There is quite honestly not enough days in the week to cope with this work-load. And I thought once sometimes seven days of monotonous, repetitious work was too long in the week. Never again! On the other hand, speaking of monotony, Mr. Strinati has had much to say about the ever-increasing threat of mass or "popular" culture. And as a fellow passive, submissive consumer (I'll explain later), I thought I would share my interpretation of my ideas for the whole world to share.
Trust me, this blog post will be shorter...
To begin with, mass culture is a matter of fast production and quick results: "Culture has to be mass produced for this audience in order will be profitable." (Pg. 12) But which audience? Our generation? The generation before? Strinati appears to fail in answering some of the most relevant questions in this particular chapter anyway. This can to an extent be answered by the fact that he states culture differs within the types of representations and open to different thoughts of groups of people. To use Bordieu again, Culture Capital is the different consumptions of people according to a hierarchical chain to which they belong. And in many cases now, pure is no longer the chic image to be in. As the quotation will help with:
"Dominant classes engage in the production of mass culture... and the people have access to popular culture outside the bounds of hierarchy" (Pg. 45)
From what I have gathered, Americanisation is not responsible alone for the dumbing down of our standards (Look to China on that scale). Instead, with what I think was referred to as the "Pro-sumer", people have choices of what they want to watch. Naturally, it's all nonsense to think that these producers will want you to watch their product placement extravaganza if you have no income to spend on their brand. Take Dallas as an example, from the book itself. People were embarrassed to watch it. I'm not! I love the series, thanks to my family now far far away, it feels like. I don't care if it Americanised Europe, that's not my problem. Populism dictates, unlike elitism, that sets of different tastes can define their loves whilst not being frowned upon. Avant garde as a format survives today and will do so, with other options for those who may seek their pleasures elsewhere. Dallas in now a cult rather than "mass" consumerism. DVDs are released and it has stood the test of time. Can you say that of the obscure programmes?
As Strinati says: "...is there any such thing as a mass audience anyway?"
Until the next time.
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