American Pop Culture

Race has always been America's first standard and central paradox. From the start, America based its politics on the principle of white supremacy, but it has always lived and dreamed of itself in color. The truth beneath the contradiction has finally emerged and led us to the threshold of a transformation of American identity as profound as slavery was defining. We live in a country where the "King of Pop" was born black and a leading rap M.C. is white, where salsa outsells ketchup and cosmetics firms advertise blond hair dye with black models. Whiteness is in steep decline as the primary measure of Americanness. The new, true American identity rising in its place is transracial, defined by shared cultural and consumer habits, not skin color or ethnicity. And this unprecedented redefinition of what "American" sounds, looks, and feels like is not being driven by the politics of protest or liberal multiculturalism but by a more basic American instinct: the profit motive. Smart marketers discovered that the inherent, subversive appeal of transracial American culture was the perfect boombox for breaking through the noise of a crowded marketplace: Nike and the NBA used unambiguous black style to create modern sports marketing; Pepsi validated Michael Jackson as a superstar while adding millions to its own bottom line; Hollywood turned a taboo into a lucrative cliche with black-white buddy films; Oprah Winfrey created the model for the ultimate individual corporate brand; and Budweiser created a signature series of commercials built around four ordinary black men signaling something ineffably American with one word--"Wassup?" In the end, this is a hopeful but clear-eyedargument that while we fall short of true equality, we are opting to carry on that struggle together within a common American cultural skin. "There's been a radical shift in the place of race and ethnicity in America.

The Trash Phenomenon looks at how writers of the late twentieth century not only have integrated the events, artifacts, and theories of popular culture into their works but also have used those works as windows into popular culture's role in the process of nation building. Taking her cue from Donald Barthelme's 1967 portrayal of popular culture as "trash" in Snow White and Don DeLillo's 1997 description of it in Underworld as a subversive "people's history" Stacey Olster explores the ways in which American popular culture can be recycled in literature so as to change the nationalistic imperative behind its inception. The Trash Phenomenon begins with a look at the mass media's role in the United States' emergence as the twentieth century's dominant power. To this end, Olster discusses the works of three authors that collectively span the century bounded by the Spanish-American War (1898) and the Persian Gulf War (1991): Gore Vidal's "American Chronicle" series, John Updike's Rabbit tetralogy, and Larry Beinhart's American Hero. Olster then turns her attention to three non-American writers whose own cultures have felt the imperial sway of American popular culture: hierarchical class structure in Dennis Potter's England, Peronism in Manuel Puig's Argentina, and Nihonjinron consensus in Haruki Murakami's Japan. Finally, Olster returns to American literature to look at the contemporary media spectacle and the representative figure as potential sources of national consolidation after November 1963. Olster first focuses on autobiographical, historical, and fictional accounts of three spectacles in which the formulae of popular culture are shown to bypass differences of class, gender, andrace: the John F. Kennedy assassination, the Scarsdale Diet Doctor murder, and the O.J. Simpson trial. She concludes with some thoughts about the nature of American consolidation after 9/11.

Pro-American sentiment - Pro-American sentiments among non-Americans are characterized by a favoring of American culture (especially pop-culture), a feeling of identity with the United States and its population, or a generally positive attitude to foreign or domestic policies of the United States. It exists in many countries, especially those from where emigration to the United States has been significant.

Classic pop - The term classic pop may be used, in general, to refer to any kind of American popular music that either wholly predates the eruption of rock and roll in the mid-1950s, or to any popular music which exists concurrently to rock and roll but originated in a time before the appearance of rock and roll, and its offshoots, as the dominant commercial music of the United States and Western culture.

American Capital of Culture - The NGO "American Capital of Culture Organization" selects one American city annually to serve as the American Capital of Culture for a period of one year. The organization claims the initiative is based closely on the European Capital of Culture programme; it enjoys the backing of the hemisphere-wide Organization of American States, but the OAS is not involved in the selection process.

African American culture - African American culture is both part of, and distinct from American culture. From their earliest presence in North America, Africans and African Americans have contributed literature, art, agricultural skills, foods, clothing styles, music, and language to American culture.

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Religion and Pop Culture - Religion and Pop Culture A Matrix of Meanings Ross religion and pop culture and Rachel had a baby, Britney religion and pop culture and Justin broke up, religion and pop culture and Time asked if Bono could save the world. From the glittering tinsel of Hollywood to the advertising slogan you can't get out of your head, we are surrounded by popular culture. In contrast to some traditional Christian responses, which have been to shun aspects of popular culture, Craig ...

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