Popular Culture, Power, and Identity

Course Description

This course is designed as an innovative, interdisciplinary approach to understanding how popular culture influences our identity development.  We consider how our understanding of identity is influenced by race, gender and sexuality, age, religious and political beliefs, and how this understanding has changed over time.  We use popular culture as the lens through which we attempt to see how power and identity are understood, experienced, and defined. Ideas about literature, music, film, art, and fashion are examined. We also consider how these cultural ideas influence our understanding of power. Special emphasis is placed on how ideas about power are formed and understood by various communities (academic, feminist, political, etc.).