Cultural Theory and Popular Culture

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124 Chapter 6 Structuralism and post-structuralism Figure 6.2 Rock-a-day Johnny ‘Drugs killed my best friend’. What makes the move from denotation to connotation possible is the store of social knowledge (a cultural repertoire) upon which the reader is able to draw when he or she reads the image. Without access to this shared code (conscious or unconscious) the operations of connotation would not be possible. And of course such knowledge is always both historical and cultural. That is to say, it might differ from one culture to another, and from one historical moment to another. Cultural difference might also be marked by differences of class, race, gender, generation or sexuality. As Barthes points out, reading closely depends on my culture, on my knowledge of the world, and it is probable that a good press photograph (and they are all good, being selected) makes ready play with the supposed knowledge of its readers, those prints being chosen which comprise the greatest possible quantity of information of this kind in such a way as to render the reading fully satisfying (29). Again, as he explains, ‘the variation in readings is not, however, anarchic; it depends on the different kinds of knowledge – practical, national, cultural, aesthetic – invested in the image [by the reader]’ (Barthes, 1977b: 46). Here we see once again the analogy with language. The individual image is an example of parole, and the shared code (cultural repertoire) is an example of langue. The best way to draw together the different elements of this model of reading is to demonstrate it. In 1991 the Department of Education and Science (DES) produced an advertisement that they placed in the popular film magazine Empire (see Photo 6.2). The image shows two 14-year-old schoolgirls: Jackie intends to go to university; Susan intends to leave school at 16. The poster’s aim is to attract men and women to the teaching profession. It operates a double bluff. That is, we see the two girls, read the caption and decide which girl wants to go to university, which girl wants to leave at 16. The double bluff is that the girl who wants to leave is the one convention – those without the required cultural competence
Photo 6.2 Advertising for teachers. Roland Barthes: Mythologies 125 to teach – would consider studious. It is a double bluff because we are not intended to be taken in by the operation. We can congratulate ourselves on our perspicacity. We, unlike others, have not been taken in – we have the necessary cultural competence. Therefore we are excellent teacher material. The advertisement plays with the knowledge necessary to be a teacher and allows us to recognize that knowledge in ourselves: it provides us with a position from which to say: ‘Yes, I should be a teacher.’
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FIFTH EDITION CULtUrAL theoryANd Po
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We work with leading authors to dev
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Contents Preface/Acknowledgements i
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Contents vii 10 The politics of the
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x Preface/Acknowledgements I have a
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Publisher’s acknowledgements We a
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2 Chapter 1 What is popular culture
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10 Chapter 1 What is popular cultur
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2 The ‘culture and civilization
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Matthew Arnold 19 is best; (iii) th
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Matthew Arnold 21 Arnold (1960) cal
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Leavisism 23 decline. What had been
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debasement of emotional life, and t
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Leavisism 27 loss. Whereas in the p
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Mass culture in America: the post-w
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disastrous that few people read cla
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previously accepted what was handed
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Photo 2.1 A day trip to Blackpool i
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3 Culturalism In this chapter I wil
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Richard Hoggart: The Uses of Litera
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Raymond Williams: ‘The analysis o
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Raymond Williams: ‘The analysis o
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E.P. Thompson: The Making of the En
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Stuart Hall and Paddy Whannel: The
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The Centre for Contemporary Cultura
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4 Marxisms Classical Marxism Marxis
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Classical Marxism 61 What Engels cl
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The Frankfurt School 63 This is one
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The Frankfurt School 65 It is not d
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The Frankfurt School 67 engages in
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The Frankfurt School 69 One might g
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Althusserianism 71 level. Neverthel
Page 89 and 90: Althusserianism 73 (the ‘symptoms
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Page 93 and 94: Althusserianism 77 no ideology is s
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Page 97 and 98: Hegemony 81 below, but a language t
Page 99 and 100: Post-Marxism and cultural studies 8
Page 105: Further reading 89 three essays inf
Page 108 and 109: 92 Chapter 5 Psychoanalysis Figure
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Page 127 and 128: 6 Structuralism and post-structural
Page 129 and 130: Ferdinand de Saussure 113 European
Page 131 and 132: Claude Lévi-Strauss, Will Wright a
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Page 135 and 136: Table 6.3 Primary and secondary sig
Page 137 and 138: Roland Barthes: Mythologies 121 Mat
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Page 143 and 144: Jacques Derrida 127 signifier to si
Page 145 and 146: Table 6.4 Film as an object of stud
Page 147 and 148: The panoptic machine The panoptic m
Page 149 and 150: production of regimes of truth, we
Page 151 and 152: 7 Gender and sexuality Feminisms
Page 153 and 154: Women at the cinema 137 that it is
Page 155 and 156: Women at the cinema 139 Escapism is
Page 157 and 158: Reading romance 141 critic but as s
Page 159 and 160: Reading romance 143 Drawing on the
Page 161 and 162: Reading romance 145 an integral par
Page 163 and 164: etween blind fantasy and perspicaci
Page 165 and 166: Watching Dallas 149 discussion, to
Page 167 and 168: Watching Dallas 151 in its narrativ
Page 169 and 170: approach to mass culture’, and th
Page 171 and 172: Reading women’s magazines 155 ten
Page 173 and 174: Reading women’s magazines 157 bet
Page 175 and 176: in the form of fantasies and imagin
Page 177 and 178: Queer theory 161 generate and guara
Page 179 and 180: Queer theory 163 Butler (2009) give
Page 181: Further reading 165 analysis. See e
Page 184 and 185: 168 Chapter 8 ‘Race’, racism an
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174 Chapter 8 ‘Race’, racism an
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182 Chapter 9 Postmodernism the dre
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184 Chapter 9 Postmodernism of cour
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186 Chapter 9 Postmodernism contemp
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188 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Rodney
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190 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Baudril
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192 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Jameson
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194 Chapter 9 Postmodernism has now
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196 Chapter 9 Postmodernism the wor
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198 Chapter 9 Postmodernism the str
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200 Chapter 9 Postmodernism very ac
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202 Chapter 9 Postmodernism meaning
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204 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Photo 9
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206 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Figure
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208 Chapter 9 Postmodernism exporte
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210 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Converg
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212 Chapter 9 Postmodernism Best, S
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214 Chapter 10 The politics of the
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238 Notes 16. The film Human Nature
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240 Notes 58. See Storey (1992). 59
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242 Bibliography Baudrillard, Jean
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244 Bibliography DiMaggio, Paul (20
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246 Bibliography Haag, Ernest van d
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248 Bibliography Leavis, F.R. (1933
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250 Bibliography Ricoeur, Paul (198
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252 Bibliography White, David Manni
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254 Index base/superstructure formu
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256 Index Doctor Who (television),
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258 Index hegemony articulation, 11
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260 Index make-over and talk shows,
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262 Index pop music (continued) pos
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264 Index realism and reality (cont
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266 Index Williamson, Judith, 78 Wi
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