University of Nottingham
School of American & Canadian Studies/Institute of Film & Television Studies
Module Title:
The Emergence of Mass Culture
Module Code:
Q42302
Credits:
20
Level:
2
Year:
2009-10
Semester:
1
Tutor:
John Fagg
John.Fagg@nottingham.ac.uk
0115 9514852
Office Hours:
Tuesday 2-3 and Thursday 4-5
Description of Module: Mass culture and mass media in various forms are dominant,
shaping forces in contemporary society: this module will explore their origins in
nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century America. While the focus of the module will be
the period 1880-1930, we will begin with a discussion of aspects of antebellum culture –
including PT Barnum’s various enterprises, minstrel shows and the penny press – that
introduce many of the cultural practices – and many of the key issues – that come to
shape American mass culture.
Turning to the period 1880-1930, we will address a number of areas that historians
have identified as origins for the fully developed mass culture of the twentieth century.
These include the evolution of theatres and amusements towards the early moving
picture shows; large scale tourist attractions such as Coney Island and the Chicago
World’s Fair (which hosted 14 million visitors in 1893); the growth of advertising as a
professionalised, national enterprise; and the contiguous emergence of department
stores, brand names and high circulation “national” magazines such as the Ladies Home
Journal and the Saturday Evening Post.
In order to understand the impact of these
developments, we will address the contested debate about the relationship between
mass culture and its audiences. To supplement the cultural histories from which much of
the module’s material required reading is drawn, we will explore paintings by the Ashcan
School and other artists who sort to record the new entertainment cultures of NYC, as
well as reading L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz – a bestselling children’s book which
is at once an example and an exploration of mass culture – and E.L. Doctorow’s Ragtime
– a novel that offers a postmodern perspective on many of the cultural and historical
developments discussed over the course of the module.
The module recognises that
“mass culture” is itself a politically loaded and highly contested term, and so will seek to
1
address the implications of distinctions between “mass,” “popular,” “commercial” and
“low” culture.
Aims & Objectives: To engage with a wide range of cultural “texts,” locating them
within various historical contexts; to assess the way that different kinds of massification
have shaped and altered American society; to engage with the pre-history of what can
be seen as a contemporary phenomenon; to offer an interdisciplinary approach to latenineteenth and early-twentieth-century American culture.
Learning Outcomes: A: Knowledge and Understanding of: 1) the historical
development of various forms of mass culture 2) attempts to theorise and critique
distinctions between “high” and “low”/“mass” and “popular” culture 3) the relationship
between modernity and mass culture B: Intellectual Skills: 1) thinking critically and
imaginatively about the subject matter 2) interpreting a wide range of primary and
secondary sources and locating them within broader historical contexts 3) engaging with
issues of interdisciplinarity 4) developing a critical language for discussing elements of
popular and material culture 5) integrating close analysis of literary representations into
cultural studies practice C: Professional and Practical Skills: 1) synthesising material
from a range of sources 2) identifying, comparing and evaluating key arguments and
claims in these sources 3) abstracting and transferring ideas and arguments from one
field to another 4) using web-based resources and archives D: Transferable Skills: 1)
the ability to communicate effectively in writing 2) presenting written work in an
appropriate manner 3) managing and taking responsibility for one’s own time and
learning
Timetable of lectures and seminars:
Lecture:
Tuesday 10-11 Trent LG11
Seminar:
Tuesday 1-2 ARCS B43
or
Tuesday 4-5 Portland E127
or
Thursday 3-4 Pope A13
Teaching and Learning Methods:
Lectures provide an opportunity to set out the contexts and histories of the topics we
address. Lectures on this course are involve images, film, quotes and discussion – so
attendance is really important as its not stuff you can catch up with from notes.
Lectures will also be as interactive as possible with opportunity to stop and ask questions
along the way.
Seminars are based around the weekly reading schedule and will involve class discussion,
groupwork and small group presentations.
The internet provides amazing resources for studying this topic and I will use lectures and
WebCT to guide you to the best material – seminars and coursework will give you the
opportunity to make use of independent internet research.
2
School Attendance Policy:
The School operates a strict attendance policy which is enforced on ALL modules across
ALL year groups. Seminar attendance is compulsory in this School. Failure to attend,
without notifying the module tutor and giving a valid reason (illness or exceptional
personal circumstances) BEFORE the class, wherever possible, may (if repeated) result
in a mark of zero for the module. Mistaking the time and venue of a seminar, deadlines
for other modules, problems with transport, and family holidays, are NOT valid excuses.
Our procedures are as follows:
1) Any student who fails to attend either 2 consecutive seminars or 3 seminars in
total on any module, will be contacted by the module tutor and asked to provide
a valid reason and supporting documentation for their absences.
2) Any student who fails to respond within 7 days or to provide a satisfatory
explanation with supporting evidence, will be asked to see the Senior Tutor for a
meeting. Failure to provide an explanation and supporting evidence at this stage
will merit a final warning that any further absences will result in a zero for the
module.
3) Any student who misses 5 classes in total without supporting documentation
will be awarded a mark of zero for the module for failing to fulfil their
commitments to the course. At this stage, a letter will be sent to the student’s
term-time and home addresses informing them of the School’s decision.
Students who wish to appeal the decision will have 14 days from the date of this
letter to produce supporting documentation for their absences. No other forms of
appeal will be accepted.
The implications of receiving a mark of zero for a module are very serious. Students will
NOT be offered a resit in the September period. They will be required to resit with
residence the following year before progressing to the next stage of their degree (thus
adding another year to their degee).
PLEASE NOTE: Students will be contacted about attendance matters in the first
instance via email. Failure to check these messages is not an acceptable reason for
failing to respond. If students have missed classes and have email problems then they
must come into the School to see the module tutor.
3
Assessment Mode and Weightings:
Assessment Type
Weight
Requirements
Exam 1
50 %
2 hour exam
Essay
40 %
2,000-2,500 words
Short Coursework Assignment
10%
800-1000 words
For information on the School’s Essay Guidelines, see
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/american/ugdocs/American_Studies___Film_Studies_UG_Es
say_Guidelines_0809.doc
Another useful resource designed to help first year students with basic questions about
essay writing, exams, seminars, is www.nottingham.ac.uk/pathways
Deadlines for Submission:
Short Coursework Assignment (worth 10% of the total mark) set in week 4
seminars and to be submitted by 12 noon Tuesday 27 October.
2,000 – 2,500 word essay (worth 40% of the total mark) to be submitted by 12
noon Thursday 26 November.
Two-hour exam will be during the January exam period.
Guidelines for Submission:
All assessed coursework for the School of American & Canadian Studies must be
submitted in two ways:
1. By electronic submission, through Turnitin
2. ONE paper copy to be handed in, either at the School Office, during Office
opening hours or, in the case of core modules, in Trent B76, at designated times,
together with the Turnitin submission receipt and a completed essay coversheet.
Both electronic and paper submission must take place by 12.00 noon on the
deadline date. The Turnitin receipt must be printed out and submitted with the paper
copy. The paper ID number from the receipt must be recorded on the essay coversheet.
4
The paper copy will NOT be accepted without a copy of the Turnitin receipt.
Penalty for late submission:
The usual penalty for lateness (5 marks per working day) will be applied to all
coursework which is not submitted both electronically to Turnitin and in paper form by
the deadline. Emailed coursework is not acceptable.
NB. Computer failure is not a valid reason for late submission of coursework.
Plagiarism:
The University regards cheating and plagiarism as serious academic offences. A mark
of ZERO is immediately awarded for the assessed work in question, and more serious
consequences can follow, including formal disciplinary action, and ultimately, dismissal
from the University.
Plagiarism is clearly defined in the Undergraduate Handbook for American & Canadian
Studies as:
“The substantial unacknowledged use of other people's work and the submission of
that work as though it were your own is regarded as plagiarism and will be
penalised heavily (see Essay Guidelines). This does not mean you cannot make
legitimate use of other resources. Essays generally involve the citation of passages from
books, articles, or other sources, either published or unpublished. But whenever such a
passage is quoted or paraphrased, acknowledgement must be made in an appropriate
manner. Also, collaboration with others must be acknowledged. You are required to sign a
statement (cover sheet) that you have acknowledged any assistance or substantial use of
the work of others when you submit all your written work.”
The “other sources” include websites and internet information. You should check with
module tutors as to which websites are appropriate for your research. Please note that
cutting and pasting passages from websites constitutes plagiarism.
The handbook text continues:
“Copying material from another student's essay (written in a previous year, for instance)
or copying from any of your other pieces of written work also constitutes plagiarism/ selfplagiarism. Should this be discovered, both you and the person who knowingly supplied
5
the copy will be penalised. If the supplier of the copy has already graduated, a note of
her/his offence will be put on her/his permanent record in the School.”
“If you are concerned about what to cite and how to go about doing so, see the School’s
Essay Guidelines or consult your module tutor.”
SCHOOL OF AMERICAN & CANADIAN STUDIES GENERIC ASSESSMENT CRITERIA
FOR BOTH COURSEWORK AND EXAMINATIONS
TUTORS MAY ADAPT THESE CRITERIA TO THEIR SPECIFIC WRITTEN
ASSESSMENT TASKS. A SEPARATE SET OF CRITERIA FOR ORAL ASSESSMENT IS
AVAILABLE.
Learning
Argument and
Sources and evidence
Written communication
outcomes
understanding
85
A work of genuine
Little additional research
A rare combination of intellect
cogency and originality
needed to warrant
and elegance
publication
80
Insightful; perceptive;
A very wide range of
Exemplary typography and
Exemplary
intellectual vigour;
sources consulted,
layout; felicitous expression;
standard
considerable originality;
demonstrating excellent
no errors of grammar;
depth of understanding
search skills; sources
sophisticated vocabulary;
directly addressed to
used with
structured appropriately to the
the question; very
discrimination; excellent
purposes of the assignment;
coherent synthesis of
judgement shown in
exemplary citation and
ideas; very high level of
assessment of
bibliography according to a
subject mastery; critical
evidence; sophisticated
standard convention
and thorough
use of examples;
understanding of key
independence of
concepts
judgement
75
Insightful; perceptive;
A wide range of sources
Excellent typography and
Excellent
some originality; depth
consulted; sources used
layout; lucid expression; no
standard
of understanding
with discrimination;
errors of grammar;
directly addressed to
sound assessment of
sophisticated vocabulary;
the question; coherent
evidence; sophisticated
structured appropriately to the
synthesis of ideas;
use of examples
purposes of the assignment;
70
critical and thorough
exemplary citation and
understanding of key
bibliography according to a
concepts
standard convention
Well argued and well
Well selected range of
6
Good to excellent typography
considered but lacking
sources with some signs
with some stylistic infelicities;
originality
of sophistication in their
exemplary citation practice
selected use
65-69
Good understanding
Well selected range of
Good typography and layout;
Proficient
directly addressed to
sources consulted;
good expression; few errors of
standard
the question; good
careful assessment of
grammar; appropriate use of
synthesis of ideas; good
evidence; good use of
vocabulary; well-structured;
understanding of key
examples
accurate and full citation and
60-64
concepts
bibliography
This answer would
Good typography and layout;
develop a logical
This answer would show
in general, good expression but
argument with
a good ability to handle
there maybe some
perception, expository
concepts as well as a
unnecessary errors of grammar
skill, balance, and a
good range of sources
as well as perhaps some
degree of insight which
consulted but could be
inconsistencies with structure.
lifts it above the sound
extended further to
A good and thorough use of the
and competent level
provide evidence of
bibliography.
which, in general,
additional connections
characterises a 2.2
and independent
answer.
research.
55-59
Competent
A range of sources
Adequate typography and
Majority at
understanding
consulted; some careful
layout; expression such that
a
addressed to the
assessment of
the meaning is generally
competent
question; fair
evidence; some
understandable; few serious
standard
understanding of key
appropriate examples
errors of grammar;
concepts; some
inconsistent citation and
weaknesses of
bibliography with significant
understanding and
omissions
knowledge but not in
significant areas
50-54
This answer would
Some good source
Acceptable typography and
display a satisfactory
material which is not
layout; some grammatical
level of relevance and
analysed in great depth
errors and loose or wordy
knowledge but is often
and with limited use of
expression.
weakened by a lack of
appropriate examples
7
focus.
45-49
Only partly addressed
Restricted range of
Poor typography and layout;
Acceptable
to the question; lacking
sources consulted; only
considerable number of
standard
in synthesis of ideas;
basic understanding of
grammatical errors; limited
tendency to description
evidence; limited range
vocabulary; inaccurate citation
rather than analysis;
of examples, sometimes
and bibliography with
limited understanding of
inappropriate ones
significant omissions
This answer would
Very limited use of
Inadequate typography and
adopt a descriptive
sources consulted;
layout; errors of organisation
approach based on
inconsistent
so that the essay has very little
superficial knowledge
understanding of
obvious focus or argument;
evidence; inclusion of
ambiguously written so its
none to few examples;
main area of discussion
some irrelevant material
remains unclear.
key concepts
40-44
35
Weak structure; largely
Minimal range of
Poor presentation; numerous
Marginal
irrelevant to set
sources consulted; very
and significant grammatical
question; considerable
limited understanding of
errors; significantly restricted
misunderstanding of
evidence; minimal
vocabulary; inadequate citation
key concepts
range use of examples;
and bibliography
little use of sources
beyond direct
paraphrase of lectures,
easily available texts or
web pages
30 Below
Substandard and
Highly derivative
Poor presentation; significant
standard
misconceived in its
grammatical errors; highly
approach
restricted vocabulary; little or
no citation and incomplete
bibliography
20-29 Well
Only marginally
Little attempt to support
Poor grammar and vocabulary
below
addresses the question;
any assertions; no use
makes it difficult to decipher
passable
fundamental
of sources beyond direct
any intended meaning; no
standard
misunderstanding of
paraphrase of lectures
citation; no relevant
key concepts; mostly
or easily available texts
bibliography
irrelevant; no line of
or web pages;
argument
10-19 Very
Few relevant elements;
No attempt to support
8
Poor grammar and vocabulary
few
only fragmentary
assertions; some
makes it very difficult to
learning
arguments; only slight
plagiarism and/or
understand the intended
outcomes
evidence of
collusion
meaning
met
understanding of key
concepts
1-10 Far
No evidence of learning
Considerable plagiarism
Short answer; note form;
from
anything from the unit,
and/or collusion
mostly incomprehensible
meeting
although there may be
any
elements derived from
learning
general knowledge
outcome
0
No work submitted or extensive plagiarism and/or collusion
SCHOOL OF AMERICAN AND CANADIAN STUDIES
Disability & Dyslexia Support:
The University of Nottingham is committed to promoting access for students who have a
disability, dyslexia and/or a long-term medical condition. Services provided aim to
enable students to fulfil the inherent requirements of the course as independently as
possible.
The University’s Disability Plan for Students: 2007-09, Disability Statement and
[dis]Ability Directory, which lists all the provision available at the University, can be
accessed from the Disability Policy Advisory Unit:
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/disability/
It is your responsibility to ensure that the University is aware of your individual
requirements. If you have a disability, specific learning difficulty (such as dyslexia) or
long-term medical condition, you are urged to inform the School’s Disability Liaison
Officer (DLO) and/or your personal tutor.
DLO contact details are:
Stephanie Lewthwaite (Semester 1)
Room B51 Trent Building
Tel:
0115 8466458
Email: stephanie.lewthwaite@nottingham.ac.uk
9
Robin Vandome (Semester 2)
Room B50 Trent Building
Tel:
0115 8468356
Email: robin.vandome@nottingham.ac.uk
The DLO or personal tutor may refer you to Academic Support (based in Portland
Building). Academic Support, in Student Services, includes the Disability and Dyslexia
Support teams, and offers a range of academic and practical support for all students.
It incorporates a recognised ASSESSMENT Centre for those who wish to apply for
Disabled Students’ Allowances, carrying out the assessments required by your LEA or
funding body. Academic Support is also responsible for making recommendations for
alternative arrangements such as those required in assessments, exams and for
timetabling. Assistance can also be given with regard to queries about adapted
accommodation and University provision of accessible transport.
Contact details are:
Tel:
+44 (0) 115 951 3710
Fax:
+44 (0) 115 951 4376
Minicom:
+44 (0) 115 951 4378
email:
studentservices@nottingham.ac.uk
Web:
www.nottingham.ac.uk/as
Please remember that letting us know what you might need at an early stage will help
us to help you.
Religious Observance:
The University respects the rights and religious views of its students. Students who are
unable to take examinations on a particular day during the published examination
periods for reasons of religious observance should complete and return a Religious
Observance Form by the published deadlines.
Full information on the University’s protocol relating to absence from an examination for
reason of religious observance can be found at:
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/courses-office/examinations/index.htm
Module Feedback:
Feedback on all modules in the School is an ongoing and two-way process.
Feedback from your tutor(s) will include:
10

Informal feedback, advice and ideas in seminar discussions

Individual feedback, advice and ideas during appointments in office hours

Individual written feedback on coursework (normally within three weeks of
submission)

Response to email enquiries (normally within seven days)

Generic feedback on exam performance communicated via the portal
If there are questions or concerns – or things that you really like – about the module
you can raise these in the following ways:

Contact the module convenor (if appropriate)

Contact your personal tutor

Contact the student ombudsman (John.Fagg@nottingham.ac.uk)

Pass your concerns to your SSFC rep
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/american/ugdocs/Undergraduate_Staff_Student_F
eedback_Committee.php

The module may also be subject to SET/SEM evaluation, in which case you will
have the opportunity to complete a detailed, anonymous evaluation at the end of
the semester.
11
Lecture/Seminar Schedule
For required reading you will need to purchase:
L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - Penguin ISBN 0140621679*
E.L. Doctorow, Ragtime - Penguin ISBN 0141188170*
*These are cheap editions and will be available from Blackwell’s from the start of term –
you can buy them ahead of time from amazon.co.uk
All other required reading will be included in the course pack which will be
available to purchase from the School Office from the start of term.
Week 1: Introduction
Required Reading: Nick Heffernan, “Popular Culture” from Howard Temperley and
Christopher Bigsby eds. A New Introduction to American Studies (Harlow: Pearson
Longman, 2006) (in course pack)
Week 2: Precursors to Mass Culture: P.T. Barnum, Minstrel Shows and the
Penny Press
Required Reading: Jim Cullen, “Democratic Vistas: The Emergence of Popular Culture,
1800-1860” from The Art of Democracy (in course pack)
Week 3: Advertising, Fraudulence and Legitimacy
Required Reading: T.J. Jackson Lears, “From Salvation To Self-Realization: Advertising
and the Therapeutic Roots of the Consumer Culture, 1880-1930” (in course pack)
Week 4: Magazines and the Creation of Mass Audiences
Required Reading: Richard Ohmann, “The Origins of Mass Culture” and excerpt from
“Charting Social Space” from Selling Culture
Class Test Set
Week 5: Amusements from Vaudeville to the First Picture Shows
Required Reading: David Nasaw, “‘Something for Everybody’ at the Vaudeville
Theater” and “The First Picture Shows” from Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public
Amusements (in course pack)
Class Test Deadline Tuesday 27 October
Week 6: Coney Island and the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair
Required Reading: Kathy Peiss, “The Coney Island Excursion” from Cheap
Amusements and excerpt from Gary S. Cross and John K. Walton, “The Crowd and Its
Critics” from The Playful Crowd (in course pack)
12
Week 7: Window Dressing, Consumer Society and The Wizard of Oz
Required Reading: L. Frank Baum, The Wizard of Oz
Week 8: Race, Identity and Mass Culture
Required Reading:
Micki McElya, “The Life of ‘Aunt Jemima’” from Clinging to Mammy: The Faithful Slave in
Twentieth-Century America
Susan Curtis, excerpt from “Introduction” and “The Legacy of Scott Joplin” from Dancing
to a Black Man’s Tune: A Life of Scott Joplin
Week 9: Records, Radios, Cars … and Consumers
Required Reading: Robert S. and Helen M. Lynd, “Inventions Re-making Leisure” from
Middletown: A Study in Modern American Culture
Lizabeth Cohen, “Encountering Mass Culture at the Grassroots: The Experience of
Chicago Workers in the 1920s,” American Quarterly, Vol. 41, No. 1 (Mar., 1989), pp. 633 (in course pack)
Essay Deadline Thursday 26 November
Week 10: Ragtime
Required Reading: E.L. Doctorow, Ragtime
Week 11: The Mass Culture Debate
Excerpt from Lawrence Levine, “The Folklore of Industrial Society: Popular Culture and
its Audiences” (in course pack)
Michael Denning, “The End of Mass Culture” in Naremore and Brantlinger eds.,
Modernity and Mass Culture
General Reading List
Gunther Barth, City People: The Rise of Modern City Culture in Nineteenth-Century
America (New York: O.U.P., 1980) HT123.B2
Gerald R. Baydo ed., The Evolution of Mass Culture in America - 1877 to the Present
(St. Louis, Mo.: Forum Press, 1982) HN57.E8
Lizabeth Cohen ed., A Consumer's Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in
Postwar America (New York: Vintage Books, 2004) HC110.C6
David B. Clarke, Marcus A. Doel & Kate M.L. Housinaux, The Consumption Reader
(London: Routledge, 2003) HC79.C6.C6 pp Rachael Bowlby, “Commerce and
Femininity"
Lizabeth Cohen, “The Mass in Mass Consumption” Reviews in American History > Vol.
13
18, No. 4 (Dec., 1990), pp. 548-555 JSTOR
** Jim Cullen ed., Popular Culture in American History (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell
Publishers, 2001) E161.P66
** Jim Cullen, The Art of Democracy: A Concise History of Popular Culture in the United
States (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2002) E161.C8
** Richard Wightman Fox and T.J. Jackson Lears eds., The Culture of Consumption:
Critical Essays in American History, 1880-1980 (New York: Pantheon Books,
1983) HC110.C6.F6
** Richard Wightman Fox and T.J. Jackson Lears eds., The Power of Culture: Critical
Essays in American History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993)
E169.1.P6
Neil Harris, Cultural Excursions: Marketing Appetites and Cultural Tastes in Modern
America (Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press, 1990) HN57.H2
Herbert J. Gans, Popular Culture and High Culture: An Analysis and Evaluation of Taste
(New York: Basic Books, 1999) E169.1.G2
** Michael Kammen, American Culture, American Tastes: Social Change and the 20th
Century (New York: Basic Books, 1999) E169.1.K2
T.J. Jackson Lears, No Place of Grace: Antimodernism and the Transformation of
American Culture, 1880-1920 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994)
E169.1.L48
** Lawrence W. Levine, Highbrow/Lowbrow: The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in
America (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1988) E169.1.L4
Lawrence W. Levine, The Unpredictable Past: Explorations in American Cultural History
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1993) E169.1.L4
Chandra Mukerji and Michael Schudson eds., Rethinking Popular Culture: Contemporary
Perspectives in Cultural Studies (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991)
GN357 RET
James Naremore and Patrick Brantlinger eds., Modernity and Mass Culture
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991) CB430.M6
David Nasaw, Going Out: The Rise and Fall of Public Amusements (1993) GV 53.NAS
David Nye and Carl Pedersen eds., Consumption and American Culture (Amsterdam: VU
University Press, 1991)E169.1.C6
Miles Orvell, The Real Things: Limitations and Authority in American Culture, 1880-1940
E169.1.O7
Bernard Rosenberg, David Manning White eds., Mass Culture Revisited (New York: Van
Nostrand Reinhold, 1971) HM258.R6
Joan Shelley Rubin, The Making of Middle/brow Culture (Chapel Hill: University of North
Carolina Press, 1992) Z1003.2.R8
** Thomas J. Schlereth, Victorian America: Transformations in Everyday Life, 1876-
14
1915 (New York: HarperPerennial, 1992) E169.1.S3
Dominic Strinati, An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture (London: Routledge,
2004) HM258.S8
** William R. Taylor ed., Inventing Times Square: Commerce and Culture at the
Crossroads of the World (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991)
F128.65.T4
Alan Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America: Culture and Society in the Gilded Age
(New York: Hill and Wang, 1982) E169.1.T7
Peter Gibian, Mass Culture and Everyday Life E169.Z82.M2
Useful Theoretical/Interpretative Approaches
Jonathan Bignell, Media Semiotics: An Introduction (Manchester: Manchester University
Press, 2002) PN1990.9.B4
Kaja Silverman, The Subject of Semiotics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983)
P325.S4
Marcel Danesi, Messages, Signs, and Meanings: A Basic Textbook in Semiotics and
Communication (Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press, 2004) P99.D2
Roland Barthes, Mythologies, selected and translated by Annette Lavers (London:
Vintage, 1993) HN425.5.B2
Roland Barthes, A Barthes Reader, Susan Sontag ed. (London: Vintage, 1993) PN37.B2
Jonathan Culler, Barthes: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2002) P85.B2.C8
James Curran and Michael Gurevitch eds. Mass Media and Society (London: Hodder
Arnold, 2005) HM1206.M2
Stuart Hall ed., Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices
(London: SAGE, 1997) HM101.R4
Raymond Williams, Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society (London: Fontana,
1988) H41.W4
Raymond Williams, Culture and Society, 1780-1950 (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1983) PR149.S7
Andrew Milner, Re-imagining Cultural Studies: The Promise of Cultural Materialism – eresource
T. J. Jackson Lears, The Concept of Cultural Hegemony: Problems and
Possibilities The American Historical Review > Vol. 90, No. 3 (Jun., 1985), pp.
567-593 JSTOR
Steve Jones, Antonio Gramsci (London: Routledge, 2006) JC265.G7.J6
15
Topic Reading Lists
Week 2: Precursors to Mass Culture: P.T. Barnum, Minstrel Shows and the
Penny Press
Barnum
** Phineas T. Barnum; James W. Cook ed., The Colossal P.T. Barnum Reader: Nothing
Else Like It in the Universe (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2005)
GV1811.B3.B2
** James W. Cook, The Arts of Deception: Playing with Fraud in the Age of Barnum
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001) E166.C6
Michael Leja, Looking Askance:Skepticism and American Art from Eakins to Duchamp
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004) Oversize N7430.5.L4 pp
“Mumler’s Fraudulent Photographs”
Neil Harris, Humbug: The Art of P. T. Barnum (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1981) GV1811.B3.Z
Eric Fretz, “P.T. Barnum’s Theatrical Selfhood and the Nineteenth-Century Culture of
Exhibition” in Rosemarie Garland Thomson ed., Freakery: Cultural Spectacles of
the Extraordinary Body (New York: New York University Press, 1996) GN68 FRE
http://www.lostmuseum.cuny.edu/intro.html (requires Flash 7)
http://www.ptbarnum.org/
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/barnum/index.htm
http://www.hti.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=moa;idno=AFW8590
On Minstrelsy, see the week 8 bibliography
Penny Press
** Michael Schudson, Discovering the News: A Social History of American Newspapers
(New York: Basic Books, 1978) PN4855.S3
Hans Bergmann, God in the Street: New York Writing from the Penny Press to Melville
(Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1995) PS255.N5.B4
David M. Henkin, City Reading: Written Words and Public Spaces in Antebellum New
York (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998) F128.44.H4 pp “The Rise of
the Daily Paper”
Gunther Barth, City People: The Rise of Modern City Culture in Nineteenth-Century
America (New York: O.U.P., 1980) HT123.B2 pp. “Chapter 3: Metropolitan Press”
Week 3: Advertising, Fraudulence and Legitimacy
** Susan Strasser, Satisfaction Guaranteed: The Making of the American Mass Market
(Pantheon, 1989) HF5813.U6.S8
16
** Pamela Walker Laird, Advertising Progress: American Business and the Rise of
Consumer Marketing (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998)
HF5813.U6.L2
Stephen Fox, The Mirror Makers: A History of American Advertising and Its Creators
(New York: Vintage, 1985) Business Library HF5813.U6.F6
Michele H. Bogart, Artists, Advertising, and the Borders of Art (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1995) NC998.5.A1.B6
T.J. Jackson Lears, Fables of Abundance: A Cultural History of Advertising in America
(New York: Basic Books, 1994) HF5813.U6.L4
Judith Williamson, Decoding Advertisements: Ideology and Meaning in Advertising
(London: Marion Boyars, 1978) HF5822.W4
Ellen Gruber Garvey, The Adman in the Parlor: Magazines and the Gendering of
Consumer Culture, 1880s to 1910s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996)
PS374.S5.G2
William R. Taylor, In Pursuit of Gotham: Culture and Commerce in New York (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1992) F128.47.T2 pp “Launching a Commercial Culture:
Newspaper, Magazine and Popular Novel as Urban Baedekers”
Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream: Making Way for Modernity, 19201940 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985) NC998.5.M2
Michael Schudson, Advertising, The Uneasy Persuasion: Its Dubious Impact on American
Society (New York: Basic Books, 1984) Business Library HF5813.U6
William Leiss, Stephen Kline and Sut Jhally, Social Communication in Advertising:
Persons, Products, and Images of Well-being (London: Methuen, 1986)
HF5821.L4
Stuart Ewen, Captains of Consciousness: Advertising and the Social Roots of the
Consumer Culture (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1976) Business Library HF5813.U6
Mary Douglas and Baron Isherwood, The World of Goods: Towards an Anthropology of
Consumption (London: Routledge, 1996) HB801.D6
James D. Norris, Advertising and the Transformation of American Society, 1865-1920
(New York: Greenwood Press, 1990) Business Library HF5813.U6.N6
Week 4: Magazines and the Creation of a Mass Audience
** Richard Ohmann, Selling Culture: Magazines, Markets, and Class at the Turn of the
Century (London: Verso, 1998) HF5813.U6.O4
** Carolyn Kitch, The Girl on the Magazine Cover: The Origins of Visual Stereotypes in
American Mass Media (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001)
P94.5.W652.K4
Tom Pendergast, Creating the Modern Man: American Magazines and Consumer Culture,
1900-1950 – e-resource
17
Theodore P. Greene, America’s Heroes: The Changing Models of Success in American
Magazines (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970) E169.1.G7
Christopher Wilson, “The Rhetoric of Consumption: Mass Market Magazines and the
Demise of the Gentle Reader, 1880-1920” in Richard Wightman Fox and T. J.
Jackson Lears eds., The Culture of Consumption
Joshua Brown, Beyond the Lines: Pictorial Reporting, Everyday Life, and the Crisis of
Gilded Age America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002) PN4834.B7
Michael Denning, Mechanic Accents: Dime Novels and Working-Class Culture in America
(Verso, 1987) PS374.D5
Jan Cohn, The Business Ethic for Boys: "The Saturday Evening Post" and the
Post Boys The Business History Review, Vol. 61, No. 2. (Summer, 1987), pp.
185-215 JSTOR
Kathryne V. Lindberg, Mass Circulation versus The Masses: Covering the Modern
Magazine Scene boundary 2, Vol. 20, No. 2. (Summer, 1993), pp. 51-83
JSTOR
Richard Ohmann, History and Literary History: The Case of Mass Culture Poetics
Today, Vol. 9, No. 2, The Rhetoric of Interpretation and the Interpretation of
Rhetoric. (1988), pp. 357-375 JSTOR
Week 5: Public Amusements: From Vaudeville to the First Picture Shows
Robert Snyder, “Vaudeville and the Transformation of Popular Culture” in William Taylor
ed., Inventing Times Square
Richard Butsch, “Bowery B'hoys and Matinee Ladies: The Re-Gendering of NineteenthCentury American Theater Audiences” American Quarterly, Vol. 46, No. 3. (Sep.,
1994), pp. 374-405.
John F. Kasson, Houdini, Tarzan, and the Perfect Man: The White Male Body and the
Challenge of Modernity in America (New York: Hill and Wang, 2001)
HQ1090.3.K2
David Nasaw, Going Out
Bill Brown, The Material Unconscious: American Amusement, Stephen Crane and the
Economies of Play (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996)
PS1449.C85.Z BRO
Early Cinema [videorecording] (London: British Film Institute, 2002) Video
PN1993.5.A1.E2
David Robinson, From Peep Show to Palace: The Birth of American Film (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1996) PN1993.5.U6.R6
Lary May, Screening Out the Past: The Birth of Mass Culture and the Motion Picture
Industry (Chicago: Chicago UP, 1983) PN1995.9.S6
Charles Musser, The Emergence of Cinema: The American Screen to 1907 (New York:
18
Scribner's, 1990) PN1993.5.U6.M8
Tom Gunning, D.W. Griffith and the Origins of American Narrative Film: The Early Years
at Biograph (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1991) PN1998.A3.G74
Tom Gunning, “The Aesthetic of Astonishment: Early Film and the (In)credulous
Spectator,” in Viewing Positions: Ways of Seeing Film, ed. Linda Williams (New
Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1995) 114-133 PN1995.V4,
Thomas Elsaesser with Adam Barker eds., Early Cinema: Space, Frame, Narrative
(London: BFI Publishing, 1990) PN1993.5.E2
Ben Singer, Melodrama and Modernity: Early Sensational Cinema and its Contexts (New
York: Columbia University Press, 2001) PN1995.9.M45.S4
http://www.earlycinema.com/index.html
“The Innovators 1900-1910: Time After Time,” BFI Sight and Sound Feature
http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/145/
Week 6: Coney Island and the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair
Coney Island
** John F. Kasson, Amusing the Million: Coney Island at the Turn of the Century (New
York: Hill & Wang, 1978) F129.C75
** Kathy Peiss, Cheap Amusements: Working Women and Leisure in Turn-of-theCentury (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1986) F124.P4
** Gary S. Cross and John K. Walton, The Playful Crowd: Pleasure Places in the
Twentieth Century (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005) GV1851 CRO
Woody Register, The Kid of Coney Island: Fred Thompson and the Rise of American
Amusements (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001) GV1852.2.T4
Michele H. Bogart, “Barking Architecture: The Sculpture of Coney Island” Smithsonian
Studies in American Art Vol. 2, No. 1 (Winter, 1988)
John Fagg, “From back number aesthetics to new expression: James Gibbons Huneker's
New Cosmopolis” European Journal of American Culture, 28(1), 21-40
Lewis A. Erenberg, Steppin’ Out: New York Nightlife and the Transformation of American
Culture, 1890-1930 (Chicago: University of Chicago) Press, 1984 F128.5.E7
Rem Koolhaas, Delirious New York: A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan (New York:
Monacelli Press, 1994) NA735.N5 KOO
George Chauncey, Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Makings of the Gay
Male World, 1890-1940 (New York: Basic Books, 1994) HQ76.2.U6
David E. Nye, Electrifying America: Social Meanings of a New Technology, 1880-1940
(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1990) HD9685.U6.N9
Jon Sterngass, First Resorts: Pursuing Pleasure at Saratoga Springs, Newport, and
Coney Island – e-resource
Stephen Crane, “Coney Island’s Failing Days” in The University of Virginia Edition of the
19
Works of Stephen Crane. Vol. 8, Tales, Sketches and Reports
(Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1973)
James Huneker, “Coney Island: By Day; By Night” in New Cosmopolis – PDF available to
download at http://www.archive.org/details/newcosmopolisboo00hune
Gunther Barth, City People: The Rise of Modern City Culture in Nineteenth-Century
America (New York: O.U.P., 1980) HT123.B2 pp. “Chapter 4: Department Store”
World’s Fair
** Neil Harris et al, Grand Illusions: Chicago's World's Fair of 1893 (Chicago: Chicago
Historical Society, 1993) NK512.C4
Robert W. Rydell et al, Revisiting the White City: American Art at the 1893 World's Fair
(Washington, D.C.: National Museum of American Art and National Portrait
Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 1993) Oversize N6510.R4
** Christopher Gair, “Whose America?: White City and the Shaping of National Identity,
1893-1905” Three Cities Project http://artsweb.bham.ac.uk/citysites/
Robert W. Rydell and Nancy E. Gwinn eds., Fair Representations: World's Fairs and the
Modern World (Amsterdam: V.U. University Press, 1994)
** Judith A. Adams, The American Amusement Park Industry: A History of Technology
and Thrills (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1991) GV 1853.2.A3
David F. Burg, Chicago's White City of 1893 (Lexington: University Press of
Kentucky, 1976) NK512.C4
Reid Badger, The Great American Fair: The World's Columbian Exposition & American
Culture (Chicago, Ill.: Nelson Hall, 1979)
Marian Shaw, World's Fair Notes: A Woman Journalist Views Chicago’s 1893 Columbian
Exposition (Pogo Press, 1992) NK512.C4
Stanley Appelbaum, The Chicago World's Fair of 1893: A Photographic Record (New
York: Dover, 1980) Oversize NK512.C4
Karal Ann Marling, “Writing History with Artifacts: Columbus at the 1893 Chicago Fair,”
pp. 13-30 JSTOR
Week 7: Window Dressing, Consumer Society and The Wizard of Oz
Stuart Culver, “What Manikins Want: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and The Art of
Decorating Dry Goods Windows” Representations, No. 21 (Winter, 1988), pp. 97116
Helen M. Kim, “Strategic Credulity: Oz as Mass Cultural Parable” Cultural Critique, No.
33 (Spring, 1996), pp. 213-233
Vivian Wagner, “Unsettling Oz: Technological Anxieties in the Novels of L. Frank Baum”
The Lion and the Unicorn 30 (2006) 25–53
Joel D. Chaston, “Baum, Bakhtin, and Broadway: A Centennial Look at the Carnival of
20
Oz” The Lion and The Unicorn 25 (2001) 128–149
Jack Zipes, When Dreams Came True: Classical Fairy Tales and their Tradition (New
York: Routledge, 1999) LB1138.Z4
Martin Gardner and Russel B. Nye eds. The Wizard of Oz and Who he Was (East
Lansing: Michigan State UP, 1994) PS3503.A923
William Leach, Land of Desire: Merchants, Power, and the Rise of a New American
Culture (New York: Vintage Books, 1993) HF5465.U6.L4
Simon J. Bronner ed., Consuming Visions: Accumulation and Display of Goods in
America, 1880-1920 (New York: W.W. Norton, 1989) HF5845.C6
William R. Leach, “Transformations in a Culture of Consumption: Women and
Department Stores, 1890-1925” The Journal of American History, Vol. 71, No. 2.
(Sep., 1984), pp. 319-342. JSTOR
Rachel Bowlby, Just Looking: Consumer Culture in Dreiser, Gissing and Zola (New York:
Methuen, 1985) PN3499.B6
Michael B. Miller, The Bon Marché: Bourgeois Culture and the Department Store 18691920 (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1981) HF5464.F7.M4
Thorstein Veblen, The Theory of the Leisure Class (Amherst, NY.: Prometheus Books,
1998) HB831.V4
John P. Diggins, The Bard of Savagery: Thorstein Veblen and Modern Social Theory
(Hassocks: Harvester Press, 1978) HB119.V4.D4
Stjepan Mestrovic, Thorstein Veblen on Culture and Society – e-resource
Week 8: Race, Identity and Mass Culture
Micki McElya, Clinging to Mammy: The Faithful Slave in Twentieth-Century
America (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007) E185.86.M2
Diane Roberts, The Myth of Aunt Jemima: Representations of Race and Region [eresource]
Michael D. Harris, Colored Pictures: Race and Visual Representation (Chapel Hill, N.C.:
University of North Carolina Press, 2003) Oversize N8232.H2 pp. Chapter 3 “Aunt
Jemima, the Fantasy Black Mammy/Servant”
Melvin Patrick Ely, The Adventures of Amos 'n' Andy: A Social History of an American
Phenomenon (Charlottesville, Va.: University Press of Virginia, 2001)
PN1991.77.A5
Sabine Haenni, The Immigrant Scene: Ethnic Amusements in New York, 1880-1920
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2008) PN2277.N4.H2
Jan Nederveen Pieterse, White on Black: Images of Africa and Blacks in Western Popular
Culture (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992) N8232.N4
Michael Pickering, Stereotyping: The Politics of Representation (Basingstoke: Palgrave,
21
2001) HM216.P4
Michael Rogin, Blackface, White Noise: Jewish Immigrants in the Hollywood Melting Pot
(Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1996) PN1995.9.N4.R6
Mark A. Reid, Redefining Black Film (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993)
PN1995.9.N4.R4
Thomas Cripps, Slow Fade to Black: The Negro in American Film, 1900-1942 [eresource]
Donald Bogle, Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of
Blacks in American Films, 4th ed. (New York: Continuum, 2001) PN1995.9.N4
Ed Guerrero, Framing Blackness: The African American Image in Film (Philadelphia:
Temple University Press, 1993) PN1995.9.N4.G8
Susan Curtis, Dancing to a Black Man’s Tune: A Life of Scott Joplin (Columbia: U of
Missouri P, 1994) ML410 JOP CUR
Brenda Dixon Gottschild, Waltzing in the Dark: African American Vaudeville and Race
Politics in the Swing Era (New York: Palgrave, 2002) GV1785.W3 GOT
David Wondrich, Stomp and Swerve: American Music Gets Hot, 1843-1924 (Chicago,
Ill.: Chicago Review Press, 2003) ML3477
Lynn Abbott and Doug Seroff, Ragged But Right: Black Traveling Shows, "Coon Songs,"
and the Dark Pathway to Blues and Jazz [e-resource]
On blackface minstrelsy
** Eric Lott, Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1993) PS456.N4
W.T. Lhamon, Jr., Jump Jim Crow: Lost Plays, Lyrics, and Street Prose of the First
Atlantic Popular Culture (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003)
PS509.N4.L4
Dale Cockrell, Demons of Disorder: Early Blackface Minstrels and Their World
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) PS456.M4.C6
W.T. Lhamon, Jr., Raising Cain: Blackface Performance from Jim Crow to Hip Hop
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998) PN1969.M5.L4
William J. Mahar, Black English in Early Blackface Minstrelsy: A New
Interpretation of the Sources of Minstrel Show Dialect American Quarterly,
Vol. 37, No. 2. (Summer, 1985), pp. 260-285. JSTOR
Eric Lott, The Seeming Counterfeit": Racial Politics and Early Blackface
Minstrelsy American Quarterly, Vol. 43, No. 2. (Jun., 1991), pp. 223-254
JSTOR.
Eric Lott, Love and Theft: The Racial Unconscious of Blackface Minstrelsy
Representations, No. 39. (Summer, 1992), pp. 23-50 JSTOR
Alexander Saxton, Blackface Minstrelsy and Jacksonian Ideology American
Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 1. (Mar., 1975), pp. 3-28. JSTOR
22
Hans Nathan, Dan Emmett and the Rise of Early Negro Minstrelsy (Norman: University
of Oklahoma Press, 1962) PS456.N4
Week 9: Records, Radios, Cars … and Consumers
Robert S Lynd and Helen Merrell Lynd, Middletown: A Study in American
Culture (London: Constable, 1929) HN80.M46
Claude S. Fischer, “Changes in Leisure Activities, 1890-1940,” Journal of Social History
27.3 (Spring 1994) 453-475
Lisa Gitelman, “Reading Music, Reading Records, Reading Race: Musical Copyright and
the U.S. Copyright Act of 1909,” The Musical Quarterly 81.2 (Summer 1997)
265-290 via JStor
Dave Laing, “A Voice without a Face: Popular Music and the Phonograph in the 1890s”
Popular Music, Vol. 10, No. 1, The 1890s (Jan., 1991), pp. 1-9 via JStor
Mark Katz, “Making America More Musical Through the Phonograph, 1900-1930,”
American Music 16.4 (winter, 1988) 448-476 via Jstor
William Randle, Jr., “Black Entertainers on Radio, 1920-1930,” The Black Perspective in
Music 5.1 (Spring, 1977) 67-74 via JStor
Carolyn Marvin, When Old Technologies Were New: Thinking About Electric
Communication in the Late Nineteenth Century – e-resource
Mark Katz, Capturing Sound: How Technology has Changed Music – e-resource
William Howland Kenney, Recorded Music in American Life: The Phonograph and Popular
Memory, 1890-1945 – e-resource
Andre Millard, Edison and the Business of Innovation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1990) HD9697.A42.E3
Jason Loviglio, Radio’s Intimate Public: Network Broadcasting and Mass-Mediated
Democracy – e-resource
Douglas B. Craig, Fireside Politics: Radio and Political Culture in the United States,
1920-1940 – e-resource
Susan J. Douglas, Listening In: Radio and the American Imagination – e-resource
Francis G. Couvares, The Remaking of Pittsburgh: Class and Culture in an Industrializing
City 1877-1919 (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1984)
HN80.P6
Pamela Walker Laird, "The Car without a Single Weakness": Early Automobile
Advertising,” Technology and Culture, Vol. 37, No. 4 (Oct., 1996), pp. 796-812
via Jstor
Steven Watts, The People's Tycoon: Henry Ford and the American Century (New
York: A.A. Knopf, 2005) HD9710.U6.W2
David L. Lewis, The Public Image of Henry Ford: An American Folk Hero and His
Company (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1976) HD9710.U62.L4
23
James J. Flink, America Adopts the Automobile, 1895-1910 (Cambridge,
Mass.: London: M.I.T. Press, 1970) HD9710.U6.F5
Week 10: E.L. Doctorow, Ragtime
** Christopher D. Morris, Models of Misrepresentation: On the Fiction of E.L. Doctorow
(U of Mississippi P, 1991) PS3554.O3.Z
Michelle M. Tokarczyk, E.L. Doctorow’s Skeptical Commitment – e-resource
Herwig Friedl, Dieter Schulz eds., E.L. Doctorow: A Democracy of Perception: A
Symposium with and on E.L. Doctorow (Essen: Blaue Eule, 1988) PS3554.O3.Z
Richard Trenner ed., E.L. Doctorow: Essays and Conversations (Princeton, N.J.: Ontario
Review Press, 1983) PS3554.O3.Z
** Peter Brooker, New York Fictions: Modernity, Postmodernism, The New Modern
(London: Longman, 1992) PS255.N5 pp 80-126
** Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (Duke
University Press, 1991) PN98.P67.J2 pp. 21-25
Henry Claridge, “Writing in the Margin: E.L. Doctorow and American History,” in Graham
Clarke ed., The New American Writing: Essays on American Literature Since
1970 (London: Vision, 1990) PS225.C5
E.L. Doctorow, London, Hemingway, and the Constitution: Selected Writings, 1977-1992
(New York: Random House, 1993) PS3554.O3 pp “Theodore Dreiser: Book One
and Book Two”
Berndt Ostendorf, “The Musical World of Doctorow's Ragtime” American Quarterly > Vol.
43, No. 4 JSTOR
Michael Wutz, “Literary Narrative and Information Culture: Garbage, Waste, and
Residue in the Work of E. L. Doctorow” Contemporary Literature > Vol. 44, No. 3
(Autumn, 2003), pp. 501-535 JSTOR
Thomas G. Evans, “Impersonal Dilemmas: The Collision of Modernist and Popular
Traditions in Two Political Novels, ‘The Grapes of Wrath’ and ‘Ragtime’" South
Atlantic Review > Vol. 52, No. 1 (Jan., 1987), pp. 71-85 JSTOR
David Wondrich, Stomp and Swerve: American Music Gets Hot, 1843-1924 (Chicago,
Ill.: Chicago Review Press, 2003) ML3477 WON pp. “Ragtime, or All Coons Alike”
43-112
Edward A. Berlin, Ragtime: A Musical and Cultural History (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1980) PS465.B4
David A. Jasen and Gene Jones, Spreadin’ Rhythm Around: Black Popular Songwriters,
1880-1930 PS451.S67
James P. Kraft, Stage to Studio: Musicians and the Sound Revolution, 1890-1950 Denis
Arnold Library ML37
24
Week 11: The Mass Culture Debate
** The following articles are responses to Levine’s “The Folklore of Industrial Society”
and were published in a forum on mass/popular/folk culture in The American Historical
Review, Vol. 97, No. 5. (Dec., 1992) and are all available via JSTOR:
Robin D. G. Kelley, Notes on Deconstructing "The Folk", pp. 1400-1408
Natalie Zemon Davis, Toward Mixtures and Margins, pp. 1409-1416
T. J. Jackson Lears, Making Fun of Popular Culture, pp. 1417-1426
Lawrence W. Levine, Levine Responds, pp. 1427-1430
Key texts and comments on the mid-century mass culture debate:
Walter Benjamin, (1936) “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”
http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm
Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer (1944) “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as
Mass Deception” (full text)
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/adorno/1944/culture-industry.htm
Clement Greenberg, “Avant-Garde and Kitsch”
http://www.sharecom.ca/greenberg/kitsch.html
Re-thinking high culture/low culture distinctions:
Andreas Huyssen, After the Great Divide: Modernism, Mass Culture, Postmodernism
(Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1988) PN771.H8
Fredric Jameson, “Reification and Utopia in Mass Culture” Social Text, No. 1. (Winter,
1979), pp. 130-148. JSTOR
Shane Gunster, “Revisiting the Culture Industry Thesis: Mass Culture and the
Commodity Form Cultural Critique,” No. 45. (Spring, 2000), pp. 40-70. JSTOR
Lawrence W. Levine, Highbrow/Lowbrow: The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in
America (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1988) E169.1.L4
Thomas Crow, Modern Art in the Common Culture (New Haven: Yale UP, 1996)
N6490.C7 pp. “Modernism and Mass Culture in the Visual Arts”
T.J. Jackson Lears, “The Courtship of Avant-Garde and Kitsch” in Fables of Abundance
Kirk Varnedoe, Adam Gopnik, High and Low: Modern Art and Popular Culture (New York:
Museum of Modern Art, 1990) Oversize N6490.V2
Kirk Varnedoe and Adam Gopnik eds., Modern Art and Popular Culture: Readings in High
and Low (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1990) Oversize N6490.V2
25