Cultural theory Flashcards
What is False Consciousness?
It is the second definition of Ideology that conceals is masking or distorting reality. Certain texts or practices hide reality.
What is the difference between Adornos understanding of meaning vs Walter Benjamins?
Adorno feels that meaning stems from the origin of a text, I.e. From where it is produced whereas Walter Benjamin understands meaning to come at the moment of consumption.
A little about the Id
Seething excitation
Subject to observance of the pleasure principle
Post Structuralism
Post-structuralists reject the idea of an underlying structure upon which meaning can rest secure and guaranteed. Meaning is always in process. What we call the ‘meaning’ of a text is only ever a momentary stop in a continuing flow of interpretations following interpretations. S
Syntax
the set of rules, principles, and processes that govern the structure of sentences in a given language, specifically word order. The term syntax is also used to refer to the study of such principles and processes.[3] The goal of many syntacticians is to discover the syntactic rules common to all
Explain the term ‘Americanization’
It refers to the origin of pop culture: in The cities of the US mainly LA and NewYork
Syntagmatic axis of language
Meaning is only to be derived by the accumulation of the unity words in their proper place.
What does Lacan say about “the kingdom of culture?”
The world of words . . . creates the world of things’ (72).
What is one of the main differences between Freuds approach to Psychanalysis vs. Lacan?
Lacan Basis his approach to behavior in culture willst Freud does so in Biology. He takes Freud’s developmental structure and rearticulates it through a critical reading of structuralism to produce a post-structuralist psychoanalysis.
View on ideology from Antonio Gramsci.
That subordinate groups resist the overpower of cultural hegemony and dominant groups use pop culture as a means to control the subordinate groups.
Why is it that the content we remember manifested in dreams is so much smaller than the latent content from the unconscious?
Because of what Freud called ‘condensation’
(i) latent elements are omitted
(ii) only part of latent elements appear in the manifest content.
(iii) related elements are condensed into composite structures.
Marx’s ‘Reflection Theory’ of culture…
n which the politics of a text or practice are read off from, or reduced to, the economic conditions of its production. The relationship can also be seen as the setting of limits, the providing of a specific framework in which some developments are probable and others unlikely.
What did Arnold mean by ‘Anarchy’?
That the new working class-movement was a breakdown of the old feudal duties. That pop culture was an agent to reinfluence, reassert subordination and deference.
What does Adorno mean when he says pop-culture is “pre-digested?”
Our responses are predetermined rather than the result of a genuine interaction with the text or practice. (I.E. Laugh track)
An example like: “While Musicians sing against the system and then their production companies profit from their sales
f articulation: the way in which dominant groups in society attempt to ‘negotiate’ oppositional voices on to a terrain which secures for the dominant groups a continued position of leadership
What is the origin of mass culture according to Ernest Van Den Haag?
That mass society and mass production created mass culture.
What did Marx and Engels say about religious suffering?
While at the same time it is an expression of real suffering its a protest against real suffering.
The functions of Panopticon
the major effect of the Panopticon [is] to induce in the inmate a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power. . .
From a Marxist approach to culture between the base and superstructure
Which is merely acting in conjunction with a modes of production?
The Superstructure- it reflects forms of definite social consciousness which are likewise generated into the institutions.
What was part of Paddy Whannel and Stuart Hills method for determining quality in pop-culture?
To look at the quality of its effect on people.
Freuds displacement.
Latent elements manifest through a chain of association.
Difference between evaluative and analytic.
an evaluation - Decides the value of something. eg Tells you if something is good or bad, useful or not useful, valid or invalid.
an analysis - Finds out the parts of something, eg its elements, structure, processes.
What is articulation?
A key concept used in post-Marxist hegemony theory that is used in a double sense meaning both to express and make a temporary connection.
How do people experience culture?
As an endeavor to know the best and to make this knowledge prevail for the good of mankind.
What does Walter Benjamin mean by theological l’art pour l’art?
That the traditionalist use of art in Ancient Greece (art as an object of religious devotion) Idols.
Renaissance, art as contemplations of Beauty.
But now in mass culture art has become commercialized.
What do cultural theorists mean when they refer to ‘reading’ or ‘readers’ of a text?
They are referring to the subject who is receiving or interpreting the message i.e. TV show, art etc.
Describe Derridas new word to explain signs.
Differance meaning both to defer and differ
What does Richard Hoggart mean by ‘moral tone.’
When a text has certain moral aesthetic (it tells us what to think in a way)
The psyche is a site at conflict. What do we call the conflict between the Id and the ego?
The Id wants to fulfill its desires at conflict with culture and the ego wants to appeal to the culture (sometimes working with the super ego)
How does Marx claim men and women make history?
Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past’ (structural determinants)
Explain the retroactive nature of desire.
By getting to close to what we desire threatens to eliminate ‘lack’ as zizek observes desire is paradoxical in that it retroactively posits its own cause. I.E. object A [object small other] can be perceived only by a gaze. Fantasy fixes on an object which generates the desire and draws me to the object.
How do people experience culture?
As an endeavor to know the best and to make this knowledge prevail for the good of mankind.
How do Marxists argue that the nuclear family performs ideological functions for Capitalism?
the family acts as a unit of consumption and teaches passive acceptance of hierarchy. It is also the institution through which the wealthy pass down their private property to their children, thus reproducing class inequality.
What is the difference of a conflictual world rather than a consensual world and what type of ideology does it suggest?
It suggests an ideology of texts that side with the oppressors and construct a distorted view of reality. The oppressed think they are free the oppressors think they are not oppressing. It is a world of alienation, inequality and oppression.
Criticisms of mass art say that it is:
Formulaic, escapist, aesthetically worthless, emotionally unrewarding
Greshems law of culture
The good will drive out the bad.
How is Macherys literary analysis like Freuds analysis of his patients?
That what is important is not what is said but what is not said. Like Freud understanding the cause of his patients turmoil lay in the unspoken unconscious.
According to Samuel Taylor what is the difference between Civilization and Cultivation?
Civilization- a mixed good with a more corrupting influence
Cultivation-the harmonious development of those qualities and faculties which characterize our humanity.
What are the 3 levels of culture?
superior’ or ‘refined’ culture, ‘mediocre’ and ‘brutal
In referring to the colonialism of the Caribbean what is indicated by the ‘carribean’ dialect and what does this tell us about Hegemony?
The English language being imposed on the people (with its grammar) was dominant but also mixed with African language elements. The result is a negotiation between dominant and subordinate.
Marked by ‘resistance’ and then ‘incorporation.’
It tells us that hegemony is not always just power imposed from above but negotiations between dominant and subordinate groups.
What is the castration complex?
It is the fear the young boy has when he realizes his father has the power to remove his penis. In girls they compensate for the lack of penis by having a baby.
How is Joke Hermes ‘post-modern’ like Walter Benjamins text interpretation and what is she opposing?
She opposed the implicit idea that readers of popular culture texts have been duped and at implicitly incapable of forming correct meaning without some sort of feminist ‘translator.’
Instead she creates a more post modern celebratory view of text readers as creators of their own meaning (Walter Benjamin.)
For even feminists get some sort of enjoyment out of the things which they criticize. I.E. Sarkissian
Subjective destitution
when symbolic representation falls away alike the big other and we lose our sense of symbols.
How do feminists set themselves up to forming a violent hierarchy?
nists are setting themselves distinctly apart: ‘us’ who know and reject most popular cultural forms (including women’s magazines), ‘them’ who remain in ignorance and continue to buy Woman’s Own or watch Dallas. The irony, however, is that many of ‘us’ feel like ‘them’: closet readers and viewers of this fare (14
Ideological forms
How do texts ( music, movies, books etc.) present an image of the world?
Bertoldt Brech
All art contains an image of the world. Good or bad. Art is not without its consequences.
According to Leavism there was a “cultural golden age”. What made it so?
It was Shakespeares time and it was when art was not contaminated with commercial interests and could be enjoyed and appealed to the populace and the “cultivated” or elite.
How does Chantal Mouffe refer to popular culture?
A process to make a disarticulation-articulation
What is Substitute living according to F.R. Leavis?
The growing focus on leisure is to distract us from the monotony of the lives we lose as a result of labor under capitalism. Thus, like addicts, we turn to mass culture to compensate us.
What does Walter Benjamin mean by the ‘aura’ of a work?
It refers to its loss of authenticity as a center of authority. It is no longer autonomous in itself but at a distance from its origination.
The decay of the aura detached it from the traditions. It brings it into a personal space.
