Responding to Inequalities in Popular Culture

What Do We Do?

Responding to Inequalities in Popular Culture

The Double Matrix of Popular Culture

• Clip from The Matrix, ch. 8• The Matrix is everywhere, it's all

around us, here even in this room. You can see it out your window, or on your television. You feel it when you go to work, or go to church or pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.

A Metaphor for Popular Culture?

• We could argue that popular culture is all around us. It is ubiquitous. There is no moment when you escape from it. You are confronted with it through televisions, the pages of books and magazines, film screens, and the face of your computer. Yet even when you walk away from these technologies, it confronts you through conversations with friends, through advertisements in halls and on highways, and it is even embodied by those around you.

The Desert of the Real

• Clip from The Matrix, ch. 12• Think of “the world that you know” as

the world according to popular culture—beautiful, happy, perfect.

• Think of “the desert of the real” as the reality of social inequalities—poverty, discrimination, loss and grief.

Popular Culture as a Variable

• This semester, we’ve examined various relationships between popular culture and other social variables.

• Many of the studies we have examined indicate a strong correlation between inequalities in popular culture and inequalities in other social locations.

• For instance…


• Inequalities in the quality of representations of gay, lesbian, and bisexual people, as compared to straight people, correlate with similar political inequalities (Linneman; Off the Straight and Narrow)

• Inequalities in the messages directed towards class groups correlate with economic inequalities (Gans)

• Gendered and racialized inequalities of access to cultural production (the big corporations responsible for popular culture), correlate with inequalities of messages about Black women as compared particularly to Black men (Emerson)


• Age inequalities in the targeting of marketing correlate with the exploitation of the young (Rushkoff; Schor; Adatto)

• Inequalities of access to cultural production correlate with potentially offensive cultural content and with a decline in democracy (McChesney; Heins).

• Inequalities in social responses to challenging cultural content correspond with racial inequalities (Binder; hooks) and political divides (Hunter)


• Racial inequalities in American life correlate with inequalities of representation on television (Hunt), and in children’s books (Pescosolido, et al)

• Narrow notions of gender presented in the media correspond with narrow roles faced by women (Kilbourne) and men (Bordo)

How do Make Sense of all these Correlations?

• Do the correlations indicate that popular culture causes inequality?

• Do the correlations indicate that inequality causes unequal representations or unequal access?

• Are these two variables explained by some third factor?• The apathy of citizens and the greed of

consumers• The failures of parents or schools

Causation

• To figure out the relationship between our variables, we need to explore the issue of causation.

• Establishing causation demands that we meet three criteria

1. Correlation2. Time Order3. Non-spuriousness

1. Correlation

• Check• The evidence for correlation of these

variables is quite strong, as evidenced by the lists made on the previous slides

• Nevertheless, some of you are not yet convinced of correlation for some issues• You are entitled to your position of not being

convinced• But it invites the question, what evidence

would convince you? What standards would need to be met?

2. Time Order

• This is the “chicken or the egg” question. Which one came first?

• It is going to be much easier to argue that inequalities in society cause inequalities in popular culture, rather than the reverse, when the popular culture we examine is historically new. • We can argue that television is new• We cannot argue that music or literature are new

• As a consequence, we might argue that racial inequalities came before the advent of television and therefore they cannot be the outcome of unequal representations on TV• However, if the character of racial disparities is different

today than it was in the past, then we may yet prove that TV is the culprit.

2. Time Order continued

• The principle of time order demands the following…• That observation of music videos comes before sexual

violence (Jhally)• That engagement with film, television, and toys comes

before formation of gender identity (Bordo) or that engagement with magazines transforms gender identity (Kilbourne)

• That television watching comes before our formation of ideas about sexuality (Linneman; Off the Straight and Narrow)

• That cultural choice happens before class identification (a reversal of Gans’s equation)

• We have to examine the question of time order on a case-by-case basis.• We cannot say that popular culture always comes first, but

we also cannot say that it never comes first.

3. Non-spuriousness

• If the relationship between two variables is non-spurious, that means that it cannot be explained with reference to some third variable.• For example, my presence in this classroom

corresponds with your presence in this classroom.

• But I didn’t show up just because I knew you would be here

• You didn’t show up because you knew I would be here• Rather, we all showed up because of a third variable—

the University, which demands my presence as part of my contract and your presence as part of your continued admission

• The correlation of my presence and your presence is spuriously explained then by reference to the third variable—the institutional demands of the university

3. Non-spuriousness continued

• Meeting the criteria of non-spuriousness is challenging

• It requires that we think through and examine every possible issue that could explain all those correlations that I listed earlier

• In our discussions, you’ve already identified several factors that might explain those correlations• Citizen apathy• Consumer demand• Human nature• A decline of the family• A failure of schooling

• Again, we have to take it on a case-by-case basis

Causation in the Theories

• Theories of social inequality say very little regarding popular culture• It is mentioned at various points as a

contributing factor, which does give it some limited causal capacities [popular culture (Y) is one of several causes of social inequalities (X)]

Y X ?


• Our theories about culture took stronger stances

• Victoria Alexander’s discussion of “Reflection Approaches” posits that the content of culture is a reflection of society, though often a partial or distorted reflection.• In the reflection approach, popular culture is the

dependent variable (Y) and its fluctuations are driven by changes in the social order (X).

X Y


• Schudson’s “How Culture Works” offers two ways of thinking about the correlation between popular culture and social inequalities

• The “dominant ideology” approach suggests that popular culture (Y) offers consistent messages that shape or drive human behavior, including those behaviors that cause social inequalities (X)

Y X• Clip from The Matrix Reloaded (Ch. 10)• But also…


• The “toolkit” approach suggests that popular culture is inconsistent and offers a variety of powerful options that we can choose from as we construct our behavior, including those behaviors that cause social inequalities • In this approach, popular culture is not one variable, but

several (A, B, C) that represent different cultural messages, which can be contrasted with messages from other sources (D,E,F) such as politics, religion, or the economy, that all shape human behavior depending upon the choices of individuals, including those choices that cause social inequalities (X)

X

F

E

D

C

B

A

Pop Culture Factors

Other Factors

Causation

• How we respond to the issues of inequality in popular culture depends in part on our stance on the question of causation

• However, I know better than to decide for you (you’d just do the opposite)

• Instead, let me suggest a few options

What do we do?

1. Insert ourselves into the Matrix of popular culture.

• Become producers of culture. Write poetry, design ads, make movies, record songs. But do it differently. Do it in way that does not produce new inequalities. Do it in a way that fights inequality.

• BUT, there is a danger that you will become overtaken by this system of inequalities. Perhaps, even your acts of resistance will be incorporated into the system of inequalities. (clip from The Matrix Reloaded, ch. 12).

What do we do?

2. Withdraw from the Matrix, and pull others out as well.

• Stop watching TV. Turn off your radios. Cut-off your internet service. Cancel your Netflix subscription. Then the matrix of inequalities in popular culture cannot harm you.

• BUT, it’s a difficult life. Hard to keep up with your friends, hard even to hold a job with such a life. Could be described as asocial, and humans are inherently social beings.

What do we do?

3. Take the blue pill. Go back into the matrix and live in ignorant bliss.

• You cannot be held responsible for fighting inequalities that you know nothing about. When this course is over, your transcript will only say Popular Culture. It won’t say anything about studying inequalities in popular culture. You can just go back to the way things were before.

• Of course, the matrix of inequalities in popular culture will persist. And they may even affect you.

What do we do?

4. Join the matrix.• Surely inequalities in popular culture

serve some social purpose. And they’re probably overstated anyway. This is all an interesting classroom discussion topic, but its not real. And besides, sociology students are great at market research!

What do we do?

5. Become a resistance fighter. • This will force you to balance your time within

and without the matrix of popular culture. You will have to take on an outsider’s perspective, as if you had unplugged from the matrix. But you will also have to plug back in, because you cannot fight an enemy that you do not see. You can critique the Dreamworld of music videos, but to understand it, you have to enter.

• The problem. There is no guarantee of success. Fighting the prevailing trends in popular culture could be dangerous (clip from The Matrix Revolutions, ch. 7, 2nd half).

How to Fight the Inequalities in Popular Culture

1. Focus on social change: when you watch tv, when you buy music, when you pick out books for your kids.

2. Work across lines of race and class, across lines of gender and sexuality, across lines of disability status. Work across all lines. Watch foreign films, listen to music from cultures different from your own, read magazines aimed at a different gender group. Refuse to fit your market genre.

3. Include indigenous organizers and leaders. That means artists! Include makers of music, film, photography and literature in your vision for the world.


4. Encourage diversity with ongoing outreach and training. Make it a principle in the ways you raise your kids. Demand it in your curriculum here at school. Become a volunteer with an educational program and make it your goal to address diversity, inequality, and popular culture.

5. Focus on the connections between local and national issues, between your community here and the culture that is distributed nationally. Between media consolidation and your friends’ struggles to become successful musicians. Between the values on TV and the values of the kids you know.


6. Develop and maintain personal empowerment while working for organizational power. As you resist inequalities in popular culture, you must also identify the culture that works for you—the TV shows, songs, movies, books, and websites that fit your values. Celebrate them. Draw happiness, consolation and inspiration from them.

7. Be flexible and ready to create new models to adapt to new needs. Popular culture changes rapidly. New inequalities appear at every turn. And sometimes popular culture surprises you and offers you something new and wonderful. Be ready to adjust.

Are you the one?

• Clip from The Matrix, ch. 22• “You got the gift, but it looks like

you’re waiting for something.”• And yet, perhaps soon, you’re going to

have to make a choice about popular culture. On the one hand, you’ll have culture that encourages inequality. On the other hand, you’ll have an alternative. What you choose, will be up to you.

25-Year Vision Exercise

1. Add 25 years to your age and write it down. Think of the children closest to you (daughters, sons, nieces, nephews, friends, pupils, mentorees) and add 25 years to their ages. Write their names and ages down.

2. Think about a Saturday 25 years from now. You wake up and watch a little TV. You spend some time on the internet. You go see a movie with the now-grown children you listed in step 1. You listen to some music. Before going to bed, you read a book. All of this culture fits the values that you’ve worked so hard to see realized. Sit for a few minutes and imagine what that world looks like and how it feels. Draw a picture or write a description of what you see.


3. Turn to 1 or 2 people sitting near you. Describe for them what you saw and ask them about what they saw. How were your visions different? How were they similar?

4. Make a list of the things that were different in 25 years from today.


5. Brainstorm as a class: What must happen to make our visions of the future become a reality? In what order?

6. What kinds of alliances would have to occur to make these visions a reality?

7. What do you need as an individual in order to actively pursue this vision in the next 25 years?

Questions for Further Discussion

• What choice will you make? How will you respond to the inequalities we’ve discussed this semester?

• Are you hopeful about popular culture? Why?

• What can you do right now? How will/do you advise your kids on these issues?

• Is this your/our responsibility?

Responding to Inequalities in Popular Culture

Education

Transcript of Responding to Inequalities in Popular Culture