their negative views on popular culture are often [br]seen as somewhat elitist.

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It is historically important because

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they were the first to focus their questions on [br]how pop culture was created

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and how it related to a larger societal context.

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We’ll talk about several more modern [br]approaches to pop culture in our next section.