Hum Exam Guide PDF

**What is high Culture?** High Culture is culture with a capital C. It is all about refinement and a culture of elites. Culture was a state of refinement, of detaching oneself from the daily struggle to survive & creating, or appreciating the products of refined, artistic & cultural labour. Only av...

**What is high Culture?** High Culture is culture with a capital C. It is all about refinement and a culture of elites. Culture was a state of refinement, of detaching oneself from the daily struggle to survive & creating, or appreciating the products of refined, artistic & cultural labour. Only available to aristocrats and not common folk. elite culture often appears 'natural' - Art - Museums - Orchestras & Oprah's **Why is Culture Ordinary?** it is the product of our everyday life "Culture is ordinary....Every human society has its own shape, its own purposes, its own meanings. Every human society expresses these, in institutions, and in arts and learning. The making of society is the finding of common meanings and directions." (Williams). **What does Raymond Williams believe culture is?** It is not the property of the elites or the intellectuals It is practiced and lived everywhere lived culture as anthropologists would say but also culture is all forms of signification -- ways we produce meaning i.e. novels, films, theatre, art, TV, digital & online production democratization of culture **How can Culture be political?** culture is 'democratized' albeit still reflecting relations of power in society and used to establish social distinction & hierarchies What is folk culture? created by ordinary people, emerging spontaneously within communities in preindustrial societies. It was common & produced no great artistic works but was created from below & reflected the needs of communities & so was authentic **Definitions and examples from Pericles\'s Funeral Oration to modern interpretations.** **Our vs. Their Way of Life: Cultural racism, bordering, and exclusion (e.g., Jacques Chirac\'s \"noise and smell\" speech).** Culture is not just about technical progress, like creating more complex music, but also a way to promote or hinder social freedom. *The Rite of Spring* (1913) was not only musically radical but also reflected social regression, where individual expression was dominated by the collective. Popular culture, while providing pleasure, also trains people to adopt limiting patterns of thought and self-understanding, hindering true freedom, partly through its predictability. The erosion of high culture is seen in shifts like theatre into cinema and literature into mass-produced novels, leading to alienation and manipulation of the audience. **Reflect on how subcultures contribute to cultural diversity and resistance.** Subcultures enrich cultural diversity by offering alternative identities, values, and practices that challenge mainstream norms. They act as forms of resistance, amplifying marginalized voices and fostering innovation in art, fashion, and ideology, while critiquing societal structures. **Heritage** the legacy of cultural, natural, or historical elements passed down through generations. It includes tangible & intangible assets such as monuments, buildings, artworks, folklore &customs. It reflects what a society or culture values & chooses to preserve for the future. often formally recognized (e.g. UNESCO World Heritage sites) & includes material culture, language, rituals, & social practices. **Tradition:** refers to practices, beliefs, customs, or rituals handed down from one generation to another within a community or group. These are often performed or celebrated informally at specific times or events, providing continuity & a sense of identity. Traditions are primarily behavioural, in contrast to heritage, which can include objects or sites. **Tangible** are physical, material elements that can be seen, touched, or measured, such as art, clothing, architecture, food, tools, and technology. These are the outward expressions of a culture\'s values and practices. **behavioural aspects of culture** are the actions, norms, and practices of individuals and groups that reflect shared values and beliefs. Examples include communication styles, social roles, traditions, rituals, and etiquette. These are intangible but observable in how people interact and live. **What does modernity do?** produces a past that is "endangered" and needs to be "preserved" (See Marshall Berman). Modernity has produced terms such as tradition and heritage **Collective memory:** The shared narrative a culture has one their past that is constructed through narratives symbols and rituals, All historical narratives are inevitably skewed & should be read with a certain degree of skepticism. **Think how societies choose what to preserve or commemorate.** Societies choose what to preserve or commemorate based on shared values, power dynamics, and the narratives they wish to uphold. Decisions often reflect the interests of dominant groups, prioritizing events, figures, or traditions that reinforce collective identity, pride, or legitimacy. Historical significance, cultural relevance, and emotional resonance also influence these choices. However, what is preserved may exclude marginalized perspectives, highlighting the role of power in shaping collective memory. **Think about the social construction of historical narratives.** The social construction of historical narratives refers to how societies create and shape stories about the past based on current values, beliefs, and power structures. These narratives are not objective accounts but are influenced by who records history, which events are highlighted or omitted, and how the past is interpreted to serve present-day goals. This process often reinforces collective identity, justifies political agendas, or validates cultural norms, while potentially marginalizing alternative perspectives or inconvenient truths. **Imagined Communities: what does this mean?** As described by Benedict Anderson, is a socially constructed concept where members of a nation perceive themselves as part of a collective identity, despite never meeting most of their fellow citizens. It is both imagined and real imagined because it relies on shared symbols, narratives, and traditions to create a sense of unity, and real because people deeply believe in and act on this identity, even to the extent of killing or dying for it. **Race as a Social Construct: Biological myths vs. real implications.** race has no biological, genetic or scientific basis, yet racial identity is very real · it is implicated in establishing & justifying systems of power, privilege, & oppression. **individual racism** beliefs, attitudes, actions of individuals that support or perpetuate racism in conscious & unconscious ways. e.g. believing in the superiority of a certain group, not hiring someone because of racial identity issues **interpersonal racism** public expressions of racism. e.g. slurs, hateful words/actions, exclusion **institutional racism** policies & practices that give unfair advantages to certain groups. e.g.: A system where students of colour are more frequently distributed into underfunded schools **structural racism** overarching system of racial bias across institutions & society privileging some people & resulting in disadvantages for others. e.g. Stereotypes of people of colour as criminals in mainstream **Gender and Culture: Binary systems, fixed roles, and intersectionality.** The social construction of gender involves culturally imposed roles and expectations, such as fixed gender roles seen in motherhood, Barbie, Disney princesses, and characters like Merida from *Brave*. It reinforces a binary system of gender and sexuality, influences rights and legislation regarding ownership and inheritance, shapes workplace roles (e.g., women as CEOs or in the military), and perpetuates stereotypes about masculinity and femininity. **Think how nations are socially constructed.** Race, gender, and sexuality intersect with cultural and national identities through social constructs that define inclusion and exclusion. Racism, sexism, and heteronormativity shape who is valued in society and influence laws, roles, and representation. These intersections reinforce power structures, determining whose identities and histories are recognized or marginalized. **Homemaking and Unmaking: How places are invested with or stripped of meaning.** **Spatial Segregation and Identity:** Homemaking practices involve investing a place with meaning, such as building churches, temples, or memorials, raising walls and fences, or creating borders. These practices also include populating spaces and marking them with our footsteps (De Certeau). Public squares, for example, become meaningful when people gather to celebrate, protest, or mark important events, and even turf wars between gangs can transform places by imbuing them with significance. **Razack's work on Palestine.** Israel\'s infrastructure projects, including walls, checkpoints, and segregated roads, serve to physically and symbolically control Palestinian movement, reflecting broader colonial goals of separation. These barriers fragment Palestinian communities, enforce spatial and social segregation, and contribute to psychological marginalization, reinforcing their dispossession and disconnection from their homeland. **Explore how culture defines and transforms spaces.** Place is not just a geographical location but a repository of culture, where meaning is given through cultural significance. Culture makes a place relevant or important to societies or social groups, such as our planet, country, city, neighborhood, holy sites, or places of commemoration **Think about the psychological and cultural impacts of spatial segregation.** Spatial segregation removes people from a place where they are connected to. With Palestine/Isreal, the removal of the Palestinians from their land removes them from their home where they have their religious and traditional rituals. **Orientalism: A critique by Edward Said on the cultural construction of \"The Orient.\"** Edward Said believes the Orient is a semi mythical construct. Orientalism in an interconnected system of institutions, policies, narratives and ideas that place the western culture as superior. Orientalist perception continue to be used as justification for contemporary foreign and domestic policies. **Antonio Gramsci's theories on Hegemony** hegemony focuses on how the ruling class maintains power not just through force, but by shaping cultural norms, beliefs, and ideologies to make their dominance appear natural and legitimate. **Antonio Gramsci's theories on Resistance** Occurs when subordinate groups challenge this cultural hegemony by promoting alternative ideologies and creating counter-narratives. This resistance is not just through direct rebellion but also through cultural, intellectual, and social actions that undermine the dominant norms and offer new ways of thinking and living. **Counter-Narratives: Folk culture, subcultures, and their roles in resistance.** play significant roles in resistance by offering alternative ways of thinking, living, and expressing identity outside the dominant culture. These cultural forms often arise as a reaction to mainstream values and ideologies, providing spaces for marginalized or oppressed groups to challenge social norms and the status quo. **Understand how cultural resistance a response to dominant hegemonic forces is.** Critiques and deconstructs assumptions made through orientalism and racism. It challenges the stereotypes in a culture and challenges hegemony by disrupting the social norms. **Review examples of subversion in popular and folk culture. Reflect on Spivak\'s \"Can the Subaltern Speak?\" and the idea of amplifying marginalized voices.** She argues that intellectuals constitute the subaltern other of Europe as anonymous and mute and at the same time constructs Europe as superior. She tries to find a way of stressing the subaltern ability to resist fails because even attempts to amplify their voices often occur within a context that is shaped by those in power, thus distorting or silencing their true experiences and needs. **Culture and Identity conclusion** In conclusion, ways of life are rarely neutral, as they are often tied to polarized perceptions of reality, framed by notions of cultural superiority or inferiority, and frequently serve as tools for exclusion and both internal and external colonization. **How does Matthew Arnold explain Culture** Culture was a state of refinement, of detaching oneself from the daily struggle to survive & creating, or appreciating the products of refined, artistic & cultural labour **Habitus culture** The habits, behaviors, and ways of thinking people unconsciously develop based on their upbringing, social environment, and cultural norms. **How does Culture change?** Cultural canons adapt to include previously excluded art, making culture more inclusive, but it still reflects power dynamics in society. **What is Culture and culture's conclusion?** culture is malleable (changing) and inherently political, shaped by artificial distinctions in human creativity that reinforce social hierarchies and distinctions rather than existing as a neutral force. **What is the construction of the past?** All human groups create historical or mythological stories to legitimize their actions and current realities, with varying degrees of investment based on material interests. These narratives are inherently biased and should be approached critically. Understanding the past involves questioning how we learn about and remember it. **What do statues do?** Every statue/monument defends a particular idea about/version of history, although these can often be subverted **Birth of a nation** Nationalism and nations are modern phenomena that emerged from empires, built on shared heritage, traditions, and historical memory. Tools like mass schooling, conscription, standing armies, and the idea of \"folk culture\" unified people under the concept of a nation. **How is a Nation Socially/Culturally Constructed?** **\ **A nation is an *imagined community* (Anderson), where people share both imagined and real connections. Different concepts of identity---such as Canadianness, Englishness, or Frenchness---create fluctuating national identities. People invest in and believe in the existence of their nation, even to the point of dying or killing for it. According to Ernest Renan\'s 1882 lecture, this belief is like a daily plebiscite, where people continuously reaffirm their commitment to the nation. **Culture\'s Role in Social Construction**: Culture plays a crucial role in shaping categories like nation, race, gender, and sexuality, often by mobilizing differences and establishing inequalities. These cultural constructions influence how societies perceive and treat individuals based on these categories. **How does place play a role in culture?** Place is not just a geographical location but a space given meaning through culture, making it important to societies. It becomes a site of memory, shaped by practices of remembering and forgetting. Place is inextricably linked with culture, serving as a battlefield for both identity formation and destruction. **How do we unmake a place?** Unmaking place involves acts of destroying familiar markers that define a group\'s identity, such as repurposing churches, mosques, or temples, renaming streets and landmarks, breaking the geographical continuity of neighborhoods, and destroying the landscapes and land that sustain communities.' **What is mass culture?** Mass culture refers to standardized, formulaic cultural products designed to be entertaining and simplistic for mass consumption. Produced by companies for profit, it appeals to the lowest common denominator and lacks the authenticity of folk art or the value of high culture