106-106 Contemporary Culture and Everyday Life

This subject offers an introduction to contemporary cultural studies by thinking about the relationships between various cultural forms, institutional sites and the practices of everyday life. It introduces students to concepts such as hegemony, ideology and culture, in order to provide intellectual frameworks for analysing cultural sites such as the family home and cultural practices such as consumption. The subject enables students to theorise many naturalised aspects of their own everyday lives in relation to the formations of identity and taste and to develop a grasp of the complex relationship between ideological formations and consumer or spectator pleasures.

• develop social, ethical and cultural understanding of self and others;

• develop critical analysis and synthesis;

• develop effective written and oral communication;

• acquire information management and information literacy skills;

• learn teamwork, flexibility and tolerance;

• learn time management and planning skills.

An essay of 1500 words 37.5% (due before mid-semester), the completion of the Virtual Shopping Mall (VSM) on-line module (due in week 10) and an essay of 2500 words 62.5% (due at the end of semester).

A subject reader will be available from the University Bookshop.

• F Martin (ed), Interpreting Everyday Culture. Edward Arnold London 2003.