Today’s podcast focused on leadership and pop culture, specifically how the two are interconnected. Culture is technically separated into two brackets: high and low. High culture is what we consider intellectual–art, the symphony, poetry. Low culture is considered popular culture, like the music we currently listen to (hip hop, pop) and the movies we watch. Regardless, of the terminology all high culture was once low culture, as told in the podcast–Shakespeare, in his time, was considered a vulgar playwright, who presented his work to the masses. Today, Shakespeare is grouped as a member of high culture as an astounding playwright, but in his era he embodied the day’s pop culture. In essence, all pop culture is a form of storytelling which is at the core of leadership. Robin Hood, a caricature of the Middle Ages prompted real change and uproar within his community, inspiring workers to revolt against their landlords due to their awful living conditions and wages. Robin Hood embodies the power pop culture can have on a community. Presently, much of pop culture is not so much found in books, but rather in movies. Because movies are such an integral aspect of our society, they work to normalize behavior, making representation along gender and racial lines extremely important. For example, Black Panther has the highest gross of a single hero movie in Marvel, garnering huge success around the country and inspiring social movements. “Wakanda Forever” became a regular chant seen at Black Lives Matter marches, illustrating the vast effects a movie can have on a population. Pop culture is at the essence of our everyday behavior; therefore, we must focus on a culture that represents and listens to all members of society.
Critical Thinking
I agree with your point that we need to as a society focus and try to create a culture that represents all of us and listens to all its diverse members. I think it’s interesting to discuss that books/plays/writing is where our “high culture” is considered to be today, but in the time of when Robin Hood was written and Shakespeares plays, many of this writing and plays were considered “low culture”. It makes me wonder if our popular or “low” culture today, like you said found mostly in movies, will one day in the future be considered “high culture”, or how the idea of high culture will change/evolve with time.
I think it is so interesting that high culture is culture that was once considered low. It goes to show how important “common” people are in setting trends that will eventually be picked up by the upper classes as their own.
I think it will be interesting to see what becomes high culture later on, even in the next 40+ years. Everything we hold in high regards, like Shakespeare, was once not very important. I think it is also interesting to hear about why something like Shakespeare was once low culture but still was relevant to the time it was written in. Pop culture defines our world and you can tell so much about what is going on in a time period just by seeing what was popular.
Looking at Black Panther, it is interesting to look at how diversity interplays with the media,. Representation is important because we look at the media, and it is this viewing that both creates and cements stereotypes that we hold about ourselves and other people. Thus, diversity in media is important to create a representation of different groups and to break the stereotypes of people that we may implicity hold.