ART 429B Popular Art, Mass Media & the Public Sphere

ART 429B POPULAR ART, MASS MEDIA & THE PUBLIC SPHERE

Course Description:

What is 'popular art'? Why is it worthwhile to spend time studying about popular culture? Let us begin to address these questions by noting that most of our cultural experiences are shaped by our exposure to the media, whether of print, film, television or radio and that the majority of this culture is defined as popular. Further, via sophisticated media technology, contemporary popular culture lays claim to audience sizes unprecedented in the history of art. According to the historian, E.J. Hobsbawm, this combination of technological innovations and the mass market has led to the emergence of popular art as "the most important development in the twentieth century." In this class we will discuss several theories about popular culture with reference to specific examples such as that of tourist art, murals and graffiti and the fashion industry. We will also study the role of the media (newsprint, television & film) in producing distinctions between 'mass culture' and 'popular culture'. The pivotal role of the user or spectator of popular culture will be central to all our discussions.

Class Participation:

This is a seminar course which means that you will be required to

Participate fully in discussions of the assigned reading material and the visuals shown in class.
Write Weekly Summaries of reading assignments, films or field trip observations.
Work with another student to lead the class discussion once during the semester.
Graduate students will meet an additional 3 times during the semester. Meeting times will be scheduled later.

Reading Assignments:

Some readings for this class are from your text-book: Mirzoeff, Nicholas. Editor. Visual Culture Reader. New York: Routledge, 1994.
In addition to the readings you might be required to watch a movie or make a museum visit. Photocopies of the additional readings will be made available in class.

Weekly Written Summaries:

Each week students are responsible for handing in written summaries of each article, film or field trip they are assigned. These summaries have to be a minimum of 400 words in length, typed, double-spaced and must include a title. In your summary, mention the major points of each article. In addition, try to include one provocative question for each article that will help stimulate class discussion. Please observe the word limits for each summary. Weekly summaries will be graded on a pass/unacceptable basis. Summaries are due at the end of class. Late summaries will be accepted within one week of the due date, however, students will only receive half credit.
Students who turn in the equivalent of 6 passing Weekly Summaries will receive an A for this section of the course. This means that you can turn in 6 Weekly Summaries on time, or 5 on time and two late. Students who turn in the equivalent of 5 Weekly Summaries will receive a B; 4 will result in a C, 3 will result in a D. Remember, a late summary is only worth half the credit.

Research Project:

The main written assignment for this course will be a research paper (10 pages - 2500 words) that analyzes the production and reception of a popular cultural event, practice or art object.
Directly after the Spring Break you will be required to present a short (5 minutes) progress report on the topic you have chosen, the way you intend to approach it and the references you intend to use. The following week you should hand in a one page (300 words) typed synopsis of your topic. A revised version of this synopsis will be the abstract of your research paper.
Towards the end of the semester, you will be required to give a formal presentation (15 minutes long), preferably with visuals, on your research paper. Your peers will provide constructive criticism which you should attempt to incorporate in the final copy of the written paper.

REFERENCES:

Baker, Houston, A. Jr. Black Studies, Rap, and the Academy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993.

Barthes, Barthes. Image, Music, Text. Essays Selected and Translated by Stephen Heath. New York: Hill & Wang, 1977.

Barthes, Roland. Mythologies. Translated by Annette Lavers. New York: Hill and Wang, 1957.

Baty, S. Paige. American Monroe. The Making of a Body Politic. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1995.

Benjamin, Walter. "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction". In Marxism and Art: Writings in Aesthetics and Criticism, edited by Berel Lang and Forest Williams. New York: David McKay Co. 1972, pp. 281-300.

Benzel, Kathryn N. "The Body as Art. Still Photographs of Marilyn Monroe." Journal of Popular Culture 25, 2 (Fall 1991): 1-29.

Boyd, Todd. "Check Yo Self. Before You Wreck Yo Self: Variations on a Political Theme in Rap Music and Popular Culture." In The Black Public Sphere. Edited by the Black Public Sphere Collective. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.

Bright, Brenda Jo and Liza Bakewell. Editors. Looking High and Low. Art and Cultural Identity Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1995.

Crow, Thomas. Modern Art in the Common Culture. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996.

Cullum, Jerry. Guest Editor. Art Papers. Inside the Outside: Rethinking Folk Art. 22(1):Jan/Feb 1998. Frank, Thomas. The Conquest of Cool. Business Culture, Counterculture, and the Rise of Hip Consumerism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997.

De Certeau, Michel. "Practices of Space." In On Signs. Pp. 122-145. Edited by Marshall Blonsky. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985.

Douglas, Mary. Purity & Danger. An Analysis of the Concepts of Pollution & Taboo. London: Routledge, 1966.

Dyer, Richard. Stars. London: British Film Institute, 1986.

Eco, Umberto. Travels in Hyper Reality. Essays. Translated by William Weaver. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1986.

Gottdiener, M. Postmodern Semiotics. Material Culture and the Forms of Postmodern Life. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1995.

Greenberg, Clement."Avant-Garde and Kitsch" (1934) reproduced in Art in Theory, 1900-1990, Edited by Charles Harrison & Paul Wood. Cambridge, Mass.:Blackwell, 1994. Pp. 529-541.

Hall, Michael and Eugene Metcalf. The Artist Outsider. Creativity and the Boundaries of Culture. Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994.

Hebdige, Dick. Subculture: The Meaning of Style. London: Methuen, 1977.

Horkheimer, Max and Theodor W. Adorno. "The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception". In Dialectic of Enlightenment. Translated by John Cumming. New York: Herder and Herder, 1972.

Huyssen, Andreas. After the Great Divide. Modernism, Mass Culture, Postmodernism. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1986.

Kipnis, Laura. "Repossessing Popular Culture." In Ecstasy Unlimited. On Sex, Capital, Gender and Aesthetics. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 1993.

Mac Robbie, Angela. ed. Zoot Suits and Second-Hand Dresses. An Anthology of Fashion and Music. Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1988.

Marcus, George & Fred Myers. Editors. The Traffic in Culture. Refiguring Art and Anthropology. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.

Marling, Karal Ann. As Seen on TV. The Visual Culture of the Everyday in the 1950’s. Cambridge, Mass.: Havard University Press, 1994.

McLuhan, Marshall.Understanding Media. The Extensions of Man. Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press. First published in 1964.

Mercer, Kobena. "Black Hair, Style Politics." In Welcome to the Jungle. New Positions in Black Cultural Studies. Pp. 97-128. London: Routledge, 1994.

Modelski, Tania. ed. Studies in Entertainment.Critical Approaches to Mass Culture. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1986.

Mukerji, Chandra and Michael Schudson. eds. Rethinking Popular Culture. Contemporary Perspectives in Cultural Studies. University of California Press, 1991.

Park, Sung Bong. An Aesthetics of the Popular Arts. An Approach to the Popular Arts from an Aesthetic Point of View. Uppsala, 1993.

Rodman, Gilbert B. Elvis After Elvis. The Posthumous Career of a Living Legend. London: Routledge, 1996.

Storey, John. An Introductory Guide to Cultural Theory and Popular Culture. Atlanta: University of Georgia Press, 1994.

Urbain, Didier. "The Tourist Adventure and His Images." in Annals of Tourism Research. A Social Sciences Journal . Special issue on the Semiotics of Tourism. 16, 1 (1989): 106-117.

Virilio, Paul. Art of the Motor. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995.

Vlach, John M."'Properly Speaking': The Need for Plain Talk About Folk Art." In Folk Art and Art Worlds. edited by John M. Vlach and Simon Bronner. Ann Arbor, Michigan: UMI Research Press, 1986, pp. 13-26.

Wallace, Michelle. Black Popular Culture. Edited by Gina Dent. Seattle: Bay Press, 1992.

Weiss, Jeffrey. The Popular Culture of Modern Art. Picasso, Duchamp and Avant-Gardism. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994.

Yanagi, Soetsu. The Unknown Craftsman. A Japanese Insight into Beauty. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1972.

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