Suchergebnisse

Explores various contemporary sociological theories of culture that have collapsed the distinction between the realm of the idea/spiritual & material into a more expansive notion of culture. It is shown that traditions stretching back to the sociological models of Max Weber & Karl Marx, & forward through the critical theory of the Frankfurt school & British cultural studies, have broken disciplinary boundaries in their quest to map the relationships among the social, culture, economics, & politics in the constitution of contemporary societies. Although these traditions have established connections to one another, it is suggested that a recent bifurcation of the field into textual & empirical analyses threatens to transform the field into warring paradigms & competing models. Celebrations of the popular & a fetishization of the audience, both of which became more pronounced in the 1980s, are particularly identified as dangerously one-sided approaches to the study of culture. It is argued that a sociological study of culture must return to an investigation of the relationships among three dimensions of culture: the political economy of culture; the textual analysis of artifacts; & the study of audience reception. 54 References. D. M. Smith

Der Begriff diskursiver Praktiken strahlt eine eigentümliche Anziehungskraft auf die anglo-amerikanischen Cultural Studies aus. Diese politisch-normative Aufladung des Praktiken-Begriffs findet sich nicht nur in den inzwischen klassischen Medienanalysen der Cultural Studies, sondern nicht zuletzt auch in deren Beiträgen zur Globalisierungsdiskussion. Das Lokale wird zum Ort von widerständigen und provokativen Praktiken, die sich der Logik globaler, vereinheitlichender Regimes gegenüberstellen. Der vorliegende Beitrag geht dieser Faszination der Cultural Studies durch den Praktikenbegriff nach. Dabei stehen zweierlei Fragen im Vordergrund. Erstens wird skizziert, auf welche Weise in den Cultural Studies der Praktikenbegriff normativ aufgeladen wird. Zweitens wird aufgezeigt, dass dieses Praktiken-Modell auch die globalisierungstheoretischen Arbeiten der Cultural Studies prägt und zu höchst problematischen theoretischen und politischen Konsequenzen führt. Der Autor sieht hier insgesamt eine "fatale Konsequenz": Die Konstruktion einer Unterscheidung zwischen dem Lokalen und Globalen wird naturalisiert und damit als immer schon gegebene jeglicher Politisierung entzogen. (ICA2)

In an introduction to this edited volume (see related abstracts in IRPS No. 87), the field of cultural studies & its relation to science & technology are discussed. It is suggested that the traditional belief in the primacy of cause/effect relationships fails to recognize the complexity & interdependence of variables in the modern world. Culture, science, & technology are not distinct entities, but overlapping fields, which transform & are transformed by each other. Although science & technology have permeated modern society, they do not independently determine the outcomes of social situations & evolution. It is argued that traditional deterministic social sciences must be replaced by a theory of complexity that erodes the boundaries between distinct forms of knowledge & perspectives, & seeks to consider cause in terms of multiple & merging influences. Further, region-oriented communities are becoming less important as technology allows easy communication with distant others, & thereby facilitates the bypass of local ties. It is concluded that the field of cultural studies is best equipped to deal with the rapidly changing circumstances of the modern world due to its appropriation of knowledge from diverse perspectives, & its lack of fundamental & fixed principles. T. Sevier

"Rainer Winter untersucht die Prozesse der 'Glokalisierung' (Robertson 1995) bei der Rezeption und Anverwandlung von Produkten der amerikanischen Popmedien. Anhand zahlreicher Beispiele, darunter auch einer ethnographischen Untersuchung der Hiphop-Kultur in Deutschland, zeigt er, wie Hybridbildungen entstehen. Die transnationale Hiphop-Kultur belegt auch, dass eine global verankerte kulturelle Identität und eine lokale Identifikation einander nicht ausschließen, sondern dass es sich um zwei Seiten desselben Vorgangs handelt." (Autorenreferat)

In seinem Beitrag legt der Autor dar, welche Perspektive er für eine transkulturelle Medienforschung in der Cultural Theory von Mary Douglas sieht. In ihrer Theorie, die auch als Grid-Group Modell bekannt ist, geht es vorrangig um die Erarbeitung von Dimensionen, die es ermöglichen, Kulturen so zu beschreiben, dass sie miteinander verglichen werden können. Vier kulturelle Prototypen bilden die Eckpfeiler der Cultural Theory: die hierarchische Kultur, die individualistische Kultur, die egalitäre Kultur und die fatalistische Kultur. Er argumentiert, dass Douglas' Begrifflichkeiten einen Ansatz transkultureller Kommunikationsforschung gestatten, der es einerseits ermöglicht, kulturelle Konflikte zu theoretisieren, der andererseits aber den Anspruch hat, kontextübergreifend anwendbar zu sein. Die Cultural Theory gestattet so eine vergleichende Auseinandersetzung mit inter- und transkulturellen Kommunikationsprozessen. (RG)

Reviews recent research in the cultural influences tradition of analyzing political communication. Traditionally, voter persuasion issues & neo-Marxist cultural studies have dominated the study of political communication from a cultural perspective. However detected in the literature is a new trend that focuses on cultural influences. Mark McPhail's (1994 [see abstract 9502528]) analysis of racial communication is deemed an excellent paradigm for a cultural influences model of political communication. According to McPhail, coherent argumentation requires the interaction of oppositional discourse, dialogue, & a discourse of coherence that integrates positions. On the basis of this model, scholars may assess oppositional discourse for its ability to foster integration or fragmentation. Moreover, these tools enable the cross-cultural comparison of various forms of political communication. D. M. Smith

Reviews the basic theoretical approaches to the sociology of culture that stem from the original work of Max Weber & Emile Durkheim. It is suggested that recent trends in the sociology of culture have been influenced by Clifford Geertz's (1973) break with the Weberian problematic of defining culture as ideas that motivate individuals. The transformation of cultural studies set off by Geertz's work is summarized in three notions, ie, that: (1) culture is composed of shared public symbols in the form of ideas & texts that are given meaning in particular contexts; (2) culture is a form of social practice, exterior to the individual, located & embodied in institutional practices; & (3) within cultural analysis, attention should always be given to issues of power & inequality. It is argued that from these new perspectives culture is viewed as powerful in three ways: (A) its power does not depend on any particular person believing in it; (B) it does not have to shape the individual's own beliefs & aspirations so much as the individual's knowledge of how others will interpret their actions; & (C) it is structured by institutions that produce systematic patterns for social action. D. M. Smith

Points out the irony in claims of poststructuralist theories of identity construction that omit a comparable genealogy of construction theories specifically conceptualized as white identity. This leads to a cultural studies proposition that, while gender & race of the Other are discursive constructions, whiteness is not. A similar void surrounding construction of white identity is noted in the work of critical feminists & postcolonial poststructuralists. Mutually reinforcing categories of Otherness & whiteness are drawn from the works of Franz Fanon (1967) & Toni Morrison (1989) to develop a different theoretical framework for studying whiteness, arguing that both white & Other are able to author the construction of whiteness. This framework is applied to three popular culture films that reflect whiteness in relation to Others in different cultural political contexts: David Lean's Passage to India; Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing; & Kevin Costner's Dances with Wolves. How these films construct whiteness in the modalities of dialectics, synchronous, & syncretic identities is examined. 29 References. J. Lindroth