How Do We Define Popular Culture In An Age Of Mass Culture (use One

How Do We Define Popular Culture In An Age Of Mass Culture (use One How Do We Define Popular Culture In An Age Of Mass Culture (use One Example Of Popular Culture To â€" Essay Example > IntroductionThis paper discusses popular culture with reference to reality television. Whereas, TV was once thought of as a ‘means to escape reality’ the inclination of the majority of today’s population is to turn on the tube, simply to be caught up in a reality show has become a unique aspect of today’s popular culture. The importance of popular culture can be seen by the fact that today, more than twice as many young people apply to MTV’s “Real World” show than to the Harvard University (Eakin, 2004). The paper commences with a description of mass culture vs. popular culture. After wards it goes on to discuss popular culture in a post-modernistic society. Various examples of popular culture are also provided. Reality television and its obsession with the audience have been discussed with reference to the Frankfurt and the Marxist school of thought. Afterwards, the same is discussed in accordance to the view of feminism. The question of the essay has been directly answered under the heading; how do we define popular culture in an age of mass culture? Lastly, a brief conclusion is provided, to give the reader an overall viewpoint. Popular Culture (Post-Modernism)Cohn (1976) states that, people usually think that only a small proportion of the society is associated with popular culture. In addition, it is thought that as popular culture comes from the general public that is why democracy exists in popular culture. Overall the general view is that the people think of it as beneficial, restorative and positive in general. Similarly, Srinati (2004, pp. 3-6) in his book has defined popular culture as, “high culture and popular culture are ideal types, or stereotypes. ” He prefers to use the term popular culture as opposed to high culture. Srinati has divided culture into public culture and private culture. Public culture focus on, mass media and other public cultural institutions, whereas private culture is the one that people create and prac tice at home and in other private spaces. Lewis (1986) believes that popular culture flows from industrialized countries to non-industrialized or developing nations. He has also maintains that popular culture in present-day society is able to transcend primary cultural boundaries to such an extent that with the passage of time people are no longer able to make a distinction between foreign cultural imports to those of their own. A number of pictorial examples have been provided in the study. Among them is that a poster of Tarzan in Morocco (people all over the world can relate easily to him) and the American fast food chain Mc Donald’s (again, which is present in numerous countries across the globe). Lewis (1986), in his study, has described these as tourist culture- a produce by a culture, specifically for outside consumption. A pre-requisite for tourist culture is that it has to be symbolic, easy to understand and transport. On the other hand, Cusic (2001) thinks of popular cu lture in terms of economics. He states that as popular culture is highly influenced by mass media (this includes the reality television shows), one should look at statistics related to viewer-ship in order to find out what form of media is a culture most inclined towards. This will automatically give the researcher details pertaining to the type and origin of popular culture in a specific society.