Popular Culture Artifact

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On interesting aspect in our current popular culture is the role that Mass Media play in our today’s society. Definitively entertainment and media have a large impact on society. Particularly, movies are a reflection of how the real world is. Humor, drama and action are used in movies to represent events that normally occur in our life such violence, war, love, drug use, etc. Everywhere you go you can hear people singing the top songs of the moment. It is very common see young people spending hours in line waiting for concert tickets or kids asking their parents buy the new video game. As well as 1,000s of dollars goes into media and electronics every week. Surely each of us would like to have the best cel phone with digital camera. People dress and label themselves by what they listen and see from their favorite singers, bands or actors. According Popular Culture & Food trends article, “Food is part of popular culture, and the beliefs, trends and practices in a culture affect as well its eating practices”. The mentioned aspects above lead to me to create my popular culture artifact. The next few pages will show how those aspects of our popular culture such icons, myths, celebrities and some values are incorporated into of popular culture artifact of my creation. In order to accede to this new website you can visit http://highstars.wetpaint.com/.

References Entertainment. Retrieved March 24, 2009 from http://www.usd230.k12.ks.us/espictt/entertainment/Entertainment.html/

Journal Article Analysis
Religion and Popular Culture: Rescripting the Sacred
Article’s author is Amos St.Germain from Wentworth Institute of Technology. He basically provides a summary of the book. Amos St. Germain identifies key elements and condenses important information into his analysis. Through this article the author describes as this book shows through its chapters as religion and popular culture are related under different points of view. In his first paragraph he also recommends this book for its interesting content.
Through the condensed summary provided by Amos we see how the author of this book relates religion to different elements from the popular culture. This book considers ways in which American cultural products have played an important role in creating contradictory religious identities. For example, he mentions the relation between Bible and modern American Christianity. It analysis makes sense of the relationship between Christianity and American popular culture analyzing the various ways in which Christians in the United States read and interpret Bible in the United States.
Amos as well shows in this article how religion and sports in the United States are related. For example, he mention to Roger Angell which is a known by his several memorable essays in baseball. Advertising is other element of our popular culture that according with Amos is reflected in the third chapter of this book. He mention to Kate Moss who is a known fashion model that appears in famous advertising campaigns. Guess jeans is as well other representative element of American Cultue mentioned in this boook. Movies and TVreligious programming are analyzed by the author of this book mentioning for example Mel Gibson’s film The passion of Christ(2004).
Finally, Amos try to convence us with this article to read this interesting, well written, and entertainment book. He consider that Religion and Popular Culture: Rescripting the Sacred contributes to popular cultures studies. Religion, sports, advertising, popular music, known films, and popular video games are some of the elements of popular culture that are closely related to religion under the analysis done by Richard W. Santana and Gregory Erickson, Jefferson, NC: McFarland in this book.


Reference
Religion and Popular Culture: Rescripting the Sacred. Richard W.Santana and Gregory Erickson. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2008.
Franklin University database Article by Amos St. Germain (2007) American Cultural Studies.

Reference of Journal Article

The article I chose from The Journal of Popular Culture is Religion and Popular Culture: Rescripting the Sacred. This article contains an interesting analysis of religion & Popular Culture and such this book contributes to Popular Culture Studies. Analyis by, Amos St. Germain from Wentworth Institute of Technology.

Reference


Religion and Popular Culture: Rescripting the Sacred. Richard W.

Santana and Gregory Erickson. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2008.

Weekly written Analysis 5

The Popular Culture topic of my choice this time is tattoo. Tattoo is a permanent marking made by inserting ink into the layers of skin to change the pigment for decorative or other reasons. I think that tattoos have a inherent message of our society through time, incorporating the elements of popular culture. Tattoos have served in many diverse cultures as symbols of religious and spiritual devotion, sexual lures, pledges of love, punishment, amulets, protection and as the marks of rites. Tattoo is a universal phenomenon, every tattoo means something to the person who has it but definitively they also mean something of our society.

Ritual Development

I think we make rituals out of everything such celebrating holidays with family, shaking hands with friends and strangers. Inauguration of President, graduations, the Independence Day, New Years, the Olympics opening ceremonies are examples of rituals in our society. Religion has ritual. Those rituals are procedures for conducting religious ceremonies. Family rituals are activities involving most or all members of the family which occur episodically. Those behaviors have a symbolic meaning for family members.

We can see rituals remain an important and enduring aspect of our daily life. Society has both retained traditional rituals and accepted new ones. However, a ritual that is right for me might not be for my neighbors. The most common rituals around the world are often celebrations, which include such things as the birth of a baby, weddings and marriages, and then death.

Weekly written Analysis 3

"Kite Runner"

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini is the story of the friendship between a wealthy Afghan boy and the son of his father's servant. According The Kite Runner official Website, The Kite Runner has shipped over four million copies and spent more than two years on the "New York Times" bestseller list. I was not familiar with the Afghan culture but I read the novel two years ago and last month I watch the movie.

The Kite Runner is the shattering first novel by Khaled Hosseini, an Afghan doctor who received political asylum in 1980 as civil conflict devastated his homeland. The story also offers a first hand account of the social and political turmoil that the Soviet invasion wrought upon the entire country. This story gave me a new feel for what Afghanistan used to be like and the level of devastation humans can wreak on each other and a society. I found a good story of loyalty, cowardice, betrayal and redemption, with a brief insight in the recent history of Afghanistan.
The Kite Runner was transformed into a film production. In both novel and film form, “The Kite Runner” recounts a simple yet shrewd story about that favorite American pastime: self-improvement.

The Kite Runner is about the price of peace, both personal and political, and what we knowingly destroy in our hope of achieving that, be it friends, democracy or ourselves. Over the last three decades, Afghanistan has been ceaselessly battered by Communist rule, Soviet occupation, the Mujahideen and a democracy that became a rule of terror. I suggest that one should take part in both reading and watching The Kite Runner.

Reference
Parks, J. (2008, December 18). Kabul - The Kite Runner. Retrieved March 2, 2009, from http://www.kiterunnermovie.com/

Assignment 2-1 weekly written Analysis 2

Slumdog Millionaire

Slumdog Millionaire comes away as the big winner of the 2009 Academy awards, capturing eight Oscars. The story of Jamal Malik, an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. Eighteen year old guy is having an amazing answering streak on the Indian version of the television game show; "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" This movie was one of the best movies that I have seen so far. This is an excellent movie. While it is clearly an Indian cast and setting, the language is English. It's a very clever fusion of Hollywood & Bollywood. The cinematography was stunning, the music was great, the characters very engaging, and the plot was excellent, with an ending that tied up everything beautifully. I recommend to watch this great movie.

ICON

Donald John Trump is an American business magnate, socialite, television personality, and author. Trump is also the founder of Trump Entertainment Resorts, which operates numerous casinos and hotels across the world. With his success in real estate and television, Trump has succeeded in marketing the Trump name on a large number of products. Oprah Gail Winfrey is an American television presenter, media mogul and philanthropist. Her internationally-syndicated talk show, The Oprah Winfrey Show, has earned her multiple Emmy Awards and is the highest-rated talk show in the history of television. George Walker Bush served as the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009. He was the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000 before being sworn in as President on January 20, 2001. President Bush promoted policies on the economy, health care, education and social security reform.
Oprah has come from being a poor, black, farm girl from Mississippi to a national celebrity. To her resume she can add reporter, actress, writer, producer, activist and TV talk show host, but it doesn't stop there. Oprah, it seems, is unstoppable.

Bush is a cultural icon who embodies the positive and negative aspects of American culture. President Bush undertook a number of educational priorities. For example, he increased funding for the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health in his first years of office, and created education programs to strengthen the grounding in science and mathematics for American high school students.
Trump is a self confident and extravagant businessman that has made himself instantly recognizable wherever he goes. Trump also owns part of the three largest beauty competitions in the world, consisting of Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA. He is also a successful author with several best selling business books published that include The Art of the Deal, The Art of Survival and How to get Rich Among his many other pursuits.

References:

Donald(John) Trump biography". biography.com.

http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9511238. Retrieved on 2009-02-26.

Oprah Winfrey the richest black person in the world. African Echo Vol. 43, 2004-03-02. Retrieved 2009-02-26.

Presidential Avenue: George Bush". Presidential Avenue. http://www.presidentialavenue.com/gb.cfm. Retrieved on 2009-02-26.

American Idol

Weekly written Analysis 1
American Idol is an American reality TV show airing on Fox. It debuted on 2002, and has since become one of the most popular shows on American television. Every year, tens of thousands of hopefuls from across the nation audition for a shot at stardom. In my personal opinion this is one the most atractive reality TV shows today. The program seeks to discover the best singer in the country through a series of nationwide auditions. The American public decides the outcomes of the later stages through phone voting. The judges give critiques of the contestants' performances. The show usually airs on Tuesday and Wednesday nights in the United States.
American Idol is often noted for advertising its sponsors during the show's runtime.
Being the number-one-rated show in the United States, I can imagine it costs for each second commercial. According WikipediaThe free Encyclopedia, American Idol is broadcast to over 100 nations outside of the United States. In most nations these aren't live broadcasts and may be tape delayed by several days or weeks. Seasonal rankings (based on average total viewers per episode) of American Idol on FOX. It is one of the highest-rated TV shows in the history of television. The eighth season of American Idol began on January 13, 2009. Also this season will have a fourth judge on the panel: record producer and songwriter Kara DioGuardi. Last night's show was certainly door die for this first group of 12, so the song choices were absolutely crucial. Some struck just the right chord with the judges, while others fell a little flat. I will continue being a faithful fan of this TV show.

POPULAR CULTURE

Popular culture has been defined as everything from common culture, to folk culture, to mass culture. While it has been all of these things at various points in history, in Post-War America, popular culture is undeniably associated with commercial culture and all its trappings: movies, television, radio, cyberspace, toys, many forms of art, photography, games, and even group experiences like collective comet-watching. Culture refers to the pattern of human activity and the symbols, which give significance to this activity. Culture is represented through the art, literature, costumes, customs and traditions of a community. Different cultures exist in different parts of the world. The natural environment greatly affects the lifestyle of the people of that region, thus shaping their culture.

Why is popular culture important? It is definitely because it gives an individual a unique identity. The culture of a community gives its people a character of their own. Culture shapes the personality of a community. The language that a community speaks, the art forms it hosts, its staple food, its customs, traditions and festivities comprise the community’s culture.




I consider "Garage sales"to be an example of a pop culture artifact.A garage sale, also known as a yard sale, rummage sale, tag sale, is an informal, irregularly scheduled event for the sale of used goods by private individuals, in which block sales are allowed, so that sellers are not required to obtain business licenses or collect sales tax. Buyers who arrive before the hours of the sale to review the items are known as Early Birds; they often are professional restorers or resellers. In some areas garage sales have taken on a special meaning to a community and have become events of special local significance. In these situations large areas of a community hold a communal garage sale involving dozens or hundreds of families at the same time.

The cultural phenomenon of garage and yard sales in the United States has been examined by several artists. The Thunderground Film production Zen and the Art of Yardsailing is a documentary film produced in 2004 that covered the aspects of finding bargains as well as the cutthroat practices of professional resellers and the previously noted "early birds."