You are on page 1of 6

PENGANTAR KAJIAN BUDAYA CULTURAL STUDIES

By :
IRMA SARIVIKA ANGGRAINI C1311004

FACULTY OF LETTERS AND FINE ARTS SEBELAS MARET UNIVERSITY SURAKARTA 2012

What is Cultural Studies


Before we talk about cultural studies, we have to know first what culture is. There are many definitions of cultural. Linton R as cited clara said "A culture is a configuration of learned behaviors and results of behavior whose component elements are shared and transmitted by the members of a particular society" (http://www.carla.umn.edu/culture/definitions.html). Another opinion culture is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, act, morals, law, customs and other capabilities and habit acquired by man as a member of society So culture studies is a study of humans way of life (lecturing, february 27, 2012). So, cultural studies is an innovative interdisciplinary field of research and teaching that investigates the ways in which culture creates and transforms individual experiences, everyday life, social relations and power. In Cultural Studies, the concept of culture can be understood along with the changes of behavior and community structure in Europe in the 19th century. Cultural studies are first, intellectual and political tradition, in ralations to its academic disciplines, in terms of theoritical paradigsm, or by its characteristic objects of study. Second, heave the study of culture from its inegalitarian anchorages in high-artistic connoisseurship and indiscourse of enourmous condescension on the not culture of the masses and last one cultural studies is must be interdiscilinary and (sometimes anti disciplinary) in its tendency. ( lecturing on february 27, 2012.) Cultural Studies provides a space for scholarly dialogues that draw on theory and methods from several disciplines: anthropology, history, literary studies, philosophy, political economy, and sociology. But whereas the traditional disciplines tend to produce stable objects of study, research in cultural studies attempts to account for cultural objects under conditions constrained by power and defined by contestation, conflict, and change. That is, cultural studies grapples with the volatility of cultural happenings. Cultural studies also

emphasizes self-reflexivity: an awareness that scholars and their scholarship are themselves caught up in the social currents and in the global circulation of meanings being studied. In taking up questions from this perspective, cultural studies both draws on and develops key strands of contemporary cultural theory: semiotics, deconstruction and post structuralism, dialogic, subaltern and postcolonial studies. The field also draws on and develops a number of innovative methodologies: auto ethnography, blurred genres of writing, and other new forms of critical researc (http://culturalstudies.gmu.edu/whatiscs.htm). As a response to the conditions of modern life, cultural studies is a trans national movement spanning a range of subjects. Cultural studies as a discipline (academic), which started developing in the West (1960), such as Britain, America, Europe (continental), and Australia base on a knowledge that are tailored to the circumstances and conditions of the ethnographic context and their culture. In the next step in the era of the early 21st century cultural studies used in the Eastern region to investigate and examine the social context in places that are rarely touched by western practitioners of cultural studies, including Africa, Asia, or Latin America. Institutional, cultural studies spawned a variety of works in the form of books, journals, textbook, course and even majors in universities.

The development cultural studies in British


The first time Cultural studies was appear in Birmingham, Inggris. There are some famous figures of cultural studies in Inggris, they are Richard Hoggart, Raymond William, dan E.P.Thompson. Three of them was so briliant to critizing mass culture production to industrys society. In the next development of cultural studies, cultural studies has spreads to Europe. The development of cultural studies in the outside of Europe spread quickly to the developed countries, especially English-speaking North America, Canada and Australia. In these countries, cultural studies since the 1990's sticking out with figures such as Meaghan

Morris (USA), Harold Innes and Marshall McLuhan (Canada), and Tony Bennett, John Frow, John Hartley, Lesley Johnson, Graeme Turner (Australia ). Cultural Studies in the Britain at the beginning of its appearance created a critique of mass culture. This criticism is parallel to the criticism that appears Frannkfurt school in Germany. Both of them are focus on workingclass culture and its counter culture. Richard Hoggart in his work. The Uses of Literacy (1957) produces banal criticism of the concept of homogenization on the influence of American institutions with capitalist ideology of working class culture in Britain. In the same era, Raymond Williams developed the concept of culture that extends to criticize the cultural problems of low taste and good taste (high / low culture). Raymond Williams also emphasized the concept of culture blend with the community. The culture of elite society has considered the working class culture through the domination of the media. Another contribute which have big influence is the idea of E.P. Thomas. In the study of cultural studies in Britain, E.P.Thomas also has big roles in the establishment of resistance to the modernization of capitalism. E.P. Thomas minded humanist-socialist also critized the mass culture of America capitalist. Either Hoggart, William, and Thomson has influence the cultural critism that make the project of the Birmingham and the Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS) in 1963-1964 has appear. CCCS is a forerunner to the birth of the Birmingham School. At the beginning of its birth, criticism of Birmingham School has the similiarities with the Frankfurt School. One of them is equally critical of capitalism that dominates the culture of the working class. Along its development, with the Frankfurt School Between Birmingham School runs on a different path though the two often intersect, especially when it comes to issues of post modernism. In addition to the above three figures, Stuart Hall is an actor who influenced the development of future CCCS. Together with William, Hall led the early days of the CCCS. Period-William Hall is a heroic period in

the analysis and interpretation of cultural criticism. Hall contributed much a combination of sociological theory and contextuality text. In 1960s-1970s Birmingham School Project is oriented towards the crucial political problem. The issue of class and ideology oppressive effect on the affairs of society in Britain. Hoggart, William, and Hall expanded variants Cultural Studies of resistance towards the subculture of young people who resist hegemonic forms of capitalist domination. In 1970s-1980s Cultural Studies has developed a radical himself. In that decade, was born the concepts of systematic resistance is able to attract the attention of, among others: feminism, race theory, gay and lesbian theory, postmodern theory, and theories of fashion. Infact, some concepts is now experiencing some development to the next stage, such as second feminisms movement. Development of British Cultural Studies in the frontal to the emergence of the principle of anything goes. Issues of multiculturalism, critical of pedagogy and critical media into all aspects and cross-disciplinary, and even tend to anti-discipline. Now, the development of Cultural Studies leads to debate which never end. In France, a group that has a spirit similar with the Birmingham School are those involved in the magazine Tel Quel, founded by Philippe Sollers in 1960 until 1982. In this magazine have donated a number of influential authors writing such as Roland Barthes, Julia Kristeva, and Derrida. In a pioneering study of film, magazine Tel Quel is known as a pioneer of film studies that attempt to develop an approach to combine elements of Marxism, Semiotics, and Psychoanalysis. It is interesting that the study of culture as it developed in England and then used as a category to re-examine the range of research on the culture that has developed in various countries. In Germany, for example, cultural studies have pre-history of "science culture" that was pioneered in Italy Marx Weber while the spirit of cultural studies can be found through the writings of Umberto Eco.

Refrences Lecturing on febuary 27, 2012 isjd.pdii.lipi.go.id/admin/jurnal/12210209230.pdf page 211 (http://www.carla.umn.edu/culture/definitions.html) http://culturalstudies.gmu.edu/whatiscs.htm. http://culturalstudies.web.unc.edu . http://www.tembi.org/majalah-prev/2001_08_asal.htm

You might also like