Within a well defined and traditional social hierarchy, the production and protection of cultural standards and the arbitration of taste are carried out by elite intellectuals. The judgements they make
apply both to those classes which share a position of power and privilege, and to those in subordinate positions who participate in their own popular culture, while respectfully deferring to elite culture.
Mass culture threatens this hierarchy. Dominant classes engage in the commercial production of mass culture, disregarding the standards set by intellectuals, and the people have access to a popular culture beyond the bounds of the traditional hierarchy and the criteria of cultural taste and distinction it embodies. The symbolic power of intellectuals over the standards of taste which are applied to the consumption of cultural goods becomes more difficult to protect and sustain when people can consume a mass culture which does not depend on intellectuals for its appreciation and its definitions of pleasure.
”
— D. Strinati (2005)
An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture (2nd edition), pp40-41
“Interaction among individuals relies on a minimum of trust between the actors involved, at least to the point that they share a common meaning of the elements of the communication process. Thus trust is a prerequisite for any social interaction and is, at the same time, a major mechanism to provide orientation in uncertain situations. It also makes the outcome of a communication more predictable. In this sense, trust is a medium to reduce complexity by limiting the scope of behavioral responses. But it is also a medium to enhance complexity because it entails a higher degree of freedom for behavioral actions without implying an extensive debate between the interaction partners about the legitimation or appropriateness of each other’s actions (Barber 1983; Luhmann 1980).”
—
O. Renn & D. Levine (1991) “Credibility and trust in risk communication” in R.E. Kasperson & P.J.M. Stallen (eds.) Communicating Risks to the Public: International Perspectives.
Cited sources:
Barber, B. 1983. The logic and limits of trust. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Luhmann, N. 1980. Trust and power. New York: Wiley.
“Much has been written about the new media overcoming barriers of space and time. In fact, ‘old media’ were good at bridging space, although perhaps less good in relation to cultural divisions. (…) How far time has been conquered is more uncertain, except in respect of greater speed of transmission, the escape from fixed time schedules, and the ability to send a message to anyone anywhere at any time (but without guarantee of reception or response). We still have no better access to the past or the future, or more time for communication, and the time saved by new flexibility is quickly spent on new demands of intercommunication.”
— Dennis McQuail (2010) Mass Communication Theory - Chapter 6: New Media - New Theory?
“I see:
a world which recognizes craft and training
in audio itself which is not disdaining;
where overall excellence is what we seek
and art comes from long-worked technique.”
Fred Rogers (1928-2003) was known as the creator, music composer, and host of the educational preschool television series Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood (1968–2001). The show featured Rogers’s kind, neighborly, avuncular persona, which nurtured his connection to the audience.
He insisted that every word, whether spoken by a person or a puppet, be scrutinized closely, because he knew that children—the preschool-age
boys and girls who made up the core of his audience—tend to hear things
literally. He took great pains not to mislead or confuse children, and his team of writers joked that his on-air manner of speaking amounted to a distinct language they called “Freddish.” Fundamentally, Freddish anticipated the ways its listeners might misinterpret what was being said. “What Fred understood and was very direct and articulate about was that
the inner life of children was deadly serious to them,” said Mister Rogers’ Neighbourhood producer Arthur Greenwald.
There were nine steps for translating into Freddish:
“State the idea you wish to express as clearly as possible, and in terms preschoolers can understand.” Example: It is dangerous to play in the street.
“Rephrase in a positive manner,” as in It is good to play where it is safe.
“Rephrase the idea, bearing in mind that preschoolers cannot yet
make subtle distinctions and need to be redirected to authorities they
trust.” As in, “Ask your parents where it is safe to play.”
“Rephrase your idea to eliminate all elements that could be
considered prescriptive, directive, or instructive.” In the example,
that’d mean getting rid of “ask”: Your parents will tell you where it is safe to play.
“Rephrase any element that suggests certainty.” That’d be “will”: Your parents can tell you where it is safe to play.
“Rephrase your idea to eliminate any element that may not apply to all children.” Not all children know their parents, so: Your favorite grown-ups can tell you where it is safe to play.
“Add a simple motivational idea that gives preschoolers a reason to follow your advice.” Perhaps: Your favorite grown-ups can tell you where it is safe to play. It is good to listen to them.
“Rephrase your new statement, repeating the first step.” “Good” represents a value judgment, so: Your favorite grown-ups can tell you where it is safe to play. It is important to try to listen to them.
“Rephrase your idea a final time, relating it to some phase of development a preschooler can understand.” Maybe: Your
favorite grown-ups can tell you where it is safe to play. It is
important to try to listen to them, and listening is an important part
of growing.
A wall newspaper or placard newspaper is a hand-lettered or printed newspaper designed to be displayed and read in public places, such as walls. The practice dates back to at the least the Roman Empire. They are often produced by governmental entities in locations where production costs or distribution problems might otherwise make regular newspaper distribution difficult.
Dazibao, (Chinese: “big character poster”), in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), prominently displayed handwritten posters containing complaints about government officials or policies. The posters typically constitute a large piece of white paper on which the author has written slogans, poems, or even longer essays in large Chinese characters with ink and brush. The posters are hung on a wall or a post and often serve as a means of protest against governmental incompetence or corruption.
A key trigger in the Cultural Revolution was the publication of a dàzìbào on 25 May 1966, by Nie Yuanzi and others at Peking University, claiming that the university was controlled by bourgeois anti-revolutionaries. The poster came to the attention of Mao Zedong, who had it broadcast nationally and published in the People’s Daily. Dazibao became a crucial tool in Mao’s struggle during the Cultural Revolution, and Mao himself wrote his own dazibao at Beijing University on 5 August 1966, calling on the people to “Bombard the Headquarters”. Big-character posters were soon ubiquitous, used for everything from sophisticated debate to satirical entertainment to rabid denunciation; being attacked in a big-character poster was enough to end one’s career. One of the “four great rights” in the 1975 state constitution was the right to write dàzìbào.
“For the French, their lives are not shaped by career plans, but by events - chance meetings, unplanned insights into themselves, casual affairs. Each of these creates the unexpected opportunity, the point of contemplation, the love of your life. Or not.
In the meantime you have your family, your blood, and the things you were born to. Whatever else happens, your family are the ones who will take you in. The contradiction between the cosmopolitan intellectual without a home and the Frenchman who always visits the family in the Vosges for the summer is startling, but I learned not to be rebuffed by it. I remember a woman of great brilliance and beauty who chose to befriend me. She lived an utterly bohemian life but went home each night to her room with her parents.”
— George Friedman (2015) Flashpoints - Chapter 12: France, Germany, and Their Ancient Borderlands
Cari Romm: So how did “vitamin” become shorthand for “healthy”?
Catherine Price: I think that that started early. The word itself has this aura—it means “life,” but health and life often go together. So I think that’s the reason it appealed so much to food marketers, is that the word itself had that connotation to begin with. Even Casimir Funk, the guy who came up with that word, thought it was brilliant. He was very into his own creation. And what I found really funny was, if you consider some of the other suggestions of the time—people were saying, “Oh, we shouldn’t call it a vitamin, we should call it a food hormone, or a food accessory factor.” It’s just funny to think about how our attitude towards these 13 unrelated dietary chemicals would be different if we called them “food accessory factors.” You’d never have ad campaigns or parents insisting that their children have their food accessory factors. It’s just not as catchy.
From Vitamin B.S. - a conversation with Catherine Price, author of Vitamania: Our Obsessive Quest for Nutritional Perfection.
Research from
Columbia Computer Graphics Group
can create textual encryption by minute altering of font characteristics using neural networks:
We introduce FontCode, an information embedding technique for text
documents. Provided a text document with specific fonts, our method
embeds user-specified information in the text by perturbing the glyphs
of text characters while preserving the text content. We devise an
algorithm to choose unobtrusive yet machine-recognizable glyph
perturbations, leveraging a recently developed generative model that
alters the glyphs of each character continuously on a font manifold. We
then introduce an algorithm that embeds a user-provided message in the
text document and produces an encoded document whose appearance is
minimally perturbed from the original document. We also present a glyph
recognition method that recovers the embedded information from an
encoded document stored as a vector graphic or pixel image, or even on a
printed paper. In addition, we introduce a new error-correction coding
scheme that rectifies a certain number of recognition errors. Lastly, we
demonstrate that our technique enables a wide array of applications,
using it as a text document metadata holder, an unobtrusive optical
barcode, a cryptographic message embedding scheme, and a text document
signature.
The (types of) modes of communication not only appeal differently to mental skills, but also help to develop them differently. In order to do so, they have to be demanding and they must force receivers to develop their skills (Salomon, 1979: 82). However, there are several modes of communication, particularly the non-notational types, that allow the receiver to choose the line of least resistance. ‘The pictorial system of television allows (but does not require) shallower processing than a written story or a verbally told one. To generalize, some symbol systems may *allow* shallower mental processing and others may *demand* deeper mental elaboration’ (1979: 223, final italic added). ‘Notational symbol systems require crystallized ability, based on verbal skills, and non-notational symbol systems require mainly fluid ability, based on spatial and perceptual skills’ (1979: 224).
All this has relevance to the new media. In theory, they can help to develop mental skills better than most old media, as they integrate a multitude of modes of communication. In practice they require full-grown mental capacities and a multifunctional usage. The problem is they do not have to be used optimally. The integration of modes of communication in the new media can also be accessed separately and enable a much shallower use. The strength of the audiovisual and the iconic modes offers potential uses that do not stim- ulate the mental skills required for notational symbol systems. ‘The employment of charts, graphs or pictures could save mental effort and make the acquisition of knowledge more effective, but it will impede skill development’ (1979: 83). The transition from the (audio)phone to the videophone is a good example. The latter gives more cues and therefore requires less mental skill to understand the conversation (see later in this chapter). People who have to rely on one or two modes of communication must develop the appropriate skills, no matter how one-sided these skills may be. The best case of this until now has been the written linguistic mode.
”
—
Jan van Dijk (2006) The Network Society, p216
This quote is largely based on Gavriel Salomon (1979) Interaction of Media, Cognition and Learning.
“In the end, Barthes’ Mythologies became absorbed into bourgeois culture, as he found many third parties asking him to comment on a certain cultural phenomenon, being interested in his control over his readership. This turn of events caused him to question the overall utility of demystifying culture for the masses, thinking it might be a fruitless attempt, and drove him deeper in his search for individualistic meaning in art.”
Language evolution is by its very nature a subject that invites speculation, and it is a domain in which it is extremely difficult to find empirical answers. Speculation is tempting because language is such a fundamental part of what makes humans human that the question of its origins fascinates both scientists and non-scientists alike. At the same time, hard evidence is scarce as it deals with events from the remote past, and the information is therefore usually very indirect. To add to the difficulty, a lot of this evidence is spread over many disciplines. Finally, language is a complex phenomenon in its structure, its history, and its instantiation in the brain and in human society.
(…)
However, a number of factors have conspired to make language evolution more amenable to empirical investigation than ever before, and the field has sufficientlyadvanced that it now merits its own journal.
One extremely important development is the enormous increase in knowledge that can be brought to bear on the questions of language origins, manifest not only in the emergence of whole new relevant fields such as brain imaging techniques or the extraction and analysis of DNA from extinct humans but also in the deeper scientific insight into animal behavior, human cognition, language acquisition, language typology, archaeological evidence, the genetic bases of language and speech, and many other areas.
We think that there are other crucial and perhaps somewhat less obvious developments. One is that interdisciplinary exchange has become much easier, mostly because of the Internet, which has facilitated communication between researchers, allowed better and faster access to the results and methods from different disciplines, and the powerful search engines that help locate formerly obscure information.
Another key factor is the availability of computer simulations. This has allowed us to tackle the complexity involved in the dynamics of language origins, to reconstruct history, to explore topics where it is very difficult to conduct experiments, and to do powerful analyses of complex data. Computer models allow us to go way beyond anything that could ever be achieved by pen-and-paper analysis. Although we can never be sure what happened exactly in language evolution, computer models help us to determine which scenarios are more plausible than others.
For reasons that go beyond the scope of this post, recently I’ve been listening to music in mono when I’m at my desk. This just resulted in a very enjoyable serendipity, described below.
The song I put on was Seaside Rendezvous by Queen. Again, for various technical (and very professional) reasons, I chose to play the song from Youtube. The video I picked was the one from Queen’s official Youtube channel, i.e. the official lyric video. At 0:55, the official lyrics go “the Mediterranean” - however, when played in mono, what you hear is “without the rain.”
I knew I couldn’t have possibly heard everything there is to hear in Queen’s opus, despite having listened to it so many times over the years (thirteen years, to be exact).
Thanks to the engineers (Mike Stone and Gary Lyons) for making the lead vocals mono-incompatible!
