POPULAR CULTURE REVIEWER Subculture – refers to a smaller culture

LECTURE 1 CULTURE within a larger culture. These are cultural

patterns that set apart some segment of the
Sociologists define culture as the values, society’s population.
beliefs, behavior, and material objects that
constitute a people’s way of life. Culture Ethnocentrism – refers to the feeling or
includes what we think, how we act, and belief that one’s culture is better than the
what we own. rest.

Two types of Culture Xenocentrism – refers to the belief that one’s

culture is inferior compared to others.
Nonmaterial culture – is the intangible
world of ideas created by members of Culture and Human Freedom
society that span wide range of ideas from
beliefs to religion. Culture can be a constraint to human
freedom because we act in accordance with
Material culture – constitutes the tangible the guidelines set forth by the society, but it
things created by members of the society also gives us the responsibility to make and
ranging from clothing to armaments. remake ourselves and society.

Characteristics of Culture On Popular Culture

 Culture is a group product. Popular is regarded with favor, approval, or

 Culture is adoptive and learned. affection by people in general.
 Culture is transmitted.
 All people have varied culture. Popular Culture is the set of practices,
beliefs, and objects that embody the most
Components of Culture broadly shared meanings of a social system.
It includes media objects, entertainment and
Material culture – composed of the material leisure, fashion and trends, and linguistic
artifacts and technology. Technology refers conventions, among other things.
to the knowledge that a society applies to the
task of living in a physical environment. What are the functions of Popular
Culture?
Norms – rules and expectations or standards
by which a society guides the behavior of its Popular culture is a means by which
members. culture generates profit. But once in place,
popular culture then co-opts many other
o Proscriptive norms – mandating important social functions. Norm generation,
what we should not do. e.g. boundary maintenance, ritual development,
prohibition by parents of PDA innovation, and social change are the key
o Prescriptive norms - spells out what social functions to which popular culture
we should do. e.g. US schools teach contributes.
practices of “safe sex”
Will Popular Culture survive?
Folkways – a society’s custom of routine, it
refers to the repetitive ways of doing things Media and Popular Culture most
which do not have moral significance but are specifically the television, radio, and internet
a part of our casual interaction. e.g. wearing are considered to be the “Tastemakers”.
of earrings, using of spoon and fork, riding
jeepney, raising hands, line etc. CHAPTER 2
STRUCTURALISM
Mores – refers to a society’s standards of
proper moral conduct e.g. prohibition of Structuralism is a method of interpreting
homosexual relations. and analyzing such things as language,
literature, and society, which focuses on
Cultural Diversity refers to the contrasting ideas or elements of structure
differentiation of culture all over the world and attempts to show how they relate to the
which means there is no right or wrong whole structure. Structuralism, in a broader
culture but there is appropriate culture for sense, is a way of perceiving the world in
the need of a specific group of people. terms of structures.
The essence of Structuralism is the belief Claude Levi Strauss, a French
that “things cannot be understood in anthropologist in the 1900s, proposed a
isolation, they have to be seen in the context theory of 'binary opposites' which entails
of larger structures they are part of”. that the majority of narratives in media
forms such as books and film contain
Structuralism is a way of approaching texts
opposing main characters. These binary
and practices that is derived from the
theoretical work of the Swiss linguist
Ferdinand de Saussure. Based on this claim,
he suggests that meaning is not the result of
an essential correspondence between
signifiers and signified; it is rather the result
of difference and relationship.
In other words, Saussure’s theory is a
relational theory of language.

Meaning is produced not through a one-to-

one relation to things in the world, but by
establishing difference.

Two theoretical approaches to linguistics

(Sausurre)

1. Diachronic approach, which studies the

historical development of a given
language, and
2. Synchronic approach, which studies a
given language in one moment in time. opposites help to thicken the plot and further
the narrative; and introduce contrast.
He argues that to find a science of
linguistics, it is necessary to adopt a
synchronic approach. Structuralists have Binary opposition is a key concept in
taken the synchronic approach to the study structuralism, a theory of sociology,
of texts or practices. They argue that in order anthropology and linguistics that states that
to really understand a text or practice it is all elements of human culture can only be
necessary to focus exclusively on its understood in relation to one another and
structural properties. This of course allows how they function within a larger system or
critics hostile to structuralism to criticize it the overall environment. We often encounter
for it is a historical approach to culture. binary oppositions in cultural studies when
exploring the relationships between different
Signifier and Signified groups of people, for instance: upper-class
and lower-class or disabled and non-
disabled. On the surface, these seem like
mere identifying labels, but what makes
them binary opposites is the notion that they
cannot coexist.

The problem with a system of binary

opposites is that it creates boundaries
between groups of people and leads to
prejudice and discrimination. One group
Meaning is produced not through a one-to- may fear or consider the opposite group a
one relation to things in the world, but by threat, referred to as the 'other'. The use of
establishing difference. Structuralists argue binary opposition in literature is a system
that language organizes and constructs our that authors use to explore differences
sense of reality – different languages in between groups of individuals, such as
effect produce different mappings of the cultural, class or gender differences. Authors
real. may explore the gray area between the two
groups and what can result from those
Binary Oppositions perceived differences.