Group+4

**Culture, Literature, and Fine Arts** Group 4 - Christine, Sairi, Sara and Elizabeth

__Culture__ According, Merriam Webster Dictionary, culture is what influences society and your roles as an individual in finding your identity ( http: www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ culture ). Culture makes us who we are, and influences our development as individuals as well as our roles in society. Through traditions and customs we find our sense of identity as we learn to actively communicate and create meanings of personal experiences. Along with culture, folk and mass culture helps to influence different aspects of our lives. It is with these parts of culture that we find ourselves and create a diverse society.

__Folk Culture __ Folk culture makes us who we are and serves as a guide of how to live our lives. It creates morals for society and people as individuals to distinguish from right and wrong. It is made up of history, traditions, food, music, dance and entertainment. Folk culture is what our ancestors have left behind for future generations to carry out and is very seldom amended. Some examples of folk culture could be mariachis in the Mexican-American culture and Chinese dragons to the Chinese culture. Mariachi is a genre of music that originated in the State of Jalisco, Mexico ([]). Mariachis are used commonly to celebrate major festivities such as weddings, quinceaneras, a girl’s 15th birthday celebration, funerals, and more. Chinese dragon was the symbol of the [|Emperor of China] and is now used as a reminder of their heritage. Jahsonic.com tells us that the common people of a society or region considered as the representatives of a traditional way of life and especially as the originators or carriers of the customs, beliefs, and arts that make up a distinctive culture ([]).

__Mass Culture__ What we are exposed to widely influences our daily actions. The clothes we choose to wear are based on the newest trends commercialized by the media. Even the words we choose in our dialogue is a reflection of mass culture; consider the slang used in top chart songs. Bitbucket.org describes mass culture as a set of cultural values and ideas that arise from common exposure of a population to the same cultural activities, communications media, music and art, etc ( http://bitbucket.icaap.org/dict.pl?term=MASS+CULTURE ). Mass culture is constantly evolving based on what mainstream considers popular at the moment. 

It’s hard to differentiate mass culture and popular culture. Popular culture is constantly changing and is specific to place and [|time] ( [] ). According to Wikipedia, popular culture is “ what is popular within the social context — that of which is most strongly represented by what is perceived to be popularly accepted among society” (http://schools-wikipedia.org/wp/p/Popular_culture.htm).Some examples of popular culture in modern life would be the cosmetic industry to appeal to women along with <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">[|weight loss] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> products. Anti-aging products fall under the category of cosmetics and in itself is a multi-billion dollar industry. Americans spent $40 billion last year in Weight Loss products, programs, and diet aids ( <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">[] <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">). Women world wide develop self esteem according to media and popular culture. The relationship between popular culture and people in society leads to the continuing purchase of these products.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 14.4pt; font-weight: normal; line-height: 200%;">__Popular Culture__ [[image:hollywood_diet_secrets.jpg width="291" height="235" align="right" caption="A company ties to market their product by advertising that their mints can help them lose weight"]] **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 120%;">__Cultural Studies__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> Cultural studies is an academic field of study that analyzes popular culture forms that are widely appealing to the public. Cultural studies investigates how cultures are shaped and looks to inform consumers on how to resist effects such as hegemony. (http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/cultural+studies). An example of this could be the popular belief in our culture of a woman’s ideal body type. Those studying cultural studies would criticize this belief and strive to reveal the truth behind this view, why our culture thinks this way and who is in charge of spreading this belief. Culture studies focuses to emphasize the capacities of the consumers to resist indoctrination and passive reception.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">__Cultural Capital__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Bourdieu along with one of his colleagues introduced the term cultural capital in order to better understand patterns of inequality such as educational inheritance. Cultural capital also helps to differentiate the ability of the children of educated parents to be judged as better students by their teachers in educational outcomes in French schools ([]). Bourdieu states that cultural capital can exist in three states. The three states are its embodied state, institutionalized state, and objectified state. In its embodied state, cultural capital consists of an implicit set of cognitive schemes of perception, appreciation and action relevant to the manner. Institutionalized cultural capital appears in the form that “distinctions that make a difference” which means that being able to separate capital is what makes the difference. Objectified state simply means ownership through objects.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">__Pierre Bourdieu __ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Peirre Bourdieu was a French sociologist that was born in 1930. He was known for being outspoken in his political views and pubic appearances. Bourdieu became the "intellectual reference" for movements opposed to neo-liberalism and globalization that developed in France and elsewhere during the 1990s ([]). Along with being a sociologist, he was also a writer. Bourdieu was best known for his book Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. In this book he argues that judgments of taste are related to social position. He combined both theory and facts in an attempt to solve difficulties such as how to understand the subject. While doing so, he also tried to solve the influences of both the social background and "free choice" on the individual. Bourdieu’s main theory’s were focused on power, practice, and field. According to Bourdieu, “ A field is constituted by the relational differences in position of social agents, and the boundaries of a field are demarcated by where its effects end” ([]).

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">__Antonio Gramsci__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> Antonio Gramsci (January 22, 1891 – April 27, 1937) was an Italian philosopher, writer, politician and political theorist.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> He was a founding member and once former leader of the Communist Party of Italy. Most of Gramsci's writing analyzes culture and political leadership. He is notable as a highly original thinker within the Marxist tradition. Gramsci is known for reasoning that his concept of cultural hegemony was a way to maintain the state in a capitalist society ([]). Antonio Gramsci defined cultural hegemony as a culturally-diverse society that can be ruled or dominated by one of its social classes. It is the dominance of one social group over another, for example, the ruling class over all other classes. The ideas of the ruling class come to be seen as the norm; they are seen as universal ideologies, perceived to benefit everyone while still only really benefiting the ruling class ([]).

__Hegemony__ Gramsci suggested that a society without conflict is not removed, but is maintained and managed. It is maintained to continue a ongoing process by the dominate group and classes. His introduction of hegemony in cultural studies produced a rethinking of the concept of pop culture. He studied hegemony, as leading to a situation in which interest of one powerful section of society of one "universalized," as the interests of society as a whole. As well, his theory of hegemony in a society with a subordinate groups and classes appear to be supportive of values, ideals, objectives, culture, and political meanings which incorporate them to the prevailing structures of power. //Inventing Popular Culture: From Folklore to Globalization,// John Storey.

Modernism was a cultural movement that took place in the mid 1800's to around 1980. During this time, the people were more independent in being <span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 20px;">se lf sufficient. If there was a problem, they view it to be resolvable. Problems were understandable and viewed as "we can fix it." For example there wasn't any plumbing, so people found solutions and alternative routes in continuing their daily lives and routines. During Modernism, religion has been viewed to rule the lives of the people. But later on, the rise of science took place and people wanted a quantifiable solution, an answer to religion. Modernism was a way of thinking about the world that is scientific, rational and advances in human progress and development. It seemed to have the "old" being replaced with the "new." People wanted to move forward, and in doing so, science was the alternative key in find solutions to their answers, for example, Charles Darwin and Karl Marx, the theory of Evolution and Freud, his studies of how the mind works and structured.
 * __ Modernism __**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) was an English naturalist who is most famous for his theory of evolution. The premise of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is a notion that all life is related and has descended from a common ancestor. Darwin's general theory presumes the development of life from non-life and emphasizes a purely naturalistic"descent with modification," meaning that complex creatures evolve from more simplistic ancestors naturally over time. Darwin's idea of "natural selection" says that as random genetic mutations occur within an organism's genetic code, the beneficial mutations are preserved, since they aid survival.These desired beneficial mutations are then passed on to the next generation. Over a period of time, the beneficial mutations collect and the result is an entirely different organism, not just a variation of the original, but an entirely different creature ([]).



Karl Marx (1818-1883) was a philosopher, social scientist, historian and revolutionary. Some argue that Marx is the most influential socialist thinker to emerge in the 19th century. Marxism is political philosophy as well as a sociological worldview based on a materialist's interpretation of history.Marxism also anaylizes capitalism, a theory ofsocial change, and gives an atheist view of human freedom.Marx believes that mankind's fountation is made of a struggle between social classes and the only way to overcome these obstacles, the working class must seize political international power through a social revolution.



__Post-Modernism__ The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy describes Post modernism as “a set of critical, strategic and rhetorical practices employing concepts such as difference, repetition, the trace, the simulacrum, and hyperreality to destabilize other concepts such as presence, identity, historical progress, epistemic certainty, and the univocity of meaning” ([]). In plainer terms, postmodernism is a movement beyond materialism, and past modernism. [|Fredric Jameson], a leading American theorist of the Postmodern, describes Postmodernism as the "dominant cultural logic of late capitalism." Postmodernism is a philosophical movement that gender or race focus’s on the uncommon such as race and sex. Postmodernism can include a celebration of otherness, such as, sexual or racial for example, “Girl power”. The “Girl Power” movement encouraged women to take a stand for their gender and made feminism more appealing. “Girl Power” targeted the young girl generation in attempt to help them take pride in their self-image and help them to gain confidence that they were equal to males.

__<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Jean Charlot __ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Jean Charlot was a French painter born in 1898 who was very active in Mexico. He took after his mother who was also a painter, who had many family members who lived in Mexico. In his later life he enjoyed teaching at the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center in Colorado. Jean Charlot painted many images of mother and child, and many times did not use many colors in his paintings. Along with painting and teaching, Jean Charlot also illustrated a few children’s books including “The Sun, the Moon, and the Rabbit” and “Tito’s Hats”. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">His works included many simpler images rather than complex and detailed. His painting, “Work and Rest” shows a woman’s role as both a mother and housekeeper/housewife.

__Irma Palacios__ Irma Palacios (born in 1943) is an artist from Iguala, Mexico. She is seen to be one of the best abstract expressionist painters in Mexico. Palacios work is influenced by the Spanish Informalism. She won the first prize of the Rufino Tamayo Painting Biennial. Palacios has had solo shows in various museums in Mexico as well as the United States. Palacios' art is abstract, which gives the idea that the interpretation is up to each individual viewer. Palacios' art features mostly earth tone colors, and most of her art does not feature images of people or specific objects. At our vist to the San Antonio Museum of Art, the docent explained to us the struggle of the push for Latin American artists to be known for abstract paintings rather than the typical folk art expected of artists from this area. There is still not much not information on Palacios perhaps because abstract artists from Latin America are still not widely known.

__Contemporary Poetry__ Contemporary poetry is defined as poetry recognized after 1920, especially that of Modernism, Postmodernism, and 21st century. In the 1930's the concepts of modernism were carried out mainly by a group of poets called the Objectivists. Most of the Objectivists came from urban communities of new immigrants and this new stream of experience and language enriched the growing American idiom ([]). Another source of enrichement came from African American poets such as Langston Hughes becoming more mainstream. Spoken word did not evolve until the late 1980s and early 1990s with the emergence of spoken word "duels" called poetry slams. In the United States, the competition of slam poetry most likely came to rise from rap music and rapper competitions. A show on HBO called Def Poets became the most visible source for slam-type protest poets for audience approval. In the early 80's, spoken word was accepted by college circles as a new wave of performing arts that was birthed during Porstmodern Art Movement. Spoken Word became a phrase to include anything that didn't already fall into an established category of performance arts. The Spoken Word movement that took place in the '80s is comparable to the Beats in the 1960’s. Spoken word and the Beats share a mutual lack of respect from the academic community, emphasis on poetry, and poems about consciousness and confession. The main difference is that spoken word is not recognized because it is not published. Many artists and poets have not published any of their works in book forms. Also spoken word is more about spreading all poetry of all diversities; not just about the white male community as was the Beats in the 1960’s ( []). Allen Ginsberg (3 June 1926-6 Apr. 1997) and his friends became the core of a group that named themselves the "Beat Generation" writers. The word "beat" referred loosely to the group's common sense of spiritual exhaustion and diffuse feelings of rebellion against what they experienced as the general conformity, hypocrisy, and materialsm of the larger society around them caught up in the unprecedented prosperity of postwar America. Ginsberg was the archetypal Beat Generation writer to countless poetry audiences and to the general public. Ginsberg remained a radical poet, the embodiment of the ideals of personal freedom, nonconformity, and the search for enlightenment ([]). Lauryn Hill discusses how the high class in society tries to keep the lower class from coming up in fear that they will loose their position in her song //Everything is Everything.// She also describes her self as being “more powerful than two Cleopatras. This is a powerful statement because society has made males out to be the ones in power and women play the role of a supporter and not the leader or the one in power. She states that even though she grew up in the ghetto she has managed to succeed even though society has tried to keep her down and motivates the “the ones who struggle in their youth” because they’re confused about why society is the way that it is.
 * __ Music __**