SOCI220

Course Summary

Description

Course Description: This course is a contemporary study of popular culture in America – its development and characteristics, its role in shaping our individual lives and key social institutions; and its broad effects on our globalizing world. The course is designed around the interdisciplinary nature of cultural studies, and students will learn how to use key concepts and theories to examine popular culture from a number of different fields including Sociology, Anthropology, Communications, History, Cultural Studies, English, Women’s Studies, Ethnic Studies, and American Studies. Students will develop the skills to analyze the reciprocal relationship between culture and key stratification factors such as gender, race, ethnicity, class, age, region and sexuality. The course will cover many facets of popular culture from all forms of media, to sports, fashion, and the influence of technology. Students will learn to situate popular culture within its social, historical, political, and economic contexts and their personal lives.

Course Scope:

The student will develop an ability to use sociological concepts, theory, and research to think critically and act intelligently in interactions with (and observations of) individuals, groups, institutions, and societies.

Objectives

Students completing this course will:

CO1: Compare and contrast culture, popular, high culture, elite culture, mass culture, low culture, subculture and counterculture.

CO2: Describe examples of the different types of norms operative in popular culture, and how these are related to the process of social control.

CO3: Identify the research methods used to create knowledge about popular culture. CO4: Apply key cultural theories and analytical dimensions for examining popular culture.

CO5: Explain how various elements of popular culture inform or reflect our attitudes, behavior, and society and why the popular culture becomes popular.

CO6: Illustrate diversity in popular culture and concepts of multiculturalism, ethnocentrism, and cultural relativism with reference to key stratifying factors such as gender, race, ethnicity, class, age, region and sexuality.

CO7: Analyze culture within individual, social, historical, political, economic, and global contexts.

CO8: Describe the cultural and social significance of popular culture in shaping the larger contemporary American society.

CO9: Examine the roles of print media, art, music, radio, television, motion picture, the Internet, sports, fashion, and technology in the development of American popular culture.

Outline

Week 1: What is Popular Culture?

Course Objective(s) 1, 2, 8, 9

Reading(s) Syllabus

Week 1 Lesson

Billboard.com. (2014). The Hot 100. Retrieved from http://www.billboard.com/charts/hot-100 Grindstaff, L. (2008). Culture and Popular Culture: A Case for Sociology.

Holton, R. (2000). Globalization’s Cultural Consequences. Queendom.com. (2014). Olympics challenge.

Rotten Tomatoes. (2017). Retrieved from http://www.rottentomatoes.com/

Snopes.com. (2014). 25 Hottest Urban Legends. Retrieved from http://www.snopes.com/info/top25uls.asp Assignment(s)

Introduction Forum Week 1 Forum

Week 2: Popular Culture and Functionalism; Gender and Sexuality

Course Objective(s) 1-7

Reading(s) Week 2 Lesson

CULTSTUD-L: A listserve devoted to Cultural Studies. (n.d.) Retrieved from http://comm.umn.edu/~grodman/cultstud/

Open Humanities Press. (n.d.). Culture Machine. Retrieved from http://www.culturemachine.net/index.php/cm

Critical theory:

Benzecry, C. and Collins, R. (2014). The high of cultural experience: Toward a microsociology of cultural consumption.

Gartman, D. (2012). Bourdieu and Adorno: Converging theories of culture and inequality.

Hatherley, O. (2011, May 27). Marx at the Movies. The Guardian. Retrieved from Marxists.org. (n.d.). Marxists Internet Archive. Retrieved from http://www.marxists.org/subject/art/music/

Marxists.org. (n.d.). The Art of Marxism. Retrieved from http://www.marxists.org/subject/art/

Schweber, H. (2008, November 29). Was Marx Right? The Bailout and the Auto Industry. Huffington Post.

Retrieved from

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/howard-schweber/was-marx-right-the-bailou_b_147114.html

Symbolic Interactionism:

American Sociological Association. (n.d.). Charles Horton Cooley. Retrieved from http://www.asanet.org/about-asa/asa-story/asa-history/past-asa-officers/past-asa-presidents/charles-h- cooley

Audiopedia. (2016, January 6). The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udT6Qq4BuCE

BBC Radio 4. (2015, April 15). Erivng Goffman and the Performed Self [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z0XS-QLDWM

Bughin, J., Doogan, J, and Vetvik, O.J. (2010, April). A new way to measure word-of-mouth marketing. McKinsey Quarterly. Retrieved from http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/marketing-and-sales/our- insights/a-new-way-to-measure-word-of-mouth-marketing

Irwin, K. (2001). Legitimating the first tattoo: Moral passage through informal interaction.

Ter Bogt, T.F.M., Delsing, M.J.M.H., van Zalk, M., Christenson, P.G., and Meeus, W.H.T. (2011). Intergenerational continuity of taste: Parental and adolescent music preferences.

Symbolic interactionism/ functionalism:

Wollscheger, J. (2012). Interaction ritual chains and religious participation. Assignment(s)

Week 2 Forum

Week 3: Popular Culture and Critical Theory; Race and Racism

Course Objective(s) 2, 5, 7, 8, 9

Reading(s) Week 3 Lesson

Anderson, K. (2012, January). You say you want a devolution? The Vanity Fair Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.vanityfair.com/style/2012/01/prisoners-of-style-201201

BBC. (2013, November 30). It’s a Mall World . Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01m3676

Esri, N.G. (2014, November 25). The Death and the Rebirth of the American Mall. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/death-and-rebirth-american-mall-180953444/? no-ist

Freepress. (2014). Who owns the media?. Retrieved from http://www.freepress.net/ownership/chart

Peterson, R.A. (1990). Why 1955? Explaining the advent of rock music.

Salomon R. Guggenheim Museum. (n.d.) The Art of the Motorcycle: Introduction. Retrieved from http://pastexhibitions.guggenheim.org/motorcycle/

Sanneh, K. (2013, December 2). Blockbuster: Who needs Hits? The NewYorker. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/12/02/blockbluster

TED Talks. (July 2009). Shereen El Feki: Pop culture in the Arab world [Video file]. Available from https://www.ted.com/talks/shereen_el_feki_pop_culture_in_the_arab_world

U.S. Copyright Office. (2016). Copyright Law of the United States. Retrieved from http://www.copyright.gov/title17/

Assignment(s) Week 3 Forum

Week 4: Popular Culture and Symbolic Interactionism

Course Objective(s) 4, 5, 6, 7

Reading(s) Week 4 Lesson

Barnett, L.A. & Allen, M.P. (2000). Social Class, Cultural Repertoires, and Popular Culture: The Case of Film.

CulturalPolitics.net. (1997-2016). Class in Pop Culture. Retrieved from http://culturalpolitics.net/popular_culture/class

DeAngelis, T. (February 2015). Class Differences. American Psychological Association Monitor, 46, 2, p.

62. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/monitor/2015/02/class-differences.aspx

Peterson, R.A. and Kern, R.M. (1996). Changing highbrow taste: From snob to omnivore. American Sociological Review, 61(5), 900-907.

Wessler, S.F. (2015, March 18). Class in America: Identities Blur as Economy Changes . NBC News. Retrieved from

Assignment(s) Week 4 Forum

Assignment 1: Movie Review

Week 5: The Manufacturing of Popular Culture

Course Objective(s) 5, 6, 7

Reading(s) Week 5 Lesson

BuzzFeedYellow. (2014, March 15). If women’s ads in were played by men [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SrpARP_M0o

ChallengingMedia. (2010, March 12). Killing us softly 4: Advertising image of women (trailer), Retrieved from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTlmho_RovY

ChallengingMedia. (2006, October 4). Mickey Mouse Monopoly: Disney, Childhood & Corporate Power [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byaMd_PNyIY

Duke University: Nasher Museum of Art. (2013). Exposing the gaze: gender and sexuality in art. Retrieved from http://nasher.duke.edu/exhibitions/exposing-the-gaze/

Crane, D. (1999). Gender and Hegemony in Fashion Magazines: Women’s Interpretations of Fashion Photographs. The Sociological Quarterly, 40(4), 541-563. http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login? url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/744016620?pq-origsite=summon&accountid=8289

Emerson, R.A. (2002). “Where My Girls At?”: Negotiating Black Womanhood in Music Videos. Gender and Society, 16(1), 115-135. http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login? url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0891243202016001007

Imelme. (2010, July 1). Bust a Rhyme, Demean and Define: The Portrayal of Women in Rap Music Videos. [Video file]. Retrieved fromhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtOqni9rPFY

Jarmakani, A. (2010). “The Sheik Who Loved Me”: Romancing the War on Terror. Signs, 35(4), 993- 1017.http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login?url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/651044

PBS online. (2001, October 30). My life as an Intersexual by Max Beck. NOVA. Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/intersexual-life.html

Schmutz, V. and Faupel, Al. (2010). Gender and cultural consecration in popular music. Social Forces, 89(2), 685-707.http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login?url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/40984552

Smith, S.L., Choueiti, M., Prescott, A., Pieper, K. (2012). Gender roles and occupations: A look at character attributes and job-related aspirations in film and television (Key findings). Gena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. Retrieved from http://seejane.org/research-informs-empowers/http://seejane.org/research-informs- empowers/

TEDx Talks. (2012, December 4). Anita Sarkeesian at TEDxWomen 2012 [Video file]. YouTube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZAxwsg9J9Q

White, T.R. (2013). Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott and Nicki Minaj: Fashionistin’ Black female sexuality in hip- hop culture—girl power or overpowered? Journal of Black Studies, 44(6), 607- 626.http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login?url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0021934713497365

Women’s Sports Foundation. (2011). History. Retrieved from http://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/en/home/about-us/foundation-history

Assignment(s) Week 5 Forum

Week 6: Cultural Consumption, Social Class, and Quest for Meaning

Course Objective(s) 2, 5, 6, 8

Reading(s)

Week 6 Lesson

Beltrán, M.C. (2005). The New Hollywood Racelessness: Only the Fast, Furious, (And Multiracial) Will Survive. Cinema Journal, 44(2), 50-67. http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login?url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/3661094

CNN. (2013, June 12). World sport: Racism in football. CNN International. Retrieved from http://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/12/football/gallery/football-racism-documentary-balotelli/

Complex Media, Inc. (2012, September 12). A history of racism in fashion. Complex Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.complex.com/style/2012/09/a-history-of-racism-in-fashion/

Complex Media, Inc. (2013, June 3). The 50 most racist tv shows of all time. Complex Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/06/most-racist-tv-shows/

Jenkins, T.S. (2011). A beautiful mind: Black male intellectual identity and hip-hop culture. Journal of Black Studies, 42(8), 1231-1251.http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login? url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0021934711405050

Martinez, T. A. (1997). Popular culture as oppositional culture: Rap as Resistance. Sociological Perspectives, 40(2), 265-286.

Mueller, J.C., Dirks, D., and Houts Picca, L. (2007). Unmasking Racism: Halloween costuming and engagement of the racial Other. Qualitative Sociology, 30, 315-335.

http://ezproxy.apus.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/758697249?pq- origsite=summon&accountid=8289

PBS online. (n.d.). Human Diversity: Howdifferent are we? Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/race/004_HumanDiversity/004_00-home.htm

PBS online. (n.d.). Sorting people: Can you tell somebody’s race by looking at them? (activity). Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/race/002_SortingPeople/002_00-home.html

Venus over Manhattan. (2014). Gang Bust and William Copley and BFBC, Inc. April 11–June 27, 2013. Retrieved from http://venusovermanhattan.com/exhibition/cply-gang-bust

Assignment(s) Week 6 Forum

Week 7: The Mall Culture

Course Objective(s) 2, 6, 7, 8, 9

Reading(s) Week 7 Lesson

CulturalPolitics.net. (1997-2016). Retrieved from from http://culturalpolitics.net/about

Keegan, J. (2016, May 18). Blue Feed, Red Feed: See Liberal Facebook and Conservative Facebook, side by side. Retrieved from http://graphics.wsj.com/blue-feed-red-feed/

Manjoo, F. (2016, November 2). How the Internet is loosening our grip on the truth. The NewYork Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/03/technology/how-the-internet-is-loosening-our-grip-on- the-truth.html?_r=0

The Pew Research Center. (2012, September 27). Trends in News Consumption: 1991-2012. In changing news landscape, even television is vulnerable. Retrieved from http://www.people-press.org/2012/09/27/in- changing-news-landscape-even-television-is-vulnerable/

Warren, J. (2011, November 12). Liberal or Conservative, the Problem of Ignorance. The NewYork Times.

Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/us/liberal-or-conservative-the-problem-is-ignorance.html Assignment(s)

Week 7 Forum

Assignment 2: Music Analysis

Week 8: Digital Technology and our Everyday Lives

Course Objective(s) 2, 5, 7, 8, 9

Reading(s) Week 8 Lesson

Bogost, I. (2017, February 23). Why nothing works anymore. The Atlantic. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/02/the-singularity-in-the-toilet-stall/517551/

CulturalPolitics.net. (1997-2016). Digital Cultures – Digital Diversity. Retrieved from from http://culturalpolitics.net/digital_cultures

Lenhart, A. (2015, August 6). Teens, Technology, and Friendships. PewResearch Center. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/08/06/teens-technology-and-friendships/

Murphy, K. (2015, August 8). What selfie sticks really tell us about ourselves. The NewYork Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/sunday-review/what-selfie-sticks-really-tell-us-about- ourselves.html

Oppenheimer, M. (2014, January 17). Technology is not driving us apart after all. The NewYork Times Magazine. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/19/magazine/technology-is-not-driving-us- apart-after-all.html

Radesky, J.S. Kistin, C.J., Zuckerman, B., Nitzberg, K., Gross, J. Kaplan-Sanoff, M. Augustyn, M, and Silverstein, M. (2014). Patterns of mobile device use by caregivers and children during meals in fast food restaurants. Pediatrics, 133(4). Retrieved from www.pediatrics.org/cgi/doi/10.1542/peds.2013-3703

Assignment(s) Week 8 Forum

Evaluation

Forums:

Participation in classroom dialogue on threaded Forums is required. Forums are scheduled weekly and found in the Forums tab in the classroom. Specific instructions and the grading rubric are located on each Forum.

Assignments

This course includes three Assignments. Instructions and specific grading rubrics are found under the Assignments tab in our classroom.

Grading:

Name	Grade %
Forums	40.00 %
Week 1 Introduction	2.35 %
Week 1 Forum	4.71 %
Week 2 Forum	4.71 %
Week 3 Forum	4.71 %
Week 4 Forum	4.71 %
Week 5 Forum	4.71 %
Week 6 Forum	4.71 %
Week 7 Forum	4.71 %
Week 8 Forum	4.71 %
Assignments	60.00 %

Assignment 1: Movie Review                20.00 %

Assignment 2: Music Analysis               20.00 %

Assignment 3: Annotated Bibliography 20.00 %

Materials

Book Title: Mix It Up: Popular Culture, Mass Media, and Society – the VitalSource e-book is provided via the APUS Bookstore

Author: Grazian

Publication Info: W.W. Norton

ISBN: 9780393929522

Book Title: You must validate your cart to get access to your VitalSource e-book(s). If needed, instructions are available here – http://apus.libguides.com/bookstore/undergraduate

Author: N/A Publication Info: N/A ISBN: N/A

Course Guidelines

Citation and Reference Style

Students will follow APA format as the sole citation and reference style used in written assignments submitted.

Please note that no formal citation style is graded on Forums in the School of Arts & Humanities.

Tutoring

Tutor.com offers online homework help and learning resources by connecting students to certified tutors for one-on-one help. AMU and APU students are eligible for 10 free hours of tutoring provided by APUS. Tutors are available 24/7 unless otherwise noted. Tutor.com also has a SkillCenter Resource Library offering educational resources, worksheets, videos, websites and career help. Accessing these resources does not count against tutoring hours and is also available 24/7. Please visit the APUS Library and search for ‘Tutor’ to create an account.

Late Assignments

School of Arts & Humanities Late Policy

Students are expected to submit classroom assignments by the posted due date and to complete the course according to the published class schedule. As adults, students, and working professionals, I understand you must manage competing demands on your time. Should you need additional time to complete an assignment, please contact me before the due date so we can discuss the situation and determine an acceptable resolution.

Work posted or submitted after the assignment due date will be reduced by 10% of the potential total score possible for each day late up to a total of five days, including forum posts/replies, quizzes, and assignments. Beginning on the sixth day late through the end of the course, late work, including forum posts/replies, quizzes, and assignments, will be accepted with a grade reduction of 50% of the potential total score earned.

Turn It In

Assignments are automatically submitted to Turnitin.com within the course. Turnitin.com will analyze an assignment submission and report a similarity score. Your assignment submission is automatically processed through the assignments area of the course when you submit your work.

Academic Dishonesty

Academic Dishonesty incorporates more than plagiarism, which is using the work of others without citation. Academic dishonesty includes any use of content purchased or retrieved from web services such as CourseHero.com or Scribd. Additionally, allowing your work to be placed on such web services is academic dishonesty, as it is enabling the dishonesty of others. The copy and pasting of content from any web page, without citation as a direct quote, is academic dishonesty. When in doubt, do not copy/paste, and always cite.

University Policies

Student Handbook

Drop/Withdrawal policy Extension Requests Academic Probation Appeals

Disability Accommodations

The mission of American Public University System is to provide high quality higher education with emphasis on educating the nation’s military and public service communities by offering respected, relevant, accessible, affordable, and student-focused online programs that prepare students for service and leadership in a diverse, global society.