Course Syllabus - Writing/Social Issues in Pop Culture (PDF) (2008)

1/28/08
Assignments and Course Schedule
*All assignments, including readings, will be due the week they are listed unless otherwise
noted.*
Week One (1/28/08) – Pop Matters
! Television and the Arts and Humanities, introduction to the course and current issues in
contemporary television; key themes/terms.
Week Two (2/4) – Representation & The Circuit of Culture
! What is representation? How do we decode meanings in television?
! Assignment: What is your favorite TV show and why?
! Read:
o
o
Hall, S. (1997). Introduction. In S. Hall (Ed.), Representation: Cultural
representations and signifying practices (pp. 1-13). London: Sage Publications &
Open University.
Kellner, D. (2003). Critical Perspectives on Television from the Frankfurt School
to Postmodernism. From Kellner’s Homepage:
http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/flash/ Go to “Essays.” Also available on
Blackboard.
Week Three (2/11) – Race as Representation
! Read:
o Hunt, D. M. (2005). Making sense of blackness on television. In D. M. Hunt (Ed.),
Channeling blackness: Studies on television and race in America (pp. 1-24). New
York: Oxford University Press.
o Gray, H. S. (2005). Different dreams, dreams of difference. In Cultural moves:
African Americans and the politics of representation (pp. 114-119). Berkeley:
University of California Press.
Week Four (2/18) – Sexualities and/in Popular Culture
! Read:
! Zeman, N. (2003). Gay-per-view TV; With Will & Grace, Queer Eye for the
Straight Guy, and Boy Meets Boy, prime time has come out. Vanity Fair.
! Tropiano, S. (2003). The prime time closet: Into the mainstream.
Popmatters.com.
! Warn, S. (2003). Vanity Fair the latest to use gay men as lesbian equivalent.
AfterEllen.com.
Week Five (2/25) – (One) Queer Space: Will & Grace
! Read:
o
Mitchell, D. (2005). Producing containment: The rhetorical construction of
difference in Will & Grace. Journal of Popular Culture, 38, 1050-1069.
o Nero, C. I. (2005). Why are gay ghettos white? In E. P. Johnson & M. G.
Henderson (Eds.), Black Queer Studies: An Anthology (pp. 228-247). Durham:
Duke University Press.
o
Watch:
! Season Six, Episode Seventeen, “East Side Story”
Week Six (3/3) – Constructing the Past: Mad Men
! Read:
o Stanley, A. (2007). Smoking, drinking, cheating and selling. New York Times, 19
July.
o Mittell, J. (2006). Narrative complexity in contemporary American television. The
Velvet Light Trap, 58, 29-40.