I thought today’s reading was very interesting. One thing that caught my attention was the first few paragraphs. They described how when people typically think of the word “culture” they think of “high culture (411).” It then goes on to explain that “cultural critics want to make the term refer to popular, folk, urban, and mass (mass-produced, -disseminated, -mediated, and –consumed) culture, as well as to that culture we associate with the so-called classics (411).”
The next paragraph states that “Raymond Williams […] suggested that ‘art and culture are ordinary’; he did so not to ‘pull art down’ but rather to point out that there is ‘creativity in all our living… We create our human worlds as we have thought of art being created’ (Revolution 37).” This part basically means to me that culture depends on how you look at things; at how you perceive things in life. Someone who grew up in the slums could have a completely different perception on a certain book than someone who was born with a silver spoon in their mouth. These two completely different people, however, must come together to exchange what they think about that book and figure out what the author was really trying to say, and not put their own spin onto things. This is what cultural critics have to do. “They seek to understand the social contexts in which a given text was written, and under what condition it was—and is—produced, disseminated, read, and used (412).” Yes, cultural critics like reading and writing and learning about topics they’re interested in, but at the same time, they force themselves to critique other people’s ideas and works that aren’t interested in the same things that they are. Think about it. Wouldn’t you get bored looking at the same type of stuff all day, every day? I know I would.
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