Though Neil Postman wrote Amusing Ourselves to Death in 1985 about television, a medium whose power has been diminished since the advent of the internet, like a great novel, its core ideas are still relevant. One of those ideas is that the more the l
When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know. But if you listen, you may learn something
Idea Transcript
Media Culture Cultural studies, identity and politics between the modern and the postmodern
Douglas Kellner
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Media Culture
Cultural studies, identity and politics between the modern and the postmodern
Douglas Kellner
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London and New York
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Contents
INTRODUCTION Media culture and society Cultural studies and social theory Acknowledgements
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Part I Theory/context/methods 1 THEORY WARS AND CULTURAL STUDIES Theory wars Approaches to cultural studies The Frankfurt School British cultural studies and its legacy A postmodern cultural studies? Notes 2 MEDIA CULTURE, POLITICS, AND IDEOLOGY: FROM REAGAN TO RAMBO Ideology and media culture: critical methods Rambo and Reagan Top Gun: Reaganite wet dream To the Gulf War! Notes 3 FOR A CULTURAL STUDIES THAT IS CRITICAL, MULTICULTURAL, AND MULTIPERSPECTIVAL For a critical multiculturalism Toward a multiperspectival cultural studies Toward a contextual cultural studies Ideology and utopia Hegemony, counterhegemony, and deconstruction Platoon: a diagnostic critique Notes
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20 27 28 31 43 49
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62 75 83 89 93
94 98 101 108 112 117 122
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Contents
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Part II Diagnostic critique and cultural studies 4 SOCIAL ANXIETY, CLASS, AND DISAFFECTED YOUTH Poltergeists, gender, and class in the Age of Reagan and Bush Diagnostic critique: from Poltergeist to Slackers and Beavis and Butt-Head Notes
125 125 138
5 BLACK VOICES FROM SPIKE LEE TO RAP The films of Spike Lee Rap and black radical discourse Resistance, counterhegemony, and everyday life Notes
157 157 17 4 188 192
6 READINGTHEGULFWAR: PRODUCTIONffEXT/RECEPTION Disinformation and the production of news The media propaganda war Warrior nation Some concluding reflections Notes
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199 210 214 223 226
Part III Media culture/identities/politics 7 TELEVISION, ADVERTISING, AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF POSTMODERN IDENTITIES Identity in postmodern theory Advertising images Situating the postmodern &~
231 233 247 255 ~
8 MADONNA, FASHION, AND IMAGE Fashion and identity The Madonna phenomenon Madonna between the modern and the postmodern Notes
263 264 266 285 292
9 MAPPING THE PRESENT FROM THE FUTURE: FROM BAUDRILLARD TO CYBERPUNK From Baudrillard to cyberpunk Neuromancer and the Baudrillardian vision Mapping the future; illuminating the present Literature, social theory, and politics Notes
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CONCLUSION: FROM THE FUTURE BACK TO THE PRESENT Critical media pedagogy Media and cultural activism
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Contents
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337 340 342 352
Media and cultural politics Notes References Index