“I’m not Always Laughing at the Jokes”

2011 ◽  
pp. 108-121
Author(s):  
Julie Faulkner ◽  
Bronwyn T. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
American Students ◽  
The Us ◽  
Student Cohorts ◽  
On Line ◽  
Television Study

Humor in popular culture plays with our perceptions and sense of dislocation. The inherently ambiguous logic of humor allows for multiple interpretations of social phenomena, and constructs the world as arbitrary, multiple, and tenuous (Mulkay, 1988). At the same time, humor is one of the central elements of much of what young people find appealing in popular culture. Exploring the potential of humor to interrogate cultural assumptions, Australian and American students participated in a cross-cultural television study. The student cohorts then communicated on line, developing their reading of the sitcom in a cross-cultural forum. Their responses highlight the disruption to accepted patterns of social order that the play upon form, or parody, delivers. Through exploring ‘insider’ and ‘outsider’ readings of a television parody, this chapter explores how humorous conventions function to reflexively position readers, and thus invite critical readings of popular and engaging texts. It also examines broader questions of the role of the US in producing and distributing popular culture, and how readers might find creative and critical ways to deal with culturally disparate world views.

Riding Critical and Cultural Boundaries

2010 ◽  
pp. 71-82
Author(s):  
Julie Faulkner ◽  
Bronwyn T. Williams
Keyword(s):  
New Technologies ◽  
Literacy Practices ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Cultural Norms ◽  
Cultural Boundaries ◽  
American Students ◽  
Student Cohorts ◽  
On Line ◽  
Television Study ◽  
The Impact

This chapter explores the impact of new technologies on young peoples’ literacy practices, with a particular focus on humour as text. Acknowledging ways in which rapidly-changing cultural and technological conditions have reshaped how people work and play, the authors work within expanded definitions of literacy, or multiliteracies. Exploring the potential of humour to interrogate cultural assumptions, Australian and American students participated in a cross cultural television study. They viewed a ‘foreign’ sitcom, asking to what extent knowledge of the sitcom’s cultural norms was fundamental to an appreciation of the intended humour of the series. The student cohorts then communicated on line, developing their reading of the sitcoms in a cross cultural forum. The study asks how the students’ multiliterate practices, including their critical interpretations of television comedy, hold implications for literacy education.

Culture and the popular: Introduction to essays in memory of Brian Rigby

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 293-299
Author(s):  
Michael Kelly
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Cultural Studies ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Rapid Expansion ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
The Us ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Uk ◽  
French Cultural Studies

This article introduces the special number of French Cultural Studies commemorating the role of Brian Rigby as the journal’s first Managing Editor. It situates his contribution in the emergence of cultural history and French cultural studies during the rapid expansion of higher education from the 1960s in France, the UK, the US and other countries. It suggests that these new areas of study saw cultural activities in a broader social context and opened the way to a wider understanding of culture, in which popular culture played an increasingly important part. It argues that the study of popular culture can illuminate some of the most mundane experiences of everyday life, and some of the most challenging. It can also help to understand the rapidly changing cultural environment in which our daily lives are now conducted.

scholarly journals Vinay Lal, The Fury of COVID-19: The Politics, Histories, and Unrequited Love of the Coronavirus, New Dehli: Pan Macmillan Publishing, 2020.

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. iv-xi
Author(s):  
Syed sami Raza
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
The Us ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Uk

This book is composed of a set of disparate essays that are grounded in history, political economy, and philosophy. These essays focus on a range of topics addressing different dynamics of the coronavirus pandemic. They include history of pandemics, governmental discourse on health and practical strategies, the role of WHO, neo-liberal economic order and consumerism, social order and human attitudes, nationalism and immigration, and global warming and climate change. Shedding light on these various dynamics, Lal exposes the high claims made by the powerful states like the US, the UK, and European states about their superior political systems, health care programs, and welfare services.

scholarly journals Co-production, multiplied: Enactments of sex as a biological variable in US biomedicine

2021 ◽  
pp. 030631272098593
Author(s):  
Madeleine Pape
Keyword(s):  
Gender Inequality ◽  
Social Order ◽  
National Institutes Of Health ◽  
Political Order ◽  
Preclinical Research ◽  
Scientific Object ◽  
Biological Variable ◽  
The Us ◽  
Policy Mandate

In 2016 the US National Institutes of Health introduced a policy mandating consideration of Sex as a Biological Variable (SABV) in preclinical research. In this article, I ask what, precisely, is meant by the designation of sex as a ‘biological variable’, and how has its inclusion come to take the form of a policy mandate? Given the well documented complexity of ‘sex’ and the degree to which it is politically and scientifically contested, its enactment via policy as a biological variable is not a given. I explore how sex is multiply enacted in efforts to legitimate and realize the SABV policy and consider how the analytical lens of co-production sheds light on how and why this occurs. I show that the policy works to reassert scientific and political order by addressing two institutional concerns: the so-called reproducibility crisis in preclinical research, and pervasive gender inequality across the institution of biomedicine. From here, the entity that underpins this effort – sex as a biological variable – becomes more than one thing, with enactments ranging from an assigned category, to an outcome, to a causal biological force in its own right. Sex emerges as simultaneously entangled with yet distinct from gender, and binary (female/male) yet complex in its variation. I suggest that it is in the very attempt to delineate natural from social order, and in the process create the conditions to privilege a particular kind of science and account of embodied difference, that ontological multiplicity becomes readily visible. That this multiplicity goes unrecognized points to the unifying role of an overarching ideological commitment to sex as a presumed binary and biological scientific object, the institutional dominance of which is never guaranteed.

What Internet Use Does and Does Not Change in Scientific Communities

2003 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-51
Author(s):  
Jochen Gläser
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Internet Use ◽  
Theoretical Perspective ◽  
Analysis Data ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Scientific Communities ◽  
The Social ◽  
Data Production ◽  
New Phenomena

This article examines the supposedly new social phenomena produced by internet use in the scientific community that has been discussed in the literature and tackles the question of which social structures and practices are actually changing. This serves as a background against which to assess new phenomena. Since the internet’s main impact obviously concerns the transmission of data and information, a theoretical perspective on the way scientific communities produce knowledge and on the role of communication in that process is developed. It can be demonstrated that the internet leaves the social order of scientific communities unchanged but affects the mode of production of some scientific communities by providing opportunities for a communalization of raw data analysis, data production, and external contributions.

Televisual diplomacy: I am the Ambassador and Danish nation branding at home and abroad

Politics ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 430-447
Author(s):  
Robert A Saunders ◽  
Joel Vessels
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Reality Television ◽  
Nation Branding ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Television Series ◽  
Culture Form ◽  
The Us ◽  
At Home

In a time when the current US president came to office via a career in reality television, it seems unnecessary to argue that popular culture and International Relations intersect in meaningful and dramatic ways. Operating from this premise, mass-mediating the act of diplomacy via a television series presents a fecund object of analysis that questions many of the myths surrounding what we call the ‘diplomatic community’. Consequently, this article is interested in the geopolitical interposition of Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR) via the popular culture form of reality television. We achieve this through a close reading of the DR series I am the Ambassador/Jeg er ambassadøren fra Amerika (2014–2016), ‘starring’ the real US ambassador to Denmark. We situate Ambassador within the evolving space of ‘new diplomacy’ through an evaluation of how it imagines, popularises, and expands ‘everyday’ sites of diplomacy via mass-mediation. However, as we argue, the series – when viewed holistically – says more about the Danish state and its people than it does about the role of the US ambassador, thus functioning as a tool of nation branding as much at home as abroad.

scholarly journals Reaction to norm transgressions and Islamization threat in culturally tight and loose contexts: A case study of Germany vs. Russia

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liza Prokhorova ◽  
Johannes Klackl ◽  
Dmitrij Agroskin ◽  
Igor Grossmann ◽  
Yuri Alexandrov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Behavioral Approach ◽  
Neuronal Markers ◽  
North Americans ◽  
Defensive Strategies ◽  
Alpha Asymmetry ◽  
Line Bisection Task

Prior research shows that North Americans and Western Europeans react to threats with defensive strategies based on behavioral approach vs. inhibition systems (BAS/BIS) -- i.e., a desire to approach a goal or to avoid a threat. In the present research, we explored whether this phenomenon is more pronounced in tight cultures (e.g., Germany) as compared to loose cultures (e.g., Russia), testing how Germans and Russians respond to societal threats. We expected that due to the higher levels of cultural tightness, Germans would show stronger defensive reactions to threats than Russians. Additionally, we investigated the role of need for tightness (i.e., need for strict regulation of social order) in threat management processes. In Study 1, Germans recalling violations of societal norms produced stronger rightward bias on the line bisection task than Russians, indicative of greater BAS activation in Germans than in Russians. In Study 2, we used frontal alpha asymmetry, providing the first cross-cultural test of BIS-BAS reactions utilizing neuronal markers. In this study, presentation of societal threat in a video portraying Islamic immigration as a large-scale violation of social norms led to higher BIS activation among Germans than among Russians, if their need for tightness was high. We discuss the role of tightness, need for tightness, and type of threat for cross-cultural particularities of threat-induced motivational shifts.

scholarly journals A Comparison Of Chinese And American College Students Perceptions Of Professors Behaviors

2011 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Stork ◽  
Nell T. Hartley
Keyword(s):  
College Students ◽  
Classroom Behavior ◽  
Chinese Students ◽  
Cultural Dimensions ◽  
Cultural Foundations ◽  
American Students ◽  
The Us ◽  
Role Of Teachers ◽  
The Individual

This empirical study reports on similarities and differences in the perceptions that Chinese and American students hold about classroom behavior of professors. At issue is identifying behaviors deemed as acceptable as opposed to being offensive. Cultural dimensions and educational philosophical worldviews are offered for context, The underlying premise of the research is that professors establish and maintain the classroom tone; certain behaviors are expected by professors to promote a conducive learning environment. Fifty professors behaviors were scored by 405 college students at one university in China and one in the US. For the most part, Chinese students perceived the offensiveness of professors behaviors as significantly less egregious than did American students. Competence and respect for the individual are important to Americans while behaviors that demonstrate fulfillment of the role of teachers are important to Chinese students. This article not only explains the differing expectations students bring to the classroom, but some deep cultural foundations on which they are likely to be based.

scholarly journals The existence of karabhat symbolic communication in Tanean Lanjhang community in Madurese society

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 565
Author(s):  
Sudahri Sudahri ◽  
Rachmah Ida
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Qualitative Methodology ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Symbolic Communication ◽  
The People ◽  
The Family ◽  
Household Members ◽  
Close Relatives ◽  
Descriptive Qualitative

Tanean Lanjhang (the long yard) is a large yard with traditional Madurese houses built in a row and facing each other. ‘Tanean’ means the distance between one house and another. Meanwhile, ‘Lanjhang’ is the area of the yard that extends along the Tanean. The group that inhabits the Tanean Lanjhang is a genealogical group from one lineage, usually from the maternal (matrilineal) line. These social phenomena happened in Sanatengah Village, Pasean District, Pamekasan Regency. The current research used descriptive qualitative methodology and studied the people of Sanatengah Village, Pasean Subdistrict, Pamekasan Regency and all its community components. The results of this study indicated that the Tanean Lanjhang community is a social order that maintains the influence of relatives in life. Communication between relatives exists because of the role of Pangaseppo, or the eldest person of the family; Oreng Toah (parents), or mother and father; and Taretan, or siblings. Those were the three relatives who have the highest position in Madurese society and must be obeyed by every household members. In maintaining kinship, marriage is also arranged within close relatives, such as between cousins, uncles, and nieces. This study concluded that the Tanean Lanjhang upholds the values of kinship. Furthermore, kinship is not only built based on traditional houses but also the tradition of marriage between close relatives.

scholarly journals Human Prosocial Motivation and the Maintenance of Social Order

2014 ◽  
pp. 27-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Gächter
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Public Goods Game ◽  
Homo Economicus ◽  
Rational Agents ◽  
Prosocial Motivation ◽  
The Third ◽  
Do So

This chapter presents some insights from basic behavioral research on the role of human prosocial motivation to maintain social order. I argue that social order can be conceptualized as a public goods game. Past attempts to explain social order typically relied on the assumption of selfish and rational agents (“homo economicus”). The last twenty years of research in behavioral and experimental economics have challenged this view. After presenting the most important findings of recent research on human prosociality I discuss the evidence on three pillars of the maintenance of social order. The first pillar is internalized norms of cooperation, sustained by emotions such as guilt and shame. The second pillar is the behavior of other people who typically are “conditional cooperators” willing to cooperate if others do so as well. This motivation can sustain cooperation if enough people cooperate but can jeopardize social order if many others follow selfish inclinations. The third pillar is sanctions meted out to anyone who does not cooperate; ideally punishment can work as a mere threat without being executed much. The chapter also presents some evidence on the cross-cultural variability of some findings, in particular with regard to punishment behavior. The chapter concludes with remarks on future research.

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