You are here: Reports » Phase 1: media » Methods » Cultural studies

Cultural studies

Although cultural studies is itself racked by opposing viewpoints and lacks an agreed principle of approach, the subject can provide stimulating insights into the way in which specific discourses are formed about the past through the media. cultural studies can situate 'media memories' into a wider societal context as it provides an, 'expanding space for sustained, rigorous and self-reflexive empirical research into the power-laden complexity of contemporary culture' (Couldry 2000: 1). cultural studies emerged in Britain in the 1950s and 1960s, with the influential Centre for Contemporary cultural studies in Birmingham founded in 1964. Much of the work which has emerged from the field has applied theoretical principles to aspects of everyday life. Though the subject has been open to all stances on theory it has been principally driven by three major areas of range of Marxism, semiotics, and feminism. cultural studies is perhaps best not described as a 'discipline' per se, rather, 'an area where different disciplines intersect in the study of the cultural aspects of society' (Hall 1980: 7). The area of cultural studies in Britain is best associated with the work of four individuals; Hoggart, Williams, E.P. Thompson and Hall. It is the work of these four individuals who have provided the basis of enquiry for cultural studies (Storey 1997: 45). These individuals, writing from the 1950s on, reacted to what they viewed as a fundamentally limiting, conservative and elitist sense of 'culture', which was dominant in Britain.

The notable literary critic, F.R. Leavis, had conceived 'culture' as being in the hands of a selected few, 'in their keeping...is the language the changing idiom upon which fine living depends and without which distinction of spirit is thwarted and incoherent (Leavis 1972: 145). With the advent of mass production and the industrialisation of the preceding centuries, Leavis warned of a sharp decline in culture, 'the finer values are ceasing to be a matter of even conventional concern for any except the minority (Leavis 1975: 213). cultural studies began with a democratic critique of this elitist perspective to culture, recognising the fundamental importance of 'popular culture' (Couldry 2000: 2-3). This can be seen in the early work by Hoggart (1992) who assessed working class entertainment during the 1950s. Hoggart underlined the ability of this group not to be subsumed by the introduction of American mass entertainment during the 1950s, but to adapt it to their own tastes; 'this is not simply a power of passive resistance, but something which, though not articulate, is positive' (Hoggart 1963: 24). This sentiment is echoed in Thompson's (1968: 10) classic work, The Making of the English Working Classes (1968); 'class is defined by men as they live their own history, and in the end this is its only definition.' Though Hoggart and Thompson contributed to the formation of cultural studies it is the work of Williams and Hall which has proven to be the most influential in the field. Williams (1965: 63) did much to characterise the objectives of the subject; 'the theory of culture is the study of relationships between elements in a whole way of life. The analysis of culture is the attempt to discover the nature of the organisation which is the complex of these relationships.' Williams suggestion that the analysis of culture should be based upon the investigation of the underlying structure was informed by his Marxist politics. Contemporary cultural studies has also been dominated by the work of Hall (1980) who has continued with a broadly Marxist approach, but importantly has stressed the need to work with and incorporate the theories and societal changes associated with movements of globalisation and postmodernism.

cultural studies itself has benefited from the dominance of Marxist orientated scholars and outside influences. cultural studies Marxist influence has been emphasised with the high regard given to the work of Horkheimer and Adorno (1979: 154-158), and their analysis of the, 'culture industry', which was thought to be a method of control and exploitation of the masses. These notions of power, control, domination, exploitation and potential resistance have been used to study aspects of ethnicity, gender, class and nationality within societies. In terms of pushing the subject further and advancing its aims, the work of feminist scholars has been one of the significant driving forces within cultural studies (Grosz 1995). McClintock (1995) has been at the forefront of this movement in her work which reveals the discourses which have emerged through British culture since the nineteenth century and which have governed and controlled notions of ethnicity and gender. The way in which cultural studies has transformed the analysis of the representation of ethnicity within society has also been highly significant. Studies have highlighted how ethnicity is constructed by 'the self', and by, 'the other', as a means of empowerment, recognition or the denial of representation of another (Baker et al 1996: Hall 1991; 1999). Paul Gilroy (1987; 1993) has been an important figure in this respect, critiquing the European myopia of cultural studies and forcing a consideration of the way in which national cultures practice exclusion of groups at a subtle level through culture.

The basis of these studies is formed from the writings of Foucault and Gramsci, with the latter particularly influential through his work concerning the nature of hegemony. Indeed, Gramscian thought has dominated cultural studies and provides a valuable theoretical tool for the analysis of underlying trends within a cultural system (Hall1980: 35). Gramsci (1971: 181-182) described how ideologies and viewpoints come into confrontation and conflict until one of a variety tended to prevail and thus propagate itself through society; 'bringing about not only a unison of economic and political aims, but also intellectual and moral unity posing all the questions around which the struggle rages...thus creating the hegemony of a fundamental group over a series of subordinate groups (Gramsci 1971: 181-182). Gramsci used hegemony to counteract notions of incorporation, stressing that hegemony did not entail the disappearance or destruction of difference, but ensures the articulation of difference. The study of culture therefore is one of the arenas where action and agency regarding the powerful is witnessed. It is a site of contestation and it is itself the spoils of that contest. Importantly, the incorporation of hegemony allowed cultural studies to think of societies as complex formations, necessarily contradictory and always historically specific (Hall 1980: 36).

cultural studies assesses a great range of material from contemporary society, texts, the mass media, entertainment, 'high culture', aspects of material culture as well as the political, social and economic institutions of society (Storey 1997: 8). This broad perspective was reiterated by Williams (1981: 64-65) as he described cultural studies as, 'the analysis of all forms of signification...within the actual means and conditions of their production.' What is important within cultural studies is the recognition of the conflicts and diversity inherent within different forms of representation in society. It is this which provides the necessary grounding of theory to examine 'media memories', as it is assumed that the culture of a society, and therefore its traditions and memories will correspond to a contemporary system of interests and values, as culture is not an absolute body of work, but a continual selection and reinterpretation (after Williams 1963, 308).

Bibliography

Methods | back to the top