Why we should study pop culture

I wanted to wait until the end of the year to write the answer to this question. I figured that after an entire semester of studying the topic I would have a better understanding of why we should study it.

Studying pop culture gives us a chance to take a deeper look into the society that we live in. When I say pop culture most people just think of tabloid magazines and celebrities. While that is an aspect of pop culture it is not the entirety of it.

Learning about the Narrative, Dramatistic, Marxist and Feminist perspective helped me to see beyond the traditional definition of pop culture. What I found most interesting to learn about was the Neo-Aristotelian Approach. This was my favorite because I enjoy philosophy as well as politics and this approach combines them both.

When we watched the video of Colin Powell in class it was interesting to try and examine it from a different viewpoint as opposed to me just watching it on TV. The five canons of the Neo-Aristotelian Approach are invention, arrangement, style, delivery and memory. These five canons help to analyze and interpret the rhetorical text at hand.

As with everything we learned in class it is a different way to look at things that we see everyday. Rather than just seeing a speech made by an important political figure we see an approach, a new method, and a new strategy.

So why should we study pop culture? We should study it because it teaches us something new. It challenges us to learn more about the culture that we live in and it forces us to look twice before we make a decision or judge something. I know after taking this class I take a closer look at things in the media to see if they are a trend or if they express a certain message. Before I would just read the news and accept it for what it was, but now I take a closer look.