Popular Culture by John Weaver Publisher Peter Lang 2009

Reviewed by Dr Mahendra Kumar Mishra

The Peter Lang publication entitled Popular Culture PRIMER written by John A. Weaver is a
commendable work in the field of understanding the paradigm shift from conventional definition
of culture to popular culture cutting across the history of human civilization.

The book is presented in defining the culture and its development through ages. It clearly explains
the definition of ‘culture’ in ancient time which had different values than the culture in modern
age. Culture was a possession of privileged class as opposed to the masses. The rest of the centuries
have faced a major challenge in 20th century by popular culture.

In 18th century the perception of European intellectuals on culture was that common masses should
not visit museum and Opera - theatres. They would not be able to understand the meaning of museum
and their time that was shared in manual labor would be wasted in theatres.

Kant said , ‘freedom and rational thought were beyond average people which cultured persons
knew how to exercise their freedom.’(p. 49). Mathew Arnold and Oscar Wilde also believed in
excellence, by telling that art dominate the spectators. Any university , said FR Levis, which attempts
to function on democratic principles simply could not create a cultured public.( p. 9) Similarly
Leo- Strauss advocated cultured few.

The writer has critically examined the history of elite culture that were advocated over centuries
and the major breakthrough was the first decade of 19th century when the popular culture
emerged after the introduction of film , radio and television in the society where common people
equally shared the culture irrespective of elite or mass.

Next the author has examined how the culture was influenced by the Americanization of culture. It was
to deny the other culture and there was a rapid paradigm shift. Opera was replaced by film, stge
performers got international attention after joining in the film. Cultured figured became screen actors
and gained popularity, than confined to the limited theatre audience. Thus there was a change from
iconic/ traditional image to popular culture image / digital image.

Invention of TV, film and Radio, brought a drastic change from mental image to physical image, from
written truth to oral truth. Visual image challenged the written image in terms representing meaning.
Likeness to religious iconography was developed and logical positivism was adopted where it was
believed that image is a pure representation of nature/ reality .Thus literature verses art and image
was synthesized as images and texts echo one another at safe distance.(p. 17)

However, the written image was replaced by the visual images, and the visual images also changed in
to digital images through compositing.
 Thus there was a shift from human to non human transformation of images, discarding the role of
human being. But it was necessary to act and interpret human being to create meaning for the
images.

Popular culture was to meet the challenges and altered world that digital image are constructing
one pixel at a time.

Definition of culture in modern world is different from the ancient one. Defining the concept of
culture in the context of popular culture, Weaver state that, culture is a blend of traditional and
popular culture with historical context. Further he stated that power as a major component of
cultural studies and finally geographical dimension of culture is another area of concern.

Tradition of popular culture was defined by an intellectual coterie most popularly known as Frankfurt
School. Their study on culture was expanded from economic domain to cultural domain. The critical
theory that was propagated by this school was based on cultural industry which gave rise to the rise of
popular culture. Art in the age of mechanical reproduction gained popularity and democratic flavor
although lost its aura.

Film, TV and Radio and photographs have changed the human culture. Audience is absent in the
film, where as “every commercial is the big lie in which advertising becomes art and nothing
else”.( P. 29)Film and photography is aimed against death. Film also reduced the “distance in both
time and space between the image and the viewer.”Film became reality is a simulation and simulation is
a reality. Television is a way to ensure access to adequacy. A Meaning of television became polysemic.
Similarly music was also threatened by technology due to its separation of voice from the body. Next
came the hip hop culture in music which is characterized by its hybridity They also co-opted in a
cultural setting of iteration. Sports in modern context is not cruel like the ancient one , but it is an
embodiment of a culture’s highest values which resulted with fan culture.

Chapter four represents new areas of study that is the cultural studies of techno science. Thomas
Kuhn was the pioneer on spelling out the fact that scientific theories represent different values,
culture, beliefs which is incommensurable with one another . Next noted writer on techno science
in relation to culture is N Catherine Hayles who discussed on cosmic web. She explained that both
the scientists and Literatures think alike and do the same thing in two different names, unknown
to each other, are connected to a cosmic web. The concept and practice of electronic literature and
interconnection of materiality of culture with interdisciplinary science took place in the field of
human resource and thus there was an attempt to end the dichotomy of two cultures ,i.e.
Humanity and science. Electronic literature took place of print literature by adopting e book. Next is
the post human condition where human brain was supported with machine which is termed as
cybrog, cybernetics and neuro-net computers. This also led to techno culture and hypermediecy and
ultimately emergence of bioscience.
 Chapter five represents cultural study of/in education .This chapter includes the study of
childhood and counseling children critical pedagogy and critical media literacy and curriculum
theory that captures the basics of contemporary popular culture and provide space for the mass .

The book contains the instances of popular culture of western society and thus is very useful
for the scholars of pre modern and modern world of developing countries to understand and
assess the values of popular culture in their own context.

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