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Popular culture
Popular culture (also called pop culture or mass culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as popular art [cf. pop art] or mass art, sometimes contrasted with fine art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a society at a given point in time. Popular culture also encompasses the activities and feelings produced as a result of interaction with these dominant objects. Mass media, marketing, and the imperatives of mass appeal within capitalism constitute the primary engines of Western popular culture—a system philosopher Theodor Adorno critically termed the 'culture industry'.
Heavily influenced in modern times by mass media, this collection of ideas permeates the everyday lives of people in a given society. Therefore, popular culture has a way of influencing an individual's attitudes towards certain topics. However, there are various ways to define pop culture. Because of this, popular culture is something that can be defined in a variety of conflicting ways by different people across different contexts. It is generally viewed in contrast to other forms of culture such as folk culture, working-class culture, or high culture, and also from different academic perspectives such as psychoanalysis, structuralism, postmodernism, and more. The common pop-culture categories are entertainment (such as film, music, television, literature and video games), sports, news (as in people/places in the news), politics, fashion, technology, and slang.
In the past, folk culture functioned analogously to the popular culture of the masses and of the nations.
The phrase "popular culture" was coined in the 19th century or earlier. Traditionally,[when?] popular culture was associated[by whom?] with poor education and with the lower classes, as opposed to the "official culture" and higher education of the upper classes. With the rise of the Industrial Revolution in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Britain experienced social changes that resulted in increased literacy rates, and with the rise of capitalism and industrialization, people began to spend more money on entertainment, such as (commercialised) public houses and sports. Reading also gained traction. Labeling penny dreadfuls the Victorian equivalent of video games, The Guardian in 2016 described penny fiction as "Britain's first taste of mass-produced popular culture for the young". A growing consumer culture and an increased capacity for travel via the newly invented railway (the first public railway, Stockton and Darlington Railway, opened in north-east England in 1825) created both a market for cheap popular literature and the ability for its distribution on a large scale. The first penny serials were published in the 1830s to meet the growing demand.
The stress on the distinction from "official culture" became more pronounced towards the end of the 19th century, a usage that became established by the interbellum period.
From the end of World War II, following major cultural and social changes brought by mass media innovations, the meaning of "popular culture" began to overlap with the connotations of "mass culture", "media culture", "image culture", "consumer culture", and "culture for mass consumption".
The abbreviated form "pop" for "popular", as in "pop music", dates from the late 1950s. Although the terms "pop" and "popular" are in some cases used interchangeably, and their meaning partially overlap, the term "pop" is narrower. Pop is specific to something containing qualities of mass appeal, while "popular" refers to what has gained popularity, regardless of its style.
According to author John Storey, there are various definitions of popular culture. The quantitative definition of culture has the problem that too much "high culture" (e.g., television dramatizations of Jane Austen) is also "popular". "Pop culture" is also defined as the culture that is "leftover" when we have decided what high culture is.[citation needed] However, many works straddle the boundaries, e.g., William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens, Leo Tolstoy, and George Orwell.
Popular culture
Popular culture (also called pop culture or mass culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as popular art [cf. pop art] or mass art, sometimes contrasted with fine art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a society at a given point in time. Popular culture also encompasses the activities and feelings produced as a result of interaction with these dominant objects. Mass media, marketing, and the imperatives of mass appeal within capitalism constitute the primary engines of Western popular culture—a system philosopher Theodor Adorno critically termed the 'culture industry'.
Heavily influenced in modern times by mass media, this collection of ideas permeates the everyday lives of people in a given society. Therefore, popular culture has a way of influencing an individual's attitudes towards certain topics. However, there are various ways to define pop culture. Because of this, popular culture is something that can be defined in a variety of conflicting ways by different people across different contexts. It is generally viewed in contrast to other forms of culture such as folk culture, working-class culture, or high culture, and also from different academic perspectives such as psychoanalysis, structuralism, postmodernism, and more. The common pop-culture categories are entertainment (such as film, music, television, literature and video games), sports, news (as in people/places in the news), politics, fashion, technology, and slang.
In the past, folk culture functioned analogously to the popular culture of the masses and of the nations.
The phrase "popular culture" was coined in the 19th century or earlier. Traditionally,[when?] popular culture was associated[by whom?] with poor education and with the lower classes, as opposed to the "official culture" and higher education of the upper classes. With the rise of the Industrial Revolution in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Britain experienced social changes that resulted in increased literacy rates, and with the rise of capitalism and industrialization, people began to spend more money on entertainment, such as (commercialised) public houses and sports. Reading also gained traction. Labeling penny dreadfuls the Victorian equivalent of video games, The Guardian in 2016 described penny fiction as "Britain's first taste of mass-produced popular culture for the young". A growing consumer culture and an increased capacity for travel via the newly invented railway (the first public railway, Stockton and Darlington Railway, opened in north-east England in 1825) created both a market for cheap popular literature and the ability for its distribution on a large scale. The first penny serials were published in the 1830s to meet the growing demand.
The stress on the distinction from "official culture" became more pronounced towards the end of the 19th century, a usage that became established by the interbellum period.
From the end of World War II, following major cultural and social changes brought by mass media innovations, the meaning of "popular culture" began to overlap with the connotations of "mass culture", "media culture", "image culture", "consumer culture", and "culture for mass consumption".
The abbreviated form "pop" for "popular", as in "pop music", dates from the late 1950s. Although the terms "pop" and "popular" are in some cases used interchangeably, and their meaning partially overlap, the term "pop" is narrower. Pop is specific to something containing qualities of mass appeal, while "popular" refers to what has gained popularity, regardless of its style.
According to author John Storey, there are various definitions of popular culture. The quantitative definition of culture has the problem that too much "high culture" (e.g., television dramatizations of Jane Austen) is also "popular". "Pop culture" is also defined as the culture that is "leftover" when we have decided what high culture is.[citation needed] However, many works straddle the boundaries, e.g., William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens, Leo Tolstoy, and George Orwell.