Page 11 - Cultural Studies A Practical Introduction

Preface ix

At work, many wear what in the West would count as conventional “ suits ”
that consist of formal slacks and jackets with ties. One can see groups of

young men outside government office buildings all dressed in the same
black suits and looking as uniform as the men one sees in Saudi Arabia.
Culture as a way of life tends to produce a commonality of thought and
behavior, as well as conformity with reigning standards, norms, and rules.
It is what allows us to live together in communities by giving us shared
signs and signals whose meaning we know and recognize. We recognize
fellow members of our culture by dress, speech, behavior, and look. In this
sense of the word, culture means embedded norms all obey usually without
thinking about it. The norms are learned as one grows up. One sees others
around one adhering to them and imbibes silent lessons from the cultural
air one breathes. Within this larger sense of culture, there can be regions
and zones, institutional settings with cultures or subcultures of their own.

High schools can have quite specific cultures, ranging from the San
Fernando Valley to East High in Newark, New Jersey, from a “ valley girl ”
cultural style to a “ ghetto ” style. Investment banks can have a culture of
“ cowboy capitalism, ” in which men compete to make the most risky bets
that make the most income. Such cultures change once government
increases regulation and imposes greater responsibility. The culture
becomes more sober and restrained. The swashbuckling adventuring comes
to an end. A more staid, responsible culture takes over.
A more familiar meaning of the word culture is the things we humans

make when we translate ideas into objects. If the first sense of the word
culture comprised behaviors and institutions, such things as the norms by
which we live, the practices in which we engage (everything from dress to
bathing), and the institutions we inhabit and use such as courts, market-
places, and workplaces, the second meaning of culture comprises cultural
artifacts, such things as the shape we give the built environment (the archi-
tecture of buildings, for example), the forms of entertainment we create
(such as Hollywood or Bollywood movies), and the music we listen to (be
it techno or rap). That list is far from exhaustive of human creativity or of
the multiple ways humans create and develop institutions, activities, and

things that are fabricated, artificial, and artistic and that count as culture
in this second sense of the word.
It is easy to forget that cultural behaviors and institutions may have
much to do with cultural artifacts. Whether one is able to write novels
depends on whether or not one can afford paper to print it on or whether
one has time away from earning a living to engage in the time - consuming