did a presentation on Douglas Kellner's book, Media Culture. focus on what is called - by Cultural Studies writers, at least - "the Text": any creation that can be watched, read, listened to, or otherwise consumed in a cultural (rather than nutritive) way. movies, sitcoms, the news, fashion magazines, videogames, hip hop, action figures, and cappuccinos* are all Texts.
- The Text: Kellner's Multiperspectival Reading (presentation slides)
Texts are things with legible cultural content, which can be "read" for intentional as well as ideological messages. there is always context. everything created was created by somebody, and their understandings of culture can be expressed - and everything consumed is consumed by somebody, and their understandings of culture can also be expressed. example: the song "Dixie" was, it turns out, quite possibly written by the Snowden family, popular Free Black performers in Ohio, during the Civil War era. they never intended the song to promote Thurmondesque segregation. but it certainly carries that message now: "opponents of integration and black rights would sing 'Dixie' as a kind of counter-song asserting white privilege and white supremacy" (University of Missouri historian Charles Reagan Wilson).
* cappuccino is consumed in two ways - people drink it for the taste and chemical content, but also for what cappuccino is in terms of culture. that would be sophistication, affluence, even a political philosophy. and the venison jerky my uncle makes has entirely different politics. few foods are culturally empty (but many foods are nutritionally empty). cultural studies is largely about learning to read the Text of our world.
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