Understanding popular culture by john fiske, 1991 online. Making sense of popular television, then, is the process of activating meanings from it, and this. A collection of essays analysing different examples of popular culture. Kop understanding popular culture av john fiske pa. Reading fiske and understanding the popular introduction to 2nd. Publication date 1991 topics popular culture, capitalism. Pdf understanding popular culture download full pdf book. An introduction to mass communication will support an engaging and interesting course experience for students that will not only show them the powerful social, political and economic forces will affect the future of media technology, but will challenge students to do their part in shaping that future. In broad use today, it is defined in qualitative termspop culture is often considered a more superficial or. Understanding popular culture 2nd edition john fiske. Seems to have gone off the boil so much now which is a pity, as fiske clearly demonstrates it is an exciting and vibrant area of study, even if some cannot take it seriously. John fiske and central to this process is the inescapable intertextuality of our culture, a point.
In broad use today, it is defined in qualitative termspop culture is often considered a more superficial or lesser type of artistic expression. He was a professor of communication arts at the university of wisconsinmadison. Here, the theory would explain that jeans are so deeply imbued with the. John fiske born 1939 is a media scholar who has taught around the world. Industries merely produce a repertoire of texts audience empowered to interpret, use, reject drive for innovation and change comes from the audience activity in the cultural economy fiske 1989c. A recurrent title in media studies and important readings on popular culture, this accompanying work to reading popular culture zeroes in on various phenomena and products such as televisions, carnivals, soap operas and movies, even jeans. Cultural fifth edition cult popular theoryand ural. Cultural theory and popular culture by john storey unite youth. As we saw in chapter 1, he accuses williams of assuming that a literary theorist would read the popular in the same way as the audience. Here i am suggesting that fiske is assuming the audience would always read the popular as an enthusiastic fan might. Cultural fifth edition cult popular theoryand ural theory.
John fiske has been and continues to be one of the most important intellectual influences on my work. He is the author of eight books, including power plays, power works 1993, understanding popular culture 1989, reading the. Fiske argues, popular culture is deeply contradictory in societies where power is. Television culture john fiske introduction to communication studies john fiske reading the popular john fiske autonomy in social science research categorical data analysis for the behavioral and social sciences the history of the social sciences since 1945, philippe fontaine arnheim for film and media studies. He is the author of eight books, including power plays, power works 1993, understanding popular culture 1989, reading the popular.
Fiske, 1989a i have argued that distance is a key marker of difference between high and low culture, between the meanings, practices, and pleasures characteristic of em powered and disempowered social formations. Glesss lexical shift from sexiness through femininity to a real strong lady is a discursive shift and therefore has sociopolitical dimension. Fiske is arguing for a strategy of looking at popular culture from the ground up, suggesting that those who consume the products of mass culture do so in ways that can resist the meanings offered them by the producers of mass culture, and that this. John fiskes understanding popular culture serves primarily as a companion to his reader, reading the popular. Jun 16, 2010 john fiske has been and continues to be one of the most important intellectual influences on my work. Designed as a companion to reading the popular, understanding popular culture presents a radically different theory of what it means for culture to be popular. Fiske differentiates between mass culture the cultural products put out by an industrialized, capitalist society and popular culture the ways in which people use, abuse, and subvert these products to create their own meanings and messages. In the culture of the socially advantaged and empowered it may take the form.
Fiske is arguing for a strategy of looking at popular culture from the ground up, suggesting that those who consume the products of mass culture do so in ways that can resist the meanings offered them by the producers of mass culture, and that this product is popular culture. John fiske understanding popular culture world of digitals. There is a vast literature on the subject and a great many collections of recorded music. Understanding popular culture 1 john fiske understanding popular culture. Understanding popular culture edition 2 by john fiske. His strong defense of popular culture as offering a series of resources through which active audiences struggled over meaning was a foundation for my ongoing investigation of participatory culture and new media literacy. It selects from the repertoire of massproduced and massdistributed entertainment certain performers, narratives or genres and takes them into the culture of a selfselected fraction of the people. Here fiske falls into precisely the same trap as raymond williams. Reading a ebook can be one of a lot of task that everyone in the world enjoys. John fiske quotes author of understanding popular culture. Fandom is a common feature of popular culture in industrial societies. His areas of interest include cultural studies, popular culture, media semiotics and television studies. Understanding popular culture takes an approach to studying such cultural artifacts as jeans, shopping malls, tabloid newspapers, and tv game shows, which remains relevant in the 21st century.
John storey is professor of cultural studies and director of the centre for research in media. Understanding popular culture john fiske in this companion volume to reading the popular, fiske presents a radical theory of what it means for culture to be popular. Lacey, for example, can understand and enjoy both the relationship between the two characters and. The term popular culture was coined in the mid19th century, and it referred to the cultural traditions of the people, in contrast to the official culture of the state or governing classes. Chambers 1986 argues that contemporary metropolitan society produces a culture of the spectacle in which the realization of the self is not achieved in the depth of ones inner being, but on the surface, through style, through image, through a series of theatrical gestures p.
Pdf cultural theory and popular culture a reader qin. It is published simultaneously, and as an extension of, reading the popular, an analysis of key sites and texts. Fiske differentiates between mass culture the cultural products put out by an industrialized, capitalist society and popular culture the ways in which people. Each book is designed to be selfsufficient, but i hope those who read both will find that the readings flesh out and interrogate the theories, and the theories deepen and generalize the readings.
He was a professor at the university of wisconsin and has authored many books on media. Fiske examines the different facets of popular culture using commodities such as denim jeans, madonna, the television show dallas, and more. Sexiness is from an explicitly patriarchal discourse, femininity is from a discourse that attempts to naturalize gender construction and difference in terms of the status quo and is therefore implicitly patriarchal. When it was first written, understanding popular culture took a groundbreaking approach to studying such cultural artifacts as jeans, shopping malls, tabloid newspapers, and tv game shows, which remains relevant today. Culture making is a constant process, and it is a distinctly social process.
Understanding popular culture reading the popular popular culture made by people. Some of them include, understanding popular culture, reading the popular and lastly the book that gives the codes of television, television culture. Introduction to communication studies john fiske pdf. Notes with a new introductory essay on why fiske still matters, by henry jenkins, and with a new discussion on the topic of reading fiske and understanding the popular, between kevin glynn, jonathan gray and pamela wilson. John fiske this study attempts to outline a theory of popular culture in capitalist societies. Television culture john fiske introduction to communication studies john fiske reading the popular john fiske autonomy in social science research categorical data analysis for the behavioral and social sciences the history of the social sciences since 1945. The cultural economy of fandom john fiske fandom is a common feature of popular culture in industrial societies. In his book, television culture, fiske said he faces the. Culture is the constant process of producing meanings of and from our social experience.
Understanding popular culture volume 4 by john fiske understanding popular culture volume 4 by john fiske this revised edition of a now classic text includes a new introduction by henry jenkins, explaining why fiske still matters for todays students, followed by a discussion between former fiske students kevin glynn, jonathan gray, and. Fiske differentiates between mass culture the cultural products put out by an industrialized, capitalist society and popular culture the ways in which people use, abuse, and subvert these. When it was first written, understanding popular culture took a groundbreaking approach to studying such cultural artifacts as jeans, shopping malls, tabloid newspapers, and. Fiske, john, understanding popular culture, london. Understanding popular culture moves from theories to readings, reading the popular from readings to theories. Pdf understanding popular culture download full pdf. Publication date 1989 topics popular culture, capitalism publisher boston. Publication date 1991 topics popular culture, capitalism publisher routledge. John fiske answers these and a host of other questions in understanding popular culture. The newlywed game, fiskes understanding of power, which he borrows.