In this final discussion, look back on your experiences in the course and provide an overview of what you have learned from the course with regard to popular culture. You can start by reviewing your final projects and your answers to the Module One discussion. In your initial post, address the following questions: How has your definition or understanding of popular culture changed?

Popular culture (or "pop culture") refers in general to the traditions and material culture of a particular society. In the modern West, pop culture refers to cultural products such as music, art, literature, fashion, dance, film, cyberculture, television, and radio that are consumed by the majority of a society's population.

There are Six Storey's definition of popular culture which has altered the way people view it in our modern society.

1. Popular culture is simply culture that is widely favored or well-liked by many people: it has no negative connotations.

2. Popular culture is whatever is left after you've identified what "high culture" is: in this definition, pop culture is considered inferior, and it functions as a marker of status and class.

3. Pop culture can be defined as commercial objects that are produced for mass consumption by non-discriminating consumers. In this definition, popular culture is a tool used by the elites to suppress or take advantage of the masses.

4. Popular culture is folk culture, something that arises from the people rather than imposed upon them: pop culture is authentic (created by the people) as opposed to commercial (thrust upon them by commercial enterprises).

5. Pop culture is negotiated: partly imposed on by the dominant classes, and partly resisted or changed by the subordinate classes. Dominants can create culture but the subordinates decide what they keep or discard.

6. The last definition of pop culture discussed by Storey is that in the postmodern world, in today's world, the distinction between "authentic" versus "commercial" is blurred. In pop culture today, users are free to embrace some manufactured content, alter it for their own use, or reject it entirely and create their own.

Explanation:

All six of Storey's definitions are still in use, but they seem to change depending on the context. Since the turn of the 21st century, mass media-the way pop culture is delivered-has changed so dramatically that scholars are finding it difficult to establish how they function. As recently as 2000, "mass media" meant only print (newspapers and books), broadcast (televisions and radio), and cinema (movies and documentaries). Today, it embraces an enormous variety of social media and forms.

To a large degree, popular culture is today something established by niche users. What is "mass communication" moving forward? Commercial products such as music are considered popular even when the audience is tiny, in comparison to such pop icons as Britney Spears and Michael Jackson. The presence of social media means consumers can speak directly to producers-and are producers themselves, turning the concept of pop culture on its head.

So, in a sense, popular culture has gone back to its simplest meaning: It is what a lot of people like.