CMNS 110 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: George Lipsitz, The Gutenberg Galaxy, Low Culture
19 Apr 2016
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Document Summary
Pop culture is a product of mass production of leisure. Three key elements in relation to rhe rise of studies in the field of pop culture: the industrial revolutions impact on the social organization of labor and everyday recreation. People could never buy their leisure, but now we can. We are largely consumers, including our leisure: the success of marshall mcluhans book, the gutenberg galaxy. Leisure activities become commodities as society sees a transformation from the production of entertainment to the consumption of entertainment. High culture: theatre, symphony, contemporary music, television, movies. You like something, find out someone else likes it, so you stop. Mass of people (connotation: this second, connotative meaning leads to notions of popular being defined as base, vile, riff-raff, common, low, vulgar, plebeian, cheap. Popular can mean something negative (too popular arguments: lacking in artistic integrity on account of having become widely appreciated, losing original authenticity on account of having become widely appreciated.
