About This Project
Overview
In 1992, MTV aired the first season of The Real World, “to find out what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real.” This groundbreaking television show aimed to bring viewers into the living room with random people. At first dismissed as “trash,” reality TV has become a staple of television programming with its own conventions and awards show. In Keepin’ Up with Popular Culture, I introduce students to popular culture as a way to view and understand society, politics, and culture.
Culture is the process through which people make symbolic meaning out of the world. Popular culture is mass produced culture that everyone has access to. Whether it is the latest hit song that you hear everywhere from the grocery store to playlists on Spotify or it is a new video game (the popular song may even be in the video game that is based on a movie), popular culture pervades our everyday lives. Therefore, it is critically important to study popular culture in order to assess its social, political, cultural and economic impact on American society.
This book demonstrates to students the overall importance of popular culture in their lives. It will explore the ways that language is used (and the way that we use language) to construct the world around us through popular culture. While the book explores popular media texts, it uses a scholarly approach to popular culture in the critical theoretical tradition to understand the uses and abuses of popular culture. The class will examine how ideas, values, and beliefs, are constructed through and are reflected by popular culture. It will provide introductory theoretical frames from cultural studies, sociology, semiotics, gender studies, race/ethnic studies and political economy.
Reality TV provides the dominant frame for the book. As a relatively new television genre, reality TV provides interest to the reader and a diversity of content. All of the major themes of popular culture can be viewed through different reality TV. For instance, the title of the book draws attention to “Keepin’ Up with the Kardashians,” a reality TV show that sparked influencer culture in social media.
About the Author
Dr. David Arditi is one of the nation’s foremost scholars in the sociology of popular culture. His research explores the way popular culture pervades our everyday lives. Specifically, he has written 6 books at the intersections of popular culture and digital technology. Most notably, Streaming Culture: Subscription Platforms And The Unending Consumption Of Culture analyzes the way streaming platforms impacted the production and consumption of popular culture from movies to video games.
