Insia N, Ali
The article of “Rising of Popular
Culture: A Historiographical Sketch” explained the transition of popular
culture throughout US History. With the thought that popular culture was once a
way of the concept of “top to bottom” where the elite social class imposed its
powers and views upon the audience into a “bottom to up” concept where it was actually
people’s values are expressed through forms of mass Medias. Theodore W. Adorno
claims that the culture industry we have mainly is just “Corporate producers
were exercising control from the top down,” through commercials of persuading a
person to buy their product. But with further studies, the scholars finally
figured out there was also an aspect of the “bottom to top” theory. Pop culture
of entertainment really pushed the “bottom to top” concept through mediums such
as radio, television, movies, and dime novels. The “bottom to top” concept was analyzed by
the scholar Robert Sklar who saw entertainments such as movies to be “first
medium of entertainment and cultural info to be controlled by men who didn’t share
the ethnic or religious backgrounds of traditional cultural elites.” It was a
way people could express their own cultures and became more popular as the
audience saw how much of the entertainment that was produced could be relatable
to their own lives. Additionally, Scholar Neil Harris, points out that the “culture
tries to make a sense of major transformation in American Society.” For example
it can focus on the racist appeals that shape the whites’ misunderstanding of
black life and culture.” The Black culture that was expressed consisted of the
folk stories and music entertainment such as jazz. This in a way was a rebellion of minorities
such as blacks at the time, to create their own culture. In the end, the popular
culture not only contained the “top to bottom” theory but additionally had the “bottom
to top “ concept had risen. By reading this article, I have come out of the
thinking that the popular culture was only a way the elite class can enforce
their opinions upon the less powerful groups and have realized that indeed
there was actually an opportunity for the less powerful to express their views
and culture.
