Alright, where did pop culture come from and what is pop culture now?
Part 1: Pop Culture, A Political Device
According to Google, pop culture is a pretty simple concept. “Popular culture is the set of practices, beliefs, and objects that embody the most broadly shared meanings of a social system,” explains the educator of everyone under the age of 32.
Pop culture is a somewhat new thing. The first reference I can find on the internet comes from a book in 1818. It’s a plea for educators and politicians to dumb down education and policy by utilizing “popular culture” to appeal to the masses (i.e. stop using big words and meme-ify concepts into bit-sized isms (what could go wrong with this?)).
“It is obvious to me that the only way to introduce general improvement into the ordinary plan and concerns of domestic life, is to generalize and simplify all the principles of education.
I see that it is impossible to attain this end without founding the means of popular culture and instruction upon a basis which cannot be got at otherwise than in a profound examination of Man himself.”
— Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, 1818 (page 7)
There are two fascinating things about this pop culture origin story:
Pop culture is barely older than the Civil War — meaning the mass dissemination of culture was not really a thing until the bearest end of the industrial revolution, when the world really shrank for the first time thanks to inventions like locomotives, steamboats and steamships and such.
Pop culture is first referenced as a tool to appeal to the masses from an educational and political perspective — meaning pop culture has sort of always been a weapon to control/persuade the normies.
In 2022, it feels like both points one and two are escalated quite sharply. The feedback loop of easier travel and near instant communication makes pop culture easier and easier to spread (for instance, Kram is sitting next to a guy wearing a Dunder Mifflin sweatshirt… in Dharamshala, India). Politicians obviously utilize pop culture as a tool to persuade (ex A, B, and C being this) and teachers use memes all the time to explain things to phone addicted students. Pop culture can be anything and everything, but usually seems to revolve around these somethings: Tik Tok addiction, Mr. Beast, supreme, rabid celebrity fandoms, virality, memes, and, of course, old people shaking theirs fists and saying stuff like “such and such [insert internet idea] is the epitome of everything that is wrong with this generation.”
Part 2: Dear Diary, The Current Pop Culture Data Is… Basic
Pop culture can be anything and everything, but usually seems to revolve around these somethings: TikTok addiction, supreme, Mr. Beast, rabid celebrity fandoms, virality, memes, and, of course, old people shaking theirs fists and saying stuff like “such and such [insert internet idea] is the epitome of everything that is wrong with this generation.”
Ok, ok, that might have been (definitely was) an overgeneralization and was not backed by anything except a gut feeling and a love for a nice sounding sentence.
So let’s change that. Let’s try to get a straighter shot at what pop culture is by using the hard data (sorta) of a Google Search.
Here are the 2022 leaders in different pop culture categories (chosen by most viewed, highest sale, etc):
Song: As It Was, Harry Styles
Movie: Top Gun Maverick
YouTube: Baby Shark Dance' by Pinkfong Baby Shark
App: Tiktok
Social Media: Christiano Ronaldo
Streaming: Stranger Things
Painting: Macklowe Collection
TV Show: House of the Dragon
Twitter: Elon Musk (likes)
Google Search: YouTube
Conclusion: Oof
I wanted to tie this all together w/ a sweeping statement
tying parts 1 and 2 together but I’m running out of steam :)
Maybe that will be part three Friday.
- Kram