Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Popular culture studies

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[edit] Popular culture studies

Although I added a picture, cleaned the formatting and added some external links, this is not a self nomination. Very good article with extensive references. For some reason it was in some cleanup category from September 2004! Diamonds in the rough, eh? TreveX^talk 00:19, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

• Object. I find the fair use claims on Image:Superman14.jpg and Image:HorrorFiction.jpg to be quite dubious, as neither is directly discussed in the article. --Carnildo 05:53, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

I disagree completely:

Umberto Eco's studies on Superman and James Bond (1988:211-256, 315-362) as myths of a static good-and-evil world view, should be mentioned as very early and lucid examples of a combination of semiotic and political analysis.

"Bad taste" products such as pornography and horror fiction, says for instance Andrew Ross (1989:231), draw their popular appeal precisely from their expressions of disrespect for the imposed lessons of educated taste. They are expressions of social resentment on the part of groups which have been subordinated and excluded by todays "civilized society".

Although these are not discussed at great length in the article, they are still important elements in and of themselves. As well as relating to particular discussions on "bad taste products" and constructed world-views, the pictures serve to illustrate that even components of "low culture" such as comic books and horror fiction are worthy of scholarly attention and discussion under the rubric of popular culture studies. This is a relatively recent development (Mukerji & Schudson 1991). I will adjust the fair use rationales to further emphasise this point. TreveX^talk 13:30, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, "Superman" and "horror fiction" are referred to briefly in the article. However, "Superman comic number 14" and "A Dark Night's Dreaming: Contemporary American Horror Fiction" are not directly discussed in the article. This second part is what's needed to meet the fair use requirement of "use for criticism, comment, or scholarship". --Carnildo 20:00, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

• Object. I find it strange that the article doesn't mention the words 'game', 'fantasy' or 'science fiction', 'sport', 'fan', 'fandom' or 'anime', which makes me doubt the article is comprehensive. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 05:58, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

This article is not about popular culture, it is about the theory of popular culture. The absence of these words does not suggest any holes in this article's coverage. An article on literary theory might discuss the major movements in such theory: phenomenology, hermeneutics, reception theory, structuralism, semiotics, post-structuralism etc. Likewise, this article is an overview of the discourse of popular culture studies.

To dismiss this article as uncomprehensive because it misses out these 'keywords' is rather like dismissing a literary theory article because it fails to mention Charles Dickens, or, for that matter, fantasy fiction. The point is that these articles discuss theory which can be applied to a broad range of output within those artistic/cultural fields. They may not mention each genre exhaustively but this does not mean that the theories discussed cannot be validly applied in different contexts than those mentioned in the articles.

The words 'anime' and 'fandom' are never mentioned once in the 512-page tome Rethinking Popular Culture: Contemporary Perspectives in Cultural Studies, which would appear to be a pretty standard work on the subject.

'Science fiction' is mentioned twice (pgs 6, 238), once in the context of new theoretical approaches to the study of culture no longer excluding topics such as romance novels, science fiction, TV soap operas etc, and once in relation to the production and distribution of cultural items, specifically that coverage in book review columns is more important to the success of literary novels than to detective or science fiction. This article deals with the former using other examples and the latter (appearing in an essay entitled Processing fads and fashions) is probably out of the scope of an encyclopedia article. Sport is covered in an essay entitled Sport and social class. It is not, however, mentioned anywhere else in the book, including the instroduction, which would suggest that a discussion of sport is not an essential prerequisite for a discussion of popular culture studies.

Anyway, Google Print has stopped working for some reason but I think you get my point. TreveX^talk 09:42, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for the explanation, I feel better about this article seeing that you seem to know a few things about the subject. I am withdrawing my objection, but I am not supporting. Yes, the article is probably fairly comprehensive and similar or better to Britannica/Encarta standard - but I think we can do better then that. Wiki is not paper and we should be able to give a comprehensive review even of the 'fringe' aspects of the popular culture. Google Scholar search on "popular culture studies"+1)"anime"=8 2) game=67 3) fandom=18 4) fantasy=71 5) science-fiction=36 6) sport=36 7) fan= 61. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 13:33, 26 September 2005 (UTC)