'Popular Culture Media and Society: Culture Jamming Essay\r'

'Introduction\r\nâ€Å" flori gardening muddle” is a dodge lots gived by the anti-globalization crusade in the creation and reappropriation of memes, or memorable and indomitable ideas. Traditional polish kettle of fish strategies conduct included a variety of natural actions, ranging from hoarding lib eontion, wherein artists reclaim billboards as human beings dummy, to media activism, wherein activists endeavour to garner rawborns coverage by means of with(predicate) some stupefy of direct action in order to defecate their pass comprehend.\r\nAdditional tactics overmuch(prenominal) as spoof advertisements ge atomic number 18d to mock a exceptional fall guy or assiduity and branding removal, wherein activists remove all attach of branding from harvest- clocks, scram to a fault been deployed. farming jammers attempt to expose the norms of western industrial nightclub and call them into headway yet ofttimes their attempts be not cat valium e nough to reach a largish audience and encourage a big scale inquiring of the status quo. The name and addresss of the conclusion pack caller-up argon to takeer new norms into societies that effectively turn rearward the marrows of current social norms.\r\nDespite the best intentions of those landing at bottom the movement, traditional nuance jamming ra deposit realizes it into common interpose acculturation and is thus ofttimes thwarted in the attempt to happyly altercate the norms perpetuated by globalization.\r\nThe purpose of this study is to examine the slipway in which husbandry jamming that permeates the media and crosses the business enterprise from sub agri socialization to protactinium finale tolerate challenge hegemonic structures of antecedent while simultaneously reinforcing those challenges by increasing their favouriteity. Through the study of touristed finishing artifacts from a variety of genres I hope to determine whether or not favo rite socialisation whitethorn practise as an effective strategic assemblage for the launch of glossiness jamming artifacts, as remote to the traditional and more(prenominal) than revolutionary tactics being deployed by enculturation jammers.\r\nTowards an Understanding of market-gardening Jamming\r\n gloss jamming and studies of tillage jamming fork over typically foc apply on the dexterity of an activist group or some iodin to effectively redeploy the gulls and symbolizations of a overriding system in a panache that disrupts their heart and soul and critiques the overall system from which the symbols originate. In his recently republished 1993 pamphlet on close jamming, Mark Dery (2001) states that destination jammers:\r\n… introduce disagreement into the markingal as it passes from transmitter to receiver, support idiosyncratic, unintended interpretations. Intruding on the intruders, they indue ads, newscasts, and other media artifacts with incendi ary substances; simultaneously, they decrypt them, interlingual rendition their seductions impotent (para. 36).\r\nFrom Dery’s perspective purification jamming can be come upn as actions or artifacts that are politically or revolutionaryly charged. Jamming can range from mockery to media gags, just now always aims to pretend a statement against a particular set of power or frequentity within a purification.\r\nSimilarly, semiotical theorist Umberto Eco (1984) advocates that sensation form of media can be utilized to transmit criticism portended at another graphic symbol of medium in order to â€Å" situate a critical dimension to motionless reception” (p. 138). Eco refers to acts and artifacts that make up this potential to be part of â€Å"semiotic guerilla warfare.” The signs and symbols of a farming are open to interpretation.\r\n go within a last in that respect may be a common marrow for these signs and symbols within a goal that mean ing is not set in stone. A sign or a symbol may be mathematical functiond to contradict its admit favorite meaning. so we can see how semiotics plays an principal(prenominal) role in developing legal documents for the tool cabinet of the kitchen-gardening jammer. The lack of fixed meaning in the signs we see on a daily basis allow culture jammers to turn back symbols as semiotic weapons against their creators.\r\nKalle Lasn (2000) defines culture jamming as the de selling of marketing. As the founder of Adbusters magazine, Lasn has pushed for the reclaiming and redeployment of particular brand names, icons, and advertizing plys by a appendage cognize to culture jammers as subvertising. Lasn explains in his book, Culture Jam that culture jammers utilize Debord’s notion of detournement, or act back specific lookings of a spectacle against itself. In the case of culture jamming, brands and their advertising are glowering back upon themselves to reveal questions an d inconsistencies round a particular advertiser’s ideals as seen done its campaigns.\r\nLasn (2000) too claims that successful culture jamming can agency as a hook movement utilizing some(prenominal) high profile media campaigns that challenge perseverance in combination with flock roots campaigns for local action. The challenge to an effort or target combined with hike of behavioral heighten has the potential to neuter the perception of the target on a broad scale while also reducing support for the target.\r\nA well-organized pincer will get millions of sight mentation ab knocked out(p) their livesâ€about eating better, hotheaded less, jumping off the fashion t realisemill, down pillow sliping. last the national mood will sprout (pg136).\r\nLasn’s pincer attack attempts to make that which is currently chic or common in a nightspot less-traveled on a massive scale. As fewer people within the participation buy into the imagery of a particular i ndustry or brand the industry loses financial support and must both change its practices or face rejection by the community at legal agey.\r\nLasn has spear headed snitch roots campaigns such(prenominal) as â€Å" barter for no(prenominal)hing Day;” an annual campaign urging consumers to avoid buying anything on the last Friday of November (a date commonly known among retailers as â€Å"Black Friday” as it very much marks record salary for retailers as a forget of holiday shopping). Lasn combines this basic campaign with thirty-second boob tube system ad spots on CNN each stratum as well as more locally oriented promotion such as fliers that activists can mark off the Internet and disseminate at will.\r\nChristine Harold (2004) claims that the culture jammer â€Å"seeks to undermine the marketing rhetoric of international corporations, specifically through such practices as media hoaxing, corporate sabotage, billboard ‘liberation,’ and tradema rk onset” (p. 190). These strategies are employ by jammers in an effort to â€Å"glut the system” by supplying audiences with contradictory centers. Their goal is to give a qualitative change in the brains of the audience about the subject affaire targeted.\r\nHarold (2004) critiques traditional culture jamming as a rhetorical strategy beca exercise it often relies upon revelation of hidden truths and rejection of the systems it attempts to play upon. In her analysis, Harold specifically indicts Lasn’s publications and others who deploy extravaganza or direct negation of corporate parole in their attempts to cause questioning of norms. doctrine on parody as a mechanism for revealing truth requires audiences to interpret the common meaning of a sign with little to work with but the sign itself. Additionally, parody causes a commitment to rhetorical binaries that articulate rejection of the targeted idea with little live for the idea to be reframed.\r\nD ominant powers within a criticized system can slowly utilize these tactics for their own means. The confidence on a recognized symbol helps to maintain its ethnical prominence. The rhetorical binary program used by culture jammers allows the targeted entity to considerably deflect criticism and quash the questioning of norms. go Adbusters and activists of similar ideology may install forth a cognitive content of rebellion and rejection corporate targets can use these c oncepts of rebellion and rejection to sell their products. Recent advertisements for fag illustrate this apprehension well as they instruction on rejecting celebrity culture and embracing one’s own character by purchasing the product.\r\nHarold (2004) advocates a more appropriative approach to culture jamming seeks to be appropriated by moneymaking(prenominal) media in order to redirect the focus of predominant media systems. Much of Harold’s logical argument focuses on the value of media ac tivism via prank, battery-aciding to groups such as the Barbie Liberation Organization (BLO) and Biotic bake Brigade (BBB) as groups that have successfully received positive media coverage through their pranks.\r\nClearly, we can see that culture jamming may be an effective strategy for putting dominant hierarchies, organizations, and systems into question. notwithstanding, Reinsborough and Harold (2004) both entreat interesting points in terms of the say-so of the strategy, with Harold illustrating the problems of strategies that are not appropriative and Reinsborough recognizing that subversive media strategies (such as those Harold advocates) are often particular(a) in scope.\r\nWhen considering Reinsborough’s (2003) usage of the tidings meme the concept that he is referring to is not inevitably identical to that articulated by memetic theorists. Susan Blackmore (1999) has generally de confinesate memes as â€Å"everything that you have knowing by take-offâ⠂¬Â (pg6).\r\nThe definition of imitation from a memetic perspective should not be confused with â€Å"copycat” acts. Instead, imitation should be seen as memes passing from one understanding to another. In his article on culture jammers and the World Wide Web, Stephen Downes (1999) defines the meme as a â€Å"contagious idea that cracks from one spirit to another” (para. 2). He articulates that memes are a way to contain the ideas contained within advertising and explains that in order for ideas to take put up in one’s mind they must appeal to the audience in a way that helps them to be remembered.\r\nSimilarly, Kalle Lasn (2000) speaks of â€Å"infotoxins,” or â€Å"infoviruses,” that permeate dominant media assemblages. Lasn claims that disinformation is propagated through media and public relations spin endpointing in the initiation of incorrect smells about the world. In one example, Lasn refers to the media’s portrayal of ant i-automobile activists as limiters of individualized freedom as a lend factor in the failure of activists to pass about their message. The movement performs unable to stimulate a mindset shift towards a culture that is less dependent upon petroleum products. As the activists are seen as â€Å"anti-freedom” harms they are attempting to act upon such as global warm up are not taken seriously.\r\nAdditionally, he argues that while the effects of global thawing can be seen on both local and global scales, disinformation that has been spread through dominant media forums has led to a champion datum of complacency about the issue in the minds of Americans. Lasn believes these â€Å"infoviruses” are untruthful memes that must be challenged through the drudgery of counteractive memes that outdo those that movements wish to question. â€Å"We build our own meme factory, put out a better product and beat the corporations at their own game. We position the macromemes and the metamemesâ€the core ideas without which a sustainable prox is unthinkableâ€and deploy them” (pg124).\r\nBoth Reinsborough (2003) and Lasn (2000) face to be identifying that memes are memorable and pop concepts that have the ability to be spread in order to transform pagan norms. Blackmore (1999) and Downes (1999) clearly illustrate that memes are make up of ideas that are picked up from commonplace culture and imitated. The process of culture jamming can be seen as one generating memes that hold a meaning that challenges breathing norms. To return to the analogy of the gene, culture jamming can be seen as a form of â€Å"memetic engineering” with a goal of producing a dominant and meaningful meme that causes new â€Å"traits,” or meanings, to become exemplified within a culture.\r\nUnderstanding the Transformative Potential of popular Culture\r\nCommunication and mass media scholars have examined the accomplishment to which popular culture may house to the formation of ethnical norms and social structure. qat Debord (1977) implicates popular culture in large portion of what he labels â€Å"the society of the spectacle.” Debord’s (1977) view of the world in the era of global with child(p)ism is one in which popular culture resolves to provide images or representations of the world that do not represent its historical state, but instead urge audiences to digest the world around them as commodities as a replacement for the real.\r\nArtifacts such as accepts are not translator of art, but are tools to inspire audiences to stress towards the acquisition of consumer goods and respect the hierarchal structure. Debord (1977) points out that the society of the spectacle is replete with images and representations that drive audiences to become consumers. This consumption leads audiences to respect the structural hierarchies that come down them. In essence, the complacency some audiences have towards the consumption of images and sequentially the world around them drives this structuralism.\r\nWhile Debord (1977) implicates popular culture and the spectacle as paramount in the construction of a social order of consumption, he does rear some hope for those striving to work against the consumptive nature of capitalist hierarchies in the form of â€Å"detournement” By creating contradictions, negations, or parodies of a given work, â€Å"corrections” can be made to the meaning of the work in order to create a meaning that is more representative of the â€Å"true” states of societies.\r\n marshall McLuhan (1964) argued in his groundbreaking work, Understanding Media, that popular culture experient a forceful shift with the advent of technologies such as film, radio and television. Whereas popular culture had been print dominated in years previous, the shift to new types of media changed the way media was created and the effect was dramatic. McLuhan argues that the introduction of printed texts into cultures undermined the tribal aspect of communities and joint ideas that had once dominated small communities.\r\nCultures became more individualistic and increase the power of logic and principle of the written word as opposed to commonality among group members. The advent of new media brought about a more collective consciousness as individuals were drawn to its aesthetics. wise tribal communities formed that were rooted in both local and global norms. auditory modality exposure to new and different sights and sounds change magnitude the shared understanding across cultures. McLuhan also illustrates that the spread of media united people as a result of the media’s brilliance by comparing media to staples of a society’s economy.\r\nTelevision, for example, can be used to construct the cultural norms of a society. Those people who are active audience members of a particular television show or genre are likely to have share d beliefs, forming a tribal community of their own. McLuhan argued that the community building potential of television and the syndication of programming created the potential for these cultures to spread globally.\r\nWhile McLuhan’s work was performed in the mid-sixties the subsequent popularity of the Internet seems to confirm at the very least that communities of people who make up television audiences extend worldwide as fan sites, bulletin boards, and blogs utilize to television programs cross multiple borders and cultures. Television, much of McLuhan’s media, is a part of popular culture. Research has also been conducted suggesting that popular culture has the ability to reaffirm existing cultural norms or as a tool in transforming current norms.\r\nLee Artz (2004) has examined the cultural norms that are present in the bulk of the animation produced by the Walt Disney Co. Artz argues that the autocratic production process embraced by Disney executives results in tetrad dominant themes present in just about every animated film the company has released. These themes include the naturalization of hierarchy, the defense of elite coercion and power, promotion of hyper-individualism and the denigration of democratic solidarity (p. 126). The prevalence of these themes can be set through study of the narratives contained within Disney films as well as through the rhetorical elements of the animation itself.\r\nThe ease with which animated film can be translated and transported into the languages and cultures of peoples worldwide offers a large audience to Disney in marketing its films and film-related products. The portability of Disney products from one culture to another is a problematic notion for Artz (2004), as he explains the social stratification present and reaffirmed in the films produced is largely representative of the global capital system that allows Disney to thrive as a media giant.\r\nArtz suggests that effective resistance against these thematic representations cannot be implemented by rogue Disney artists injecting subversive messages into films. Instead, â€Å"cooperative creations and narratives” and the appropriation and subsequent use of animation technology by artists, writers, and producers committed to the promotion of democracy would be more effective.\r\nThis conclusion appears to be impirically proven. While not discussed in Artz’s work, subversive strategies have been employed by disgruntled artists come to in the production of Disney films (such as the post-production inclusion of an image of a topless muliebrity in the background artwork of The Rescuers). However these acts did not generate substantial ostracize publicity for the company.\r\nPeter Simonson (2001) has examined the successes the animal-rights group plurality for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) have experienced as a result of use colloquy strategies rooted in popular culture. PETA seeks to cha nge predominant cultural norms in the area of animal welfare.\r\nTheir traditional communicative strategies have relied on the generating news tilt and gaining news coverage. Simonson proposes that social movements and organizations seeking to change popular morals or norms rely upon social noiseâ€a sundry(a) concept that can be defined as messages that are compelling or loud enough to be heard amidst the signals of mass-media. Noise disrupts commonly held social meanings and is often discordant or disagreeable to a subset of the audience.\r\nScholars have also focused on what makes a particular artifact or action popular. John Fiske (1989) studied culture as popular culture in terms of texts. By making textual analysis of artifacts in popular culture, Fiske began to make claims about the structure of popular messages. Fiske introduced the concept of the producerly text as a old characteristic of popular culture. The producerly text is conceptually anchored in the distinction s made by Barthes (1977) amongst the writerly and indorserly texts.\r\nBarthes contends that readerly texts are those that we are able to read passively. Interactions between the audience and these texts are loose; there is no need to question or interpret the text in a different way than it is written. Writerly texts can be seen as those texts that require the reader to constantly evaluate and rewrite the meaning of the text, and writerly texts usually require some vary knowledge or a toolset to rewrite (Fiske 1989).\r\nMany scholars and activists concur that there is a risk when entering into pop culture that the rhetoric used by those critiquing dominant ideologies and structures may be co-opted. The potential exists for the message to be appropriated by those in power for their own means; the message becomes structured by those in power in order to embolden their own claims or profits. The same process that allows activists to change the meaning of texts is available to ev eryone.\r\n commonplace culture has the potential to create and transform both social structure and norms. Additionally, communities of common exposure and belief can be developed utilize popular culture as a medium. There may be a risk of that subversive ideas can be incorporated by dominant systems of power, but this internalisation does not necessarily limit the transformative potential popular culture holds. When considering the culture jammer’s intent of questioning and changing norms popular culture becomes an interesting point of cultural injection.\r\nConclusion\r\nIn essence, the popular culture jam seeks to be appropriated into pop culture- it becomes pop culture and helps to redefine that which is popular. The result is a sort of â€Å"subpropriation,” where in the fountain seeks to have his or her work popularized in order to simultaneously popularize a previously subversive concept or idea. However, this appeal to the popular does not necessarily stop culture jamming from occurring. first appearance into popular culture does not range that the message will be recuperated by industry. Rather, popular culture jamming takes place at a different point than other types of culture jamming. The â€Å"jam” in popular culture jamming occurs at the point that the artifact, action, or behavior becomes popular.\r\nThe most obvious effect of moving towards a jamming of popular culture is the increased access to larger audiences. Popular culture does not request to be cover in the same way that news-oriented communication or advertisements often do. Instead, popular culture places demands upon media outlets to not only be cover but also be distributed to the masses. This sense of demand results because the popular is attractive to the media as a potential form of profit.\r\nAgain, we see Fiske’s (1989) theories on production and incorporation at work. A popular culture jam spreads as a result of its popularity. Often this popu larity is created by the irresistible profits that may be yielded from an artifact’s incorporation into the popular. In essence, one aspect of the structures that propagate and allow for globalization (and the subsequent problems that those in anti-globalization movements perceive to be resultant from it) to persist and thrive are turned back to criticize either itself or another portion of the hierarchal structure.\r\nPopular culture, despite the criticisms it often faces for lack of mundanity or intelligence, is an important element of our lives. Popular culture may also serve as a tool for those assay against globalization, rampant consumerism, and capitalist exploitation. Each time we turn on a television or listen to the radio or log on to the Internet we are exposing ourselves to popular culture. Popular culture should not be sensed as an noetic wasteland. While much of that which makes up popular culture may be perceived as being detrimental to society by any numbe r of people, activists and media scholars cannot abbreviate or reject it.\r\nPopular culture needs to be embraced and transformed through the use of producerly texts in order to modify and transform the genre into another glib conduit for activists. Popular culture is not going away. In the age of new media popular culture is becoming even more pervasive in our lives as media formats are combined. If embraced as a rhetorical forum by culture jammers, popular culture can be transformed into a more revelatory and revolutionary space for communicating ideals that activists wish to make popular.\r\nReferences\r\nArtz, L., (2004), The function of Self-centered Royals: The World According to Disney Animation, decisive Arts Journal, Vol. 18, No. 1, 116-146.\r\nBlackmore, S., (1999). The meme machine, beginning(a) ed., Oxford University Press.\r\nDebord, G., (1977), The association of the Spectacle. Available at http://library.nothingness.org/articles/SI/en/pub_contents.\r\nDery, M., (2004, Oct 10), Culture jamming: hacking, slashing and sniping in the empire of signs. Available at: http://www.markdery.com/ memoir/2004/10/cultureJamming_l.html.\r\nDownes, S., (1999, Oct. 4), Hacking memes. First Monday, 4.10. Available at: http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue4_l 0/downes/index.html.\r\nEco, U., (1984), Semiotics and the philosophy of language, 1st ed., Bloomington, regular army: Indiana University Press.\r\nFiske, J., (1989), Understanding popular culture. 1st ed. Boston, USA: Unwin Hyman.\r\nHarold, C. (2004). Pranking rhetoric: â€Å"culture jamming” as media activism. Critical Studies in Media Communication, Vol. 21, No. 3, 189-211.\r\nLasn, K., (2000), Culture Jam: How to throwback America’s Suicidal Consumer pig outâ€And Why We Must, 1st ed. New York, USA: HarperCollins Publishers.\r\nMcLuhan, M., (1964), Understanding Media. London, England: Routledge Press.\r\nReinsborough, P., (2003, Aug.), Decolonizing the revolutionary imagination, Journal of aesthetics and Protest, No.1, Available at: http://www.journalofaestheticsandprotest.org/l/de_colonizing/index.html.\r\nSimonson, P., (2001), friendly Noise and Segmented Rhythms: News, Entertainment, and Celebrity in the Crusade for Animal Rights, Communication Review, Vol. 4, No. , 399-420.\r\n'