These chapters provide an overview of the changing opinions of culture. What stuck out most to me was the idea that culture can bring people together or separate them. I immediately thought of an example of pop culture regarding this idea. Within pop culture there are many fan bases which bring the fans of those shows, movies or artists together. They are able to unite over a common idea, but when another fan base seeks to threaten the existence of another, they are no longer united.
Arnold suggests that culture can be a fix to problems and work to unite people. He even goes on to say that culture "… seeks to do away with classes." I had trouble agreeing with this. While culture can certainly bring people together, I think there will always be wealthy classes that value tickets to the metropolitan opera, while middle class teenage girls get excited to go see Justin Bieber. Certainly, the lines are becoming blurred, but I found it improbable that culture could ever do away with classes. This also brings us back to the difficulty in defining culture and what we consider popular culture. Different definitions could lead to different discussions regarding culture's affect on the classes.
Arnold also argues culture, as of the twentieth century, has become 'standardized' and 'leveled down' so people need to learn to abstain from this kind of culture. This connects to Leavisism which blames marketing for the decline of culture. As marketers learn what people like, less effort goes into the craft and more effort goes into creating a formula for what people like. My issue with the Leavisism viewpoint was that in talking about literature, it suggests that "culture itself, lost its authority" and that "mass culture undermines the vitality of high culture… while offering nothing in return." This statement overlooks the ideas presented in the previous chapter which suggests that high art can become low art and low art can become high art. Shakespeare was used as an example to show that low art can become high art. Certainly Shakespeare has given us a lot. Thus, I must disagree that low art offers nothing.
Arnold suggests that culture can be a fix to problems and work to unite people. He even goes on to say that culture "… seeks to do away with classes." I had trouble agreeing with this. While culture can certainly bring people together, I think there will always be wealthy classes that value tickets to the metropolitan opera, while middle class teenage girls get excited to go see Justin Bieber. Certainly, the lines are becoming blurred, but I found it improbable that culture could ever do away with classes. This also brings us back to the difficulty in defining culture and what we consider popular culture. Different definitions could lead to different discussions regarding culture's affect on the classes.
Arnold also argues culture, as of the twentieth century, has become 'standardized' and 'leveled down' so people need to learn to abstain from this kind of culture. This connects to Leavisism which blames marketing for the decline of culture. As marketers learn what people like, less effort goes into the craft and more effort goes into creating a formula for what people like. My issue with the Leavisism viewpoint was that in talking about literature, it suggests that "culture itself, lost its authority" and that "mass culture undermines the vitality of high culture… while offering nothing in return." This statement overlooks the ideas presented in the previous chapter which suggests that high art can become low art and low art can become high art. Shakespeare was used as an example to show that low art can become high art. Certainly Shakespeare has given us a lot. Thus, I must disagree that low art offers nothing.
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