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UNST 254O-001/64701 SOPHOMORE
INQUIRY: POPULAR CULTURE
Dr. Grace Dillon. 725-8144 / dillong@pdx.edu / CH 117Q.
Office Hours: MW 5-6 p.m. and by appointment.
Class
meets MW 3:30-4:45 p.m. / CH 228
Mentor Section UNST 254P-001, M 5-5:50 p.m. / CH 249.
Mentor Section UNST 254P -002, W 5-5:50 p.m. / CH 249.
Mentor Section UNST 254P -003, M 6-6:50 p.m. / CH 249.
Grad Mentor: Britt Godchaux godchaux@pdx.edu
 Course
Description and Goals: Critics often
associate popular culture with low art because the general public seems
to prefer Austin Powers to Artaud and pulp fiction to the classics. The term "popular culture" in fact
suggests a contrast with an "unpopular culture," implying
that most people actually dislike what is not popular because it is
high art. From these assumptions, one can argue that choosing
to study popular culture involves a choice to abandon something that
is more refined and therefore more worthy of critical attention. In this view, the study of popular culture becomes
evidence of the dumbing down of America. Conversely, one can argue that such a claim
simply reflects an elitist stance and that embracing popular culture
as a topic of scholarship provides evidence of a welcomed move away
from elitism. As we choose to study critically aspects of
popular culture, we will confront these issues throughout the quarter.
This course examines how popular culture, “the cultures
of everyday life” (Cultural Theory
and Popular Culture: A Reader xi) “offers a common ground”, “is
an arena of consent and resistance” (xi) and possibly is “the most visible
and pervasive level in a given society” (Petracca and Sorapure, Common Culture, p. 3). In the
process of myth reading and choosing and decoding the signs of everyday
life, course participants will observe, research, and write about cultural
phenomena and gain experience with methodologies, such as semiotics,
that are employed in cultural studies. In addition, hegemonic theory,
“the concept” used “to explain and explore relations of power articulated
in terms of class” will be expanded to “include, for example, gender,
race, meaning, and pleasure” (xiv). Ultimately, the course emphasizes
the idea that artifacts of popular culture are in fact “texts” that
we should analyze in order to determine their creators’ intentions.
The end goal is to gain control
of, rather than be controlled by, the texts of popular culture.
COURSE SCHEDULE: The day-to-day schedule
follows. Note that you should complete
reading assignments by the day on which they
are listed. Pck.=Smart
Copy packet.
WEEK ONE: Screening Avenues
M 4/3 Introduction to course. Welcome to popular culture!
W 4/5 Mark Schaefermeyer's "Film Criticism" and
Robert Stam's "Film and the Postcolonial" and "the Poetics and Politics
of Postmodernism" (same selection). (handouts in class session before)
Discussion of theoretical approaches, political economy, and ritual
with film clip samples in class. Group discussion includes either film
clips shown in class or what you feel qualifies as more recent blockbusters
or award-winning films.
Mentor Sessions M 4/3 and W 4/5: Introduction to
mentor session. Bring a cultural artifact to class that represents you
(e.g. a skateboard, toy, magazine, cd) Semiotic approach. Background
reading: Sonia Maasik,et. al., "The Semiotic Method". Welcome to Popular
Culture questionnaire.
 WEEK
TWO: Fake News: The Word!
M 4/10
Readings: Robert W. McChesney’s “Global Media,
Neoliberalism, and Imperialism” and Robert Scholes' "Intertextuality”.
(Pck. 1 and 2) Clips of The
Daily Show and The Colbert Report. Parody, intertextuality,
class, and transnational exchanges, negotiations, and crosscurrents.
W
4/12 Readings: Michael Omi, "In Living Color:
Race and American Culture," Antonio
Gramsci’s “Hegemony” and Howard Winant’s “Racial Politics in the Twenty-first
Century (Pck. 3, 4. and 5) The Tyra Banks episode. Stuart Hall and
Paul Gilroy referenced. “Corporate multiculturalism” and neoracism. Race, class, and appropriation from an
ethnic studies perspective.
Mentor
Sessions M 4/10 and W 4/12 Workshop on forms of intertextuality of TV
selections of choice. Select
group for panel presentations by this session.
WEEK THREE: The Imperial Gaze and Ghosts
of the Machine
 M
4/17 Readings:
Jean Baudrillard’s “The Precession of Simulacra” and “Simulacra and
SF” (Pck 6) and Toshiya Ueno’s
“Japanimation and Techno-Orientalism”
available online at: http://www.t0.or.at/ueno/japan.htm
Umberto Eco’s Travels in Hyperreality referenced.
Ghost in the Shell, Ghost
in the Shell 2, The Matrix, Shrek, Vanilla
Sky, Momento. and The Kung-Fu Hustle referenced. Hyperreality,
the desert of the real, Disneyfication and techno-orientalism.
W 4/19 Readings:
James Newman’s “Manufacturing Fun” and Chris Crawford’s “Two Cultures.
No Hits. No Runs.” (Pck. 7
and 8) Guest Lecturer: Beth Dillon.
Video games, franchisements, indie game developers, and interactive
storytelling.
Mentor sessions M 4/17 and W 4/19: Continuing to deconstruct the mythos of a “postracial
era.” Follow-up on readings Packet 3,4, and 5. Writing workshop: Invention
strategies and thesis development for upcoming research paper.
 WEEK FOUR: Down the Rabbithole or the In-Front-of-Us
M 4/24 Readings: Carl Freedman’s “The Critical Dynamic: SF and
Utopia,” William Gibson’s “Gernsback Continuum,” and Cherene Sherrard’s
“The Quality of Sand.” (Pck.
9,10, 11) Fritz Lang’s Metropolis,
Rintaro’s Metropolis, The Island, and Sky Captain and the World Tomorrow referenced.
Ray-gun gothic transmogrified , transatlantic triangles “marooned,”
and the “no-where” of utopia engaged.
W 4/26 Readings:
Henry Jenkins’ " Television Fans” and
Barish Ali’s “The Violence of Criticism: The Mutilation and Exhibition
History From Hell.” (Pck.
12, and 13). The transformation
of graphic novels and comics into film. Batman
Begins, Tank Girl, Spiderman (epic series), X-Men, and Sin City. Unbreakable,
Galaxy Quest, High Fidelity, Nurse Betty, and Starship
Troopers also referenced. Rogue fans and comic metanarrative.
Mentor
Sessions M 4/24 and W 4/26: Aeon
Flux techno-surrealism, cyberfeminism, and forms of
hyperreality. Writing workshop: Developing your paper,
using secondary sources, and formatting.
Time to work with your groups. Come prepared to discuss your
ideas! Research paper: thesis and prospectus due
in mentor session.
WEEK FIVE: Visualizing between the Panels
and the Comic Book Guy
 M
5/1 Panel
presentations (2) on either cyberculture or hyperreality, postmodernism,
or TV.
W 5/3 Max Horkheimer and Theodore W. Adorno’s “Culture Industry.” (Pck. 14) Ad workshop
on metonymy.
Mentor
Sessions M 5/1 and W 5/3: Serenity
and the Firefly
series discussed. Active consumerism and rogue fandom. Annotated bibliography on research paper due in mentor session.
WEEK SIX: Media Morphing of the Body Image
 M
5/8 Susan Bordo's
“beauty (re) discovers the male body” (Pck. 15) Feminization,
gender and image shifts, and global homogenization.
Feel free to bring a fashion magazine, preferably filled with
international models, to class. Clips
of Zoolander and Tank Girl.
W 5/10 Frederic Jameson’s ”The waning of affect” and
Sherif Hetata’s “Dollarization, Fragmentation, and God.” (Pck. 16 and
17) Postcolonial theory , transnationalism and neo-colonialism. Fight Club, Twelve Monkeys, Once Upon a Time
in Mexico,
and Ghost Dog: The Way of
the Samurai referenced. Research
Essay (5-6 pages, 5 sources minimum) due
in main class.
Mentor
Sessions M 5/8 and W 5/10: Read Mark Dery’s “The Empire of Signs” available
online at http://www.well.com:70/0/cyberpunk/cultjam.txt and his recent culture jamming on his floating
signifier blog,October
28, 2005: http://www.markdery.com/archives/blog/floating_signifier/index.html#000051.
Culture jamming, internet activism, and adbusters. Writing Workshop: Peer review. Bring
the rough draft copy of your research
paper.
WEEK SEVEN: Globalization and Postmodern
Schizophrenia
 M 5/15 Panel
presentations (2) on either ads or film.
W 5/17 Reading: Peter Stallybrass and Allon White's "From
Carnival to Transgression". (Pck.19) and clips of Hannibal, Young Frankenstein, Blade, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Dead Man, Spawn. Ravenous,
The Shadow of the Vampire
and Shaun of the Dead referenced. Encoding
and decoding humour and horror.
Mentor
Sessions M 5/15 and W 5/17: Reading:
Mike Davis 's "Fortress LA: The Militarization of Space" and
Ecology of Fear. (Pck. 18) Architecture, urban planning,
and Disney’s Celebration.
WEEK EIGHT: The Pith and the Rind, Ruah, Wind Spirits, and Wiindigo
M 5/22
Reading: Ismail Xavier’s “Historical Allegory.” (Pck. 20) Epic
film.”Circumflectere cursus.” The long journey and Way home. The Cathedral, The Lord of the Ring series, Gladiator
and
the Rome HBO series, Troy, Alexander, Kingdom of Heaven, and Kill
Bill Volumes One and Two. From epic hero storytelling to the consciousness
of a national allegory. The psychomachia of private and public virtues.
accompanying transnational imaginaries.
Edward Said’s “Invention, Memory, and Place” referenced.
W 5/24 Reading: Carolyn
Podruchny’s “Werewolves and Windigos: Narratives of Cannibal Monsters in French-Canadian
Voyageur Oral Tradition” (available online, Academic Premier Database).
Antonia Bird’s Raveonous, Christopher Gans’ Brotherhood of the Wolf, Grant Harvey’s
Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning, and Andrew Raj Berzins and
Norma Bailey’s Cowboys and Indians: The J. J. Harper Story. Postmodernism renewed in postindian territory.
Intimate intersections, forbidden frontiers, and the windigo
spirit.
Mentor
Sessions Monday 5/22 and W 5/24: Final exam review.
WEEK NINE: The Vatic Impulse
 M
5/29 Holiday, Campus
closed.
W 5/31 Panel presentations
(2) on either film or music.
Mentor
Sessions M 5/29 and W 5/31 : Bring in a song lyric (with CD, etc,) to
share that you feel qualifies as poetry for you.
WEEK TEN:
The Aesthetics of our Plastic World, and Beyond
M 6/5 Michael Coyle and Jon Dolan’s Modeling Authenticity”
and Cornel West’s “Black Postmodernist Practices.” (Pck. 21 and 22)
Music, aura and authenticity, choreography, and “MTV heuristics.” Samples of MTV videos and Rage Against the Machine documentaries.
The globalization of Hip-Hop, postmodern tenets renewed, political activism,
and cultural appropriation in musical circles.
W 6/7 Panel
presentations (2) on sports, leisure, fads and fashion, or appropriation
of culture.
Mentor
Sessions M 6/5 and W 6/7: End-of-quarter celebration
Final Exam Schedule: Wednesday, June 14, 12:30-1:20
p.m. Take-home final
exam due.
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