For example in seeking to address the second point in the Course material I remain unsure that he is really against the philosophy of "the People of the Post." I assume that he is because he wants to constantly remind himself that the world is round and thus rejects the people of the post standpoint. However I am left wondering why he feels the need to remind himself if he is so sure that the people of the post are wrong. Does this not suggest that at a minimum there is a possibility that the people of the post have got it right and that his rejection is more a gut feeling that he would not want to live in such a flat world than a rational assessment of the arguments offered? His tone of despair in the short paragraph "To stare into the blank, flat Face is to look into a world where your actual presence is unnecessary, where nothing adds up to much anything any more, where you live to be alive..." suggests only that he has looked and rejected it as being too scary.
However he does argue that the people of the post have set out to undermine the differences that are said to exist between good/bad, legitimate/illegitimate and style/substance. He sees this attack as a project of the Post: to replace representation by an anti-system. For Hebdidge the consequences of this assault on representation are first that the world outside the text ( he assumes that such a world exists) disappears followed by the signified leaving us in a world of empty signifiers. His doom laden prophecy is,to use his own words, "No meaning. No classes. No history. Just a ceaseless procession of simulacra."
Popular culture is everything that is left after we have decided what is high culture. At the extremes say such things as TV reality shows, soaps and other activities that are designed to attract the largest audiences by finding the lowest common denominator and at the other end the appearance of Placido Domingo at Covent Garden it is easy to distinguish between the two. However as we move further up or down the scale it is much more difficult until there seems to be a boundary across which some activities move from 'low' to 'high (e.g Shakespeare plays were originally seen as low culture but are now seen as being high) and vice versa. It is probably fair to say that if an activity is adopted by the mass media appearing on Sky or BBC1 then it will be seen as being part of the popular culture whilst if it is only shown and talked about on the minority art channels then it will acquire high status.
High culture has its high priest(ess) in Opera particularly the government subsidised opera as performed at Covent Garden. It could be accused of elitism that is ensured by the high ticket prices that are charged excluding many who might wish to attend. I am reminded of the BBC programme 'Yes Minister' where the possibility of reducing the government subsidy shocks the permanent secretary Sir Humphrey who rallies the Civil Service to ensure that the subsidy remains. Needless to say he was a regular attender. The reality is equally bizarre when £50m of Lottery Money was used to re-furbish the Opera House despite it offering 'culture' to a very small percentage of the population. High culture is defined by those who have the financial means and the leisure time to attend and use their contacts to ensure that they are part of the favoured view. Ballet has a similar relationship again with the masses.
Subsidised art galleries and museums are provided for the education of the masses who it is felt should be exposed to high culture so that in some strange way they will come to appreciate its superiority over the popular culture by which they are surrounded. Of course what happens is the general population react adversely to being treated as lesser beings by those who claim to be their superiors and reject the effort seeing it as patronising and boring. In many ways it is counter productive even if there is any validity in the argument that some artistic activities are superior to others.
It seems that the best way to decide what is 'high culture' is to look to those artistic activities that receive government subsidies (sourced from general taxation) in order to survive and where such subsidies are justified by people who could well afford the price of attending.
I am not sure that the developments in the media, the arts and culture really have a major influence on whether the First or Second world is in the ascendant. Not least you have to accept that the concept of 'round' and 'flat' has any validity. We are asked by Hebidge to imagine two worlds that are at war. He describes the main constituent element of each of these worlds as he sees them. They are constructed by him presumably for the sake of the argument he wishes to offer. Whether deliberately or otherwise he chooses the terms 'round' and 'flat' that already suggests to the reader that the second world is in some way the province of those people that fear that if they walk far enough they will fall of the edge of the world and are generally seen at the best as slightly bonkers and at worst stark staring mad. It is not a world occupied by 'normal' people. We are led to believe World Two is inferior before he has presented any real argument to show that it is.
He makes clear that his desire is to keep the faith that the world in which he lives is 'round' and presumably better. How he knows that this is the case is not made clear and it could be said that the world he thinks he lives in is an illusion created by him so that he feels comfortable in his skin.
There is no inherent element in his argument that means that World Two is inevitably 'flat'. Indeed I would argue that it is as round as World One or as flat as World One. Rejection of a something called 'reality' that is supposedly out there does not necessarily imply the type of world described by Hebidge. To argue that there is no 'reality' other than that created by the individual mind is merely pointing out that we all see the world in a different way. For example if I use the word 'tree' (signifier) in conversation without selecting a specific tree then those around me will have a different image of 'tree' (signified) based on their experience. Some may coincide but we cannot know that and indeed it is possible that the image held by one person resembles no tree known to the others (for a slightly ridiculous example think 'shoe tree!). If I point to an object and say 'tree' (assume that it is something that can be included in the classification 'tree' there remains the fact that all of the audience will see something different albeit only slightly. Some will see the whole of the tree whilst others will concentrate on the specific. The effects of nature and nurture will impact on their interpretation of what they are seeing. In short everyone (or almost everyone) will have created a different 'tree'. What is seen as 'reality' is different for us all so it can be argued that there is no reality only illusion. For me the world still remains round and full of exciting possibilities even if I accept that I construct my own world .
Popular culture is largely associated with the commercial market whether it be in fashion items such as the latest jeans from Levi's (that probably shows my age as they may no longer be the fashion item that the youth of today aspires too) and the latest handbags, television in all its forms but particularly the output that is targeted at the largest audience possible, activities such as the various music festivals held in the open air and apparently made special by the amount of mud and possibly the willingness of a broad range of the population to join together in protest. Although the latter may seem to be non-commercial the stories that it offers to the news media and how it is reported is driven by commercial imperatives that in the case of newspapers is to increase the readership so that advertisers will (have to ) pay more that in turn will feed back into the commercial world of selling. Popular culture is forever evolving with what is fashionable today becoming 'old hat' tomorrow. Indeed to be recognised as the latest thing is to condemn that particular activity to being no longer desirable.
High culture is more resilient to change in part because its disciples are a relatively small group who have a vested interest (their need to belong to an 'elite' group) in maintaining the status quo. Opera; Classical Music as offered by the world's leading orchestras in purpose built concert halls; Art as displayed in Art Galleries and/or highly priced art sales points; Drama by the recognised (now, although possibly not when they were alive) dramatists such as Shakespeare, Chekov and Ibsen; and Ballet as offered by National Ballet Companies such as Sadler Wells. Cynically one could suggest that reference to the amount of taxpayers money they receive is a clue to whether something is seen as high culture.
Largely due to the financial problems that such organisations face they are forced to, at least, acknowledge the existence of a 'popular' audience and so make efforts to find a niche in popular culture through such things as orchestral renditions of popular music. Attempts are made to engage schoolchildren in high culture through special events that rely upon the use of high culture such as music having been used in such things as adverts that children can recognise and see as part of their world. There will always be attempts, both well meaning and simply commercial, to move down market to reach a larger audience but one has to accept that this is seen as a means for ensuring the continuing existence of something that is definitely not 'pop'.
On the opposite side I once owned a CD that consisted of recordings of classical music that had been used as the background music to commercials. The cover claimed that such use had made them 'popular' and well known. Yet, presumably, they had been used as backing for commercials because they were popular and well known by a larger audience.
The Course material says 'We need to ask "Who is to decide what is good taste in the first place"' I am left wondering why. History suggests that what is todays popular culture may one day become high culture and the reverse can also be true. It is not a fixed entity and at the margins is highly fluid. The deciders during a time of limited mass communication are entirely different from those in a world where mass communication dominates our lives in a very real way. We do not need to decide. I personally think that Damien Hirst's work is an abomination but I accept that there are others who think the opposite. Should I care - only if they are using my money to buy his works. The world, whether 'round' or 'flat' is big enough for us all to live in relative harmony irrespective of our views of what constitutes good or bad taste even if those terms do not actually have any meaning.
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