Page 37 - Cultural Change and Ordinary Life

28 Cultural change and ordinary life

and theoretical refinement in a number of other countries (see Peterson and
Anand 2004). This has suggested that the patterns of omnivoric taste may vary
according to the medium being considered. However, as will be further con-
sidered in Chapter 8, this does offer evidence on some of the issues introduced
by the debate on postmodernism. I now introduce the key dimensions of the
third key area of change.

Spectacularizing and performing
In an argument that will be more fully explored in the next chapter, Nick
Abercrombie and I (1998) have argued that in the course of becoming more
audience-like, contemporary societies have involved increasingly significant
processes of spectacle and performance that are fuelled by different types of
media processes. A good example of these processes can be seen in Crawford’s
(2004) consideration of the contemporary sports event. Locating his discussion
in the context of consumption, Crawford argues that:
The spectacle within the sport venue should not be viewed as a one-way
process of production and consumption, in which the audience consti-
tutes passive consumers of the spectacle – as the audience themselves
often constitute an important role in the creation of the spectacle and
atmosphere within the venue.
(2004: 85)
Thus, as these processes have developed, the spectators at the event
become very significant to the creation of the event as a spectacle and perform
for the audiences at the event and for those who might be watching via, for
example, TV. Thus, performers in the crowd will be shown on the screens that
are in the venue itself – ‘the advent of large screen televisions at many con-
temporary sport venues allows key performances to become key spectacles; as
these are selected by the venue’s cameras and displayed on the screens and
scoreboards’ (Crawford 2004: 86). In addition, these performances will also
be shown as part of the event to the wider audiences that are watching the
event in homes and bars. The dressing up (or indeed undressing, as for
example, men attending football matches without shirts become selected for
wider transmission) shows how spectacle, performances and audiencing are
interlocked.
Crawford also shows how the presence of the cameras at such events
can be seen as part of a process of social control and surveillance. The increased
presence of speed cameras involves the same sort of dualism: they keep
drivers under surveillance, but the driver has to perform certain acts for them.
Discussions of the sorts of processes of surveillance that are involved here
are very common. Their main theoretical warrant is usually derived ultimately
from the classic work of Foucault (1979), sometimes combined with some
Weberian themes on bureaucratic control. However, this is only half the
story. The reason why this is so has been most elegantly argued by Mathiesen
(1997).
Mathiesen summarizes how, through the opening to Discipline and
Punish (1979), Foucault draws attention to three processes of change: first,