Course Schedule

February 9High Fidelity (2000) – MCTR 7132D
February 10 – Introduction to Popular Culture
February 12 – Culture & Civilization Tradition
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 1 – 2
Storey, Reader, Ch. 1 – Arnold
Dwight Macdonald, “Theory of Mass Culture” (eRes)

February 16My Darling Clementine (1946) – PN1997.M888 A1 2007D
February 17 – Culturalism
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 3
Storey, Reader, Ch. 4, 6 – Williams, Hall & Whannel
Lawrence Levine, “Shakespeare in America” (eRes)
February 19 – Semiotics & Structuralism
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 6
Storey, Reader, Ch. 28 – Wright
Jere Surber, “Formalist, Structuralist & Semiotic Analyses” (eRes)

February 23It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) – PN1997.I758 A1 2006D
February 24 – Structuralism & Myth
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 27 – Barthes
Robert Ray, “It’s a Wonderful Life” (eRes)
WRITING:    Essay #1 due by email before class 2/24
February 26 – Marxism
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 4
Storey, Reader, Ch. 8-11 – Marx & Engels, Adorno

March 2Tootsie (1982) – PN1997.T62 A1 2008D
March 3 – Ideology
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 30 – Althusser
Robin Wood, “Ideology/Genre/Auteur” (eRes)
March 5 – Hegemony & Post-Marxism
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 12-13, 16 – Gramsci, Bennett, Hall

March 9Die Hard (1988) – PN1997.D489 A1 2004D
March 10 – Negotiation
READINGS:    Stuart Hall, “Encoding/Decoding” (eRes)
Storey, Reader, Ch. 15 – Gledhill
March 12 – Active Audiences
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 18 – Ang
John Fiske & Robert Dawson, “Audiencing Violence” (eRes)

March 16Animal House (1978) – MCTR 7868D
March 17 – Psychoanalysis & Popular Culture
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 5
Storey, Reader, Ch. 25-26, 33 – Freud, Lacan, Zizek
March 19 – The Politics of the Carnivalesque
READINGS:    Mikhail Bakhtin, “Carnival & Carnivalesque” (eRes)
Kathleen Rowe, “Pig Ladies, Big Ladies” (eRes)
WRITING:    Essay #2 due by email before class 3/19

March 21-29 – Spring Break

March 30Barbie Nation (1998) – NK4894.3.B37 B475 2007D
The Simpsons, “Lisa vs. Malibu Stacy” (1994) – PN1992.77 .S58 v.5 2004D
Superstar: Karen Carpenter Story (1987) – reserve or online
March 31 – Feminism & Popular Culture
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 7
Storey, Reader, Ch. 19-20 – Rakow, Radway
Laura Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure & Narrative Cinema” (eRes)
April 2 – Case Study: Barbie
READINGS:    Lynn Spigel, “Barbies without Ken” (eRes)
Mary Desjardins, “The Incredible Shrinking Star” (eRes)

April 6The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985) – MCTR 6700D
April 7 – The Cultural Studies Paradigm
READINGS:    Brooker, Using the Force, Preface – Ch. 4
April 9 – Researching Audiences
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 49 – Ang
Brooker, Using the Force, Ch. 5-7
Andrea Press & Sonia Lingstone, “Taking Audience Research” (eRes)
WRITING:    Proposal for Final Research Paper due by email before class 4/9

April 13Twin Peaks, “Pilot” (1990) – PN1992.77 .T88 2007D
The Simpsons, “Simpsons Spin-off Showcase” (1994) – PN1992.77 .S58 v.8 2006D
April 14 – Popular Culture Fandom
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 46 – de Certeau
Brooker, Using the Force, finish book
Henry Jenkins, “Do You Enjoy Making the Rest of Us Feel Stupid?” (eRes)
Barbara Ehrenreich et. al., “Beatlemania” (eRes)
April 16 – Postmodernism
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 8
Storey, Reader, Ch. 34 – Baudrillard
Fredric Jameson, “Postmodernism” excerpted

April 20Bamboozled (2001) – MCTR 6961D
April 21 – Poststructuralism and Discourse
READINGS:    review Storey, Intro pp. 98-103
Storey, Reader, Ch. 31-32 – Foucault, Weedon
Stuart Hall, “On Postmodernism and Articulation” (eRes)
Jason Mittell, “Cultural Power of Anti-TV Metaphor” (eRes)
April 23 – Race & Representation
READINGS:    Robert Stam, “Cultural Studies and Race” (eRes)
Stuart Hall, “New Ethnicities” (eRes)
Stuart Hall, “What is this ‘Black’ in Black Popular Culture?” (eRes)

April 27The Manchurian Candidate (1962) – PN1997.M2568 A1 2004D
April 28 – Case Study: The Manchurian Candidate
READINGS:    Jacobsen & Gonzalez, What Have They Built You To Do, Ch. 1-3
WRITING:    Essay #3 due by email before class 4/28
April 30 – Case Study: The Manchurian Candidate
READINGS:    Jacobsen & Gonzalez, What Have They Built You To Do, Ch. 4 – Postscript

May 4Almost Famous (Bootleg Cut) (2000) – PN1997.A3248 A1 2001bD
May 5 – Taste and Popular Culture
READINGS:    Storey, Intro, Ch. 9
Storey, Reader, Ch. 42, 43, 48 – Bourdieu, Hall, Fiske
May 7 – Politics of the Popular
READINGS:    Storey, Reader, Ch. 51-53 – Webster, Frith, McGuigan

Final Research Essay due via email by noon, Friday, May 15
Graduating seniors absolutely MUST hand in papers on time (and preferably early)!

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