Course Description:
This course takes a long view of how culture has been consumed (and produced) from the 19th century until the contemporary moment. The possibilities for studying how forms of culture can be understood in relation to commodity culture are incredibly wide ranging, but in this class we will focus on the emergence of popular culture and practices across such topics as the novel, photography, the museum, the department store, fashion, cinema, celebrity and social media. We will also examine how these forms relate to issues such as authenticity, the construction of audiences, “high” and “low” cultures, and how gender, race, and class intersect with the forms and social practices of commodity culture. This class is participation-intensive: class members will be expected to take part in discussions of the readings and the objects under scrutiny.