300138 Sociology and History of Popular Culture (S) (SoSe 2010)

Tracing developments of popular culture since the late 19th century, the seminar discusses theories of key debates on and methodological approaches to “pop” and “popular culture” in history and sociology. Among the keywords are: popular culture and identity, cultural studies, the production of culture perspective, cultural transfer and cultural scenes. Reading historical as well as sociological literature, the seminar also investigates the promises and difficulties of the relationship of sociological and historical research on popular culture. The focus will be on American, British and German cases. The seminar is held in English and aims at master and post graduate students.

Bibliography

Lawrence W. Levine: The Folklore of Industrial Society: Popular Culture and Its Audiences, in: American Historical Review 95 (1992), pp. 1369-1399
Richard A. Peterson/ Narasimham Anand: The Production of Culture Perspective, in: Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 30 (2004), pp. 311-334
Max Horkheimer/Theodor W. Adorno: The Culture Industry as Mass Deception, in: Meenakshi Gigi Durham/Douglas M. Kellner (Hrsg.): Media and Cultural Studies, revised edition, Malden u.a.: Blackwell , 2006, pp. 41-72
Urs Stäheli, Urs: The Popular in the Political System, Cultural Studies 17 (2003), pp. 275-299
Greta Hsu/Joel M. Podolny: Critiquing the Critics: An Approach for the Comparative Evaluation of Critical Schemas, Social Science Research 34 (2005), pp. 189-214