Media Subcultures Spring 2015 TCS 159 Shared Field Notebook James Clifford: “On Collecting Art and Culture” Natalie Lam (Shared Reading Summary/Analysis): This article provides an analysis of the criteria used when “collecting”, and how this criteria changes amongst collectors in relation to time period, cultural context and collection categories. However, when reading this article I often tended to find myself more interested not so much in the criteria, but more so in the collectors themselves. It seems like it is being argued that collections are only significant in the fact that they are collected? Which also parallels the Marxist theory that the source of the value of a product is the labor, as opposed to the materials used to produce it. That regardless of who the collector is (a child collecting rocks, or a museum curator collecting centuries old artwork for a national museum), it is the collector or group of collectors who create and assign the value of these objects by taking interest in them for whatever reason. I then made a connection with the latter example and the Social Capital Theory works of sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, and the idea that social networks have the power when assigning value. Collections are only significant when labeled significant by significant members of a significant, relevant group. This then provides an interesting perspective when analyzing Clifford’s statement that “cultures are ethnographic collections”. Each “culture collection” then seems valuable for different reasons depending on who is citing it as valuable (i.e. the participant or the observer?). Albert K. Cohen: "A General Theory of Subcultures" Emily Lin: In this article, Cohen addresses the connection between the nature of human problems and what produces them. Certain things are decided to be problems according to ones' own point of view, meaning that what decided to be correct for one individual may not be correct to the other. To solve these "problems" humans come up with solutions in hopes that they do not form new problems. For those who gather together and agree upon "solutions", they form a consensus, validating one another, coming together as a single unit. However, for those who disagree, judgements form and a clear division of opinions appear. As these groups gather, they share similar standards and therefore create new subcultures. A General Theory of Subcultures - Albert K. Cohen Ully Povoa It is assumed that all humans strive for acceptance, even if their actions to do so are ineffective. If confronted with a conflict in our frame of reference, we have two options: to allow our failure to become part of our frame of reference, or to find others who share our perspectives. However, it must be noted that the change in the self can only be accompanied by the change with others, for the whole purpose of a new subculture is to find social acceptance, even if by doing so we lose the acceptance of the greater culture. Ultimately, subcultures give us validity by finding others with like outlooks, however there are numerous barriers in communication that may prevent us from ever finding them. Intro to Birmingham - Ken Gelder; Girls and Subcultures - Angela McRobbie, Jenny Garber Daphne Liu 1. In explaining what exactly constitutes a subculture, Ken Gelder begins by looking at Raymond Williams and Phil Cohen whose work on youth subcultures and their place in the working-class served some guidance for other CCCS (Center for Contemporary Cultural Studies; Birmingham School) researchers. Phil Cohen talks about how the working class is to subcultural identity as the youth are to subcultural studies. The working class is so important to subcultures because of how the “narrative positioning” of its story is essentially what places the working class at the base of subcultural identity formations (p 82). Essentially, recounting the “‘history from below’” of a