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Culture Studies
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Shefali Arora
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Roll No: 196
MBA Advertising
Batch 2011

10th October, 2010

Short Answers

1. In your own words, explain your understanding of cultural signs. Using your own example,
explain how a cultural sign can have both implicit and explicit meanings
Signs also referred to as semiotics is a representation of something. Semiotics has been evolved from a
Greek word, semeiotikos as interpreter of signs, is a branch that studies signs. It may be understood as
a discrete unit of meaning, and includes words, images, gestures, scents, tastes, textures, sounds
essentially all of the ways in which information can be communicated as a message by the sender of the
message. In semiotics, a sign is "something that stands for something, to someone in some

capacity".
Signs are said to be dyadic in nature, meaning they can be divided into two parts: the Signifier and the
Signified. The signifier is the "shape" of a word, its phonic component, i.e. the sequence of letters or
phonemes. The signified on the other hand is the ideational component, the concept or object that
appears in our minds when we hear or read the signifier e.g. a small domesticated canine. The former is
a "mental concept", the latter the "actual object" in the world. In other words, signs can mean anything
we agree that they mean, and they can mean different things to different people. Thus they can have an
implicit meaning or an explicit meaning.
Michel Foucault proposed a linkage between linguistic signs and their cultures, stating that language
practices help to maintain assumptions in a culture by serving as a tool for knowing and constructing the
world. He calls this connection between the physical reality and the discursive reality the dominant
discourse and gives the example of freedom in the United States.
Across the world members of different cultures may see the world they live in very differently. There
way of perceiving the world is entirely based on the signs and their respective interpretations that they
draw from. Thus the cultural interpretation of the same sign maybe very different across cultures
depending on what history and cultural background the signified associated with that sign draws from.
Explicit meanings refers to a meaning of a particular sign which is commonly accepted and understood
by everyone whereas implicit meaning is an individuals interpretation or understanding of a particular
sign or gesture. For example, a black dress during a funeral depicts mourning which is understood and
accepted by everyone. Thus we can conclude that an explicit meaning of black is mourning however its
implicit meaning can be that the woman is in depression.
Similarly, it is noticed that art cinema and documentaries are associated with being hard hitting and
often too brutal but the implicit tone that underlines it is the fact that it is depicting reality without
covering any of its flaws.
Cultural Semiotics is a branch of communication theory that investigates sign systems and the modes of
representation that humans use to convey feelings, thoughts, ideas, and ideologies. Semiotic analysis is

rarely considered a field of study in its own right, but is used in a broad range of disciplines, including
art, literature, anthropology, sociology, and the mass media. Semiotic analysis looks for the cultural and
psychological patterns that underlie language, art and other cultural expressions.
The Burqa is a sign of male patriarchy and female subordination. However, in most of the Islamic
countries where the Burqa is a norm it is a cultural symbol of the dignity and modesty of women. A
burqa clad woman earns the respect of the men in the society and she also feels protected against the
male gaze which would always try and evaluate her eligibility as his potential partner.
Thus cultural signs get their interpretations from their individual which further might or might not be
accepted globally if there is a conflict between the interpretations of the signifieds of the same signifier
across various cultures.

2. What is Simulacra? Explain the term in relation to postmodern society where there are no originals
Simulacra mean likeness or similarity. It is representation of another thing or person. Simulacra are
believed to be subversive towards truth because the two tend to be confounded.
According to Jean Baudrillard, the current society has replaced reality with symbols and images.
Simulacra discuses how these signs, symbols and images relate to the present. The term simulacrum
derives from the Latin simulare meaning to make like or simulate and is usually understood as
constituting a problem for thought because it raises the issues of falsity and untruth. However,
Baudrillard entirely rejects this (Platonic) understanding of simulacra.
According to Baudrillard, when it comes to postmodern simulation and simulacra, it is no longer a
question of imitation, nor duplication, nor even parody. It is a question of substituting the signs of the
real for the real. Baudrillard is not merely suggesting that postmodern culture is artificial, his point,
rather, is that we have lost all ability to make sense of the distinction between nature and artifice.
To clarify his point, he argues that there are three "orders of simulacra":
1. In the first order of simulacra, which he associates with the pre-modern period, the image is a
clear counterfeit of the real; the image is recognized as just an illusion, a place marker for the
real;
2. In the second order of simulacra, which Baudrillard associates with the industrial revolution of
the nineteenth century, the distinctions between the image and the representation begin to
break down because of mass production and the proliferation of copies.
3. In the third order of simulacra, which is associated with the postmodern age, we are confronted
with a precession of simulacra; that is, the representation precedes and determines the real.
There is no longer any distinction between reality and its representation; there is only the
simulacrum.
Baudrillard contends that the present media age is dominated by the pure simulacrum, giving a
number of examples such as the medias love of political scandals and Disneyland which exists in order
to hide that it is the real country, all of real America that is Disneyland. Thus, it is no longer a
question of a false representation of reality (ideology) but of concealing the fact that the real is no longer
real.
With the advancement of technology in the post modern world originality & reality have become but an
ideal ambition. Almost everything in the media of the post modern world is based on a simulacra or
simulation. While paintings were always representations of the original, photography & sound recording
are the mechanically reproduced copies in which all copies are identical with one another, but still retain
a trace connection with an original (light on silver oxide, soundwaves in wax).
He also talks about contemporary media including television, film, print and the Internet, which are
responsible for blurring the line between goods that are needed and goods for which a need is created

by commercial images. With the design revolution and the rise of advertising, signs and commodities
merged and this not only generated a vast media image factory, but extended simulation to the realm of
objects as well as images.
Hence in the post modern world man is trapped in a spiral of simulacras and the line between the real
and the simulated has been blurred to such an extent that it is difficult for him to make do even for a
second without these simulations of reality. Cellular phones, the internet, television are all simulacras
which simulate functions which would have been performed in a very different way in a technology free
world. The advertising that is constantly bombarded on the post modern consumer are all
representations trying to cater to a need which might exist in the minds of a potential customer. They
are in the end, all simulacras, something which an individual would like to experience, own or be a part
of.

Long Answers

1. Explain your understanding of the following sentence: Gender is a social construction.

Gender is a fluid construct. It is not determined by our biology, but is a product of our environment, our
performance, our choices, and our society.
Our society sets up gender as a dichotomy: masculine and feminine. Masculinity includes traits like
brave, noisy, and strong. Femininity includes being timid, quiet, fragile, and nurturing. Nothing is
genetically inherent in men to make them masculine, or in women to make them feminine. Global
variations in behaviour and expectations show that gender is a cultural construct.
To be born a man or a woman in any society is more than a simple biological fact. It is a biological fact
with social implications. Women constitute a distinct social group, and the character of that group, long
neglected by historians, has nothing to do with feminine "nature." "Gender" is the term now widely
used to refer to those ways in which a culture reformulates what begins as a fact of nature. The
biological sexes are redefined, represented, valued, and channelled into different roles in various
culturally dependent ways. An American anthropologist has put it well: a "Sex/gender system is a set of
arrangements by which a society transforms biological sexuality in to products of human activity, and in
which there transformed sexual needs are met."
Sex refers to the biological attributes of being male or female. Gender refers to the socially constructed
attributes of being male or female, or of femininity and masculinity. Women and men are treated
unequally on the basis of the fact their sex.
Creation of gender role stereotypes- The creation of gender being a social construction creates the
problem of gender stereotypes. Gender role stereotypes help to perpetuate gender norms within the
three subsystems of biology, society and culture. These stereotypes are perpetuated through various
means, such as through pressure from society and institutions, and the creation (and internalization) of
cultural gender norms. They often become so ingrained that we do not realize the extent to which they
are socially constructed, and as Harrison notes, the lack of conscious intentionality in a large part of our
performance then supplies its naturalness. Indeed, the fact that gender often involves the body
naturalizes gender performances.
Man and womans roles in the patriarchal society have been defined by the interplay of power
structures across both genders. But it is the male ideologies and constructs which hold sway because of
their exercise of power and definition of feminine roles.
Parenting for example is gendered, with different expectations from mothers and fathers, and people of
different genders working at different kinds of jobs. The work adults do as mothers and fathers, as lowlevel workers and high-level bosses, shapes women's and men's life experiences, and these experiences

produce different consciousness, feelings, relationships, and skills and defines feminine or masculine
roles and gender constructs. All of these processes constitute the social construction of gender.
Right from birth parents create a gendered world for the newborn.
Naming of the newborn, the toys that they play with, the clothes they
are made to wear are all constructs of gender that the newborn is
made to conform with. Hence a girl who plays with toy guns (an
essentially masculine plaything) is scolded by her mother and a boy
who would play with a Barbie doll might be shunned by his own peers
since he is going against gender conventions. How children have to
behave with their peers of the same sex or with the opposite sex is
also ingrained in their minds. More than parents, it is the media which plays a huge role in this.
Today the media is one of the strongest upholders of gender roles, most of which is done subconsciously
by the purveyors of the various media. Although the media is a pervasive and profoundly influential
socializing force, parents and teachers can make a difference. Young children are especially vulnerable
to the teachings of media because they don't have the critical capacity necessary to distinguish between
fantasy and reality, to identify persuasive intent, or to understand irony and disregard stereotypes. For
example, the image and representation of women and girls in the media has long been a subject of
concern. Research shows that there are many fewer females than males in almost all forms of
mainstream media and those who do appear are often portrayed in very stereotypical ways. Constantly
polarized gender messages in media have fundamentally anti-social effects.
In a discussion of social construction of gender, we also need to ask how gender articulates with class,
caste, race and ethnicity structures which, in different degrees and combinations, shape all societies. It
does not require much effort to see how gender is inextricable from these vital determinants of any
social organization. To be an urban middle class woman implies holding a different social position than
that occupied by a urban middle class man. But the position of an urban middle class woman is also
significantly different from and also unequal to one occupied by a poor rural woman. The class
distinctions permeate gender distinctions in a manner that may sometimes obliterate the possibility of
gender consciousness to rise above class consciousness.
Socially constructing gender is problematic. When gender defines acceptable behaviors and interests, it
limits an individual. If a girl is supposed to be interested in nurturing, not machines, she may not
receive a full range of choices and opportunities to develop her interests. On a larger scale, society also
suffers. Fields like computing, which have historically excluded women, neglect half of a potential pool
of knowledge and skills. When entire groups of individuals are discouraged from exploring and
developing interests in an area, these fields develop internal biases and are skewed to the interests of a
non-representative group of the population.
Society benefits from encouraging individuality, rather than relying on stereotypes to determine each
persons potential contribution to the community. Gender dichotomies create a hierarchy, giving
preference to one element over the other. This preference is then used to esteem one group at the

expense of the other when with cooperation, both groups contribution could be valuable, if the society
were open to it.
Gender inequality - the devaluation of "women" and the social domination of "men" - has social
functions and a social history. It is not the result of sex, procreation, physiology, anatomy, hormones, or
genetic tendencies. It is created and maintained by identifiable social processes and built into the
general social structure and individual identities deliberately and purposefully. The social order as we
know it in Western societies is organized around racial ethnic, class, and gender inequality.
I strongly believe that ones sexuality, ones gender is constructed socially. The ways one is groomed to
be affects the way they get constructed. One understands that the sexual hormones also play a role in
gender construct however its role is minimal that what society does to gender.
However, Gendered roles are changing. Today fathers are taking care of their children, boys and girls are
wearing unisex apparel and getting the same education, and women and men are working at the same
jobs. There still are social groups which are very strict about maintaining the gender roles but in many
societies especially in the west we see the lines between these roles getting blurred.
The various books that we have read about Afghan women being ill treated, and films on stone pelting
and other atrocities on them have opened once eyes and ears to the social constructs of a particular
place and how enlightenment and awareness needs to be brought about for harmony in society. It is
also with power that one sees the roles changing and an egalitarian society coming into place. With
women leading nations and acting as prime ministers, there roles are definitely getting blurred and new
social constructs are emerging.

2. What is Queer theory? Does it deliberately challenge all notions of fixed identity?
Queer theory developed in the early 1990s out of the conjunction of feminist theory, sexuality studies,
and queer activism. It is a set of ideas based around the idea that identities are not fixed and do not
determine who we are.
Queer is by definition whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant. There is
nothing in particular to which it necessarily refers. It is an identity without an essence. Queer then,
demarcates not positivity but a positionality vis--vis the normative, queer describes a horizon of
possibility whose precise extent and heterogeneous scope cannot in principle be delimited in advance.
Queer theory is based, in part, on the work of Judith Butler (in particular her book Gender Trouble,
1990). She is considered the Mother of Queer Theory. It is a mistake to think that queer theory is
another name for lesbian and gay studies. It suggests that it is meaningless to talk in general about
'women' or any other group, as identities consist of so many elements that to assume that people can
be seen collectively on the basis of one shared characteristic is wrong. Indeed, it proposes that we
deliberately challenge all notions of fixed identity, in varied and non-predictable ways.
The word "queer" in queer theory has some of these connotations, particularly its alignment with ideas
about homosexuality. Queer theory is a brand-new branch of study or theoretical speculation; it has
only been named as an area since about 1991. Queer theory evolved in part out of feminist and gender
studies. Feminism challenged institutions and knowledge initially through adding in the study of women,
and followed this by offering a fundamental rethinking of every category of analysis within the social
and political sciences, arts and humanities. Gender studies added in lesbian and gay studies, alongside
the study of heterosexual men. Queer theory, however, does more than add in the study of lesbians
and gay men to political and social analysis: it aims to make analyses queerer through exploring all those
whose lives transgress heteronormative assumptions and then theorizing from their lives. The theory is
synonymous with new wave of feminist theory questioning rigid dichotomies of gender. It challenges
Identity Politics and the notions of sexual identity on which liberation movements have historically been
based.
Queer theory is strongly influenced by the work of Michel Foucault and to a lesser extent perhaps by
Jacques Derrida. In recent years 'queer' has come to be used differently, sometimes as an umbrella term
for a coalition of culturally marginal sexual self-identifications and at other times to describe a
theoretical model which has developed out of more traditional lesbian and gay studies. Broadly
speaking, queer describes those gestures or analytical models which dramatise incoherencies in the
allegedly stable relations between chromosomal sex, gender and sexual desire. Resisting that model of
stability, queer focuses on mismatches between sex, gender and desire. Institutionally, queer has been
associated most prominently with lesbian and gay subjects, but its analytic framework also includes such
topics as cross-dressing, hermaphrodites, gender ambiguity and gender-corrective surgery.
Demonstrating the impossibility of any 'natural' sexuality, it calls into question even such apparently
unproblematic terms as 'man' and 'woman'.

The recent intervention of this confrontational word 'queer' in altogether politer academic discourses
suggests that traditional models have been ruptured. Yet its appearance also marks continuity. Sigmund
Freud explored various tenets of sexuality and disrupted many of the traditional ways of thinking about
the issues related to the topic. It was not until the work of Foucault, however, and especially in the late
1980s, that an independent area of queer theory first began to take hold in the academy.
In challenging the ontology of sexuality Queer Theory offers a means of challenging other ontologies. It
critiques dependence upon binaries, by which some have to be treated as inferior in order to buttress
the dominant positions which, in pervading modern Western culture, regulate identity. As its initial
focus has largely been upon gender and sexuality, an overview of how the grounding categories of
gender and sexuality have been queered can illustrate means of confronting other grounding categories.
Gender and sexuality are conventionally regarded as fixed, stable categories determined largely by
biology. Feminism argued that gender is a social construction, that is, gender is something that is
learned , with biology determining the behaviors that are achieved.
Queer theory tackles this biological status of the body and shows that biology, too, is constructed.
Moving beyond the conventional ideas of social constructs, it shows that what are constructed are
regulatory fictions which not only order and organize but also make such ordering and organizing appear
natural and right. These regulatory fictions are shown to have no authenticity no core (such as
biology) that produces gender. In Butlers words, there is no gender behind the expressions of gender
for identity is performatively constituted by the very expressions that are said to be its results ( Butler
1990 ). By this she means that gender is constructed through the very doing of gender according to the
norms of how a person with the relevant genitalia should behave.
Hence, Queer Theory shows how there is no choice but to adopt and perform a recognizable identity,
through a performance so natural that it does not appear to be a performance. The very name by which
one is called influences the possibilities and the limitations of what can be performed. It also shows how
tentative, how preliminary, how insecure, that identity is. It is an identity that, in its weakness, relies on
a subordinated other by which it knows itself. Queer theory hence is concerned with identifying those
norms which make it possible for a subject to have something that approximates a liveable life, and how
that very possibility depends upon rendering others polluting and subordinated.
Queer theorist Michael Warner's definition of the concept, was the kinds that typically circumvents
categorical definitions: "Social reflection carried out in such a manner tends to be creative, fragmentary,
and defensive, and leaves us perpetually at a disadvantage. And it is easy to be misled by the utopian
claims advanced in support of particular tactics. But the range and seriousness of the problem that are
continually raised by queer practice indicate how much work remains to be done. Because the logic of
the sexual order is so deeply embedded by now in an indescribably wide range of social institutions, and
is embedded in the most standard accounts of the world, queer struggles aim not just at toleration or
equal status but at challenging those institutions and accounts.
Queer theory, therefore, is aimed at exploring the contesting of the categorization of gender and
sexuality; identities are not fixed they cannot be categorized and labelled because identities consist

of many varied components and that to categorize by one characteristic is wrong. For example, a
woman can be a woman without being labeled a lesbian or feminist, and she may have a different race
from the dominant culture. According to Queer theorists, she should be classed as possessing an
individual identity and not put under the collective label of feminists or of colour or the like.

3. In what ways do you think the media and advertising play a role in perpetuating and justifying
current power relationships through the selling of material goods? Does media perpetuate
hegemony? Give at least one example and discuss it in these terms.
Media plays a crucial role in forming and reflecting public opinion, connecting the world to individuals
and reproducing the self imagery of the society. It is more important as it surrounds us on day-to-day
basis. It is all around us in form of television we watch, music we listen to, books and magazines that we
read and hence we interact with it regularly. It reflects the beliefs and the values of the society. It is
often considered the fourth pillar of a society. The media has a strong social and cultural impact upon
society. This is predicated upon their ability to reach a wide audience with a strong and influential
message. Marshall McLuhan uses the phrase the medium is the message as a means of explaining how
the distribution of a message can often be more important than content of the message itself. It is
through the persuasiveness of media such as television, radio and print media that messages reach their
target audiences. These have been influential media as they have been largely responsible for
structuring people's daily lives and routines.
Advertising, materialism and consumption are central aspects of contemporary Western culture. We are
bombarded with idealised images of the perfect body, desirable consumer goods, and affluent lifestyles,
yet psychology is only just beginning to take account of the profound influence these consumer culture
ideals have on individuals sense of identity and worth.
Consumer culture can have negative psychological impact on how individuals view themselves and on
their emotional welfare in the following ways:
a) The unrealistic socio-cultural beauty ideals embodied by idealized models.
b) Psychological buying motivations in conventional buying environments and on the Internet
c) The purchasing of material goods as a means of expressing and seeking identity, and the
negative consequences of this.
Advertising, a paid form of non-personal communication, uses media as a tool to reach its target group.
According to James .B. Twitchwill, The culture we live in is carried on the back of advertising.
Advertising has the potential to influence and/or alter the decisions of its consumer. Thus, we can
conclude that media and advertising plays an important role in making or breaking a powerful identity. It
has the ability to affect our beliefs, strengthen our knowledge and broaden our perspective.
Advertising plays a demand-stimulation role, encouraging this pattern of "over consumption." Social
scientists and media critics have attributed the increasing materialism among young people to
contemporary advertising. Content analyses of magazine, television & internet advertising have
revealed a growing materialistic trend in advertising all over the world including India. Materialism in
the first sense is not caused by advertising. It is biological. People can get carried away after they have
met all their basic needs, which brings us to materialism in the second sense. This is an effect of
"commoditization". In a commoditized society, the economic system rewards those who produce

commodities, but does not reward those who produce non-commodities, or those who produce things
which don't make as good commodities as other things.
Tata Teas `Jago Re campaign is a classic example of a company taking their communication strategy
beyond the obvious and still managing to strike a chord with the audience. In the first phase of the
campaign they urged the youth to vote. The number of people who registered on their website was not
as many as they had expected yet Tata Tea was successful in getting etched in the mind of the user.
Buoyed by the success of this campaign Tata decided to come out with a campaign that addresses a
social issue that plagues the country. After research they concluded that one of the biggest deterrents of
the pace private and public investment and sectorial and social reforms can impact the life of the
common man is corruption. Tata Tea would also promote December 9th (World Anti Corruption Day) to
make it into a national activity.
Media & Hegemony
Hegemony is the domination of one group or entity by that of another group or entity; it consists of the
polarization of at opposite ends a given spectrum between domination and subjugation with little in
between. While hegemony or alternatively, hegemonism, is most often conceived as blatant or
superficially apparent but in reality, hegemonism of the cultural variety is occurring daily in the popular
media most often facilitated through advertising and the advertisers who both design and produce
advertising.
In the Information Age national economies are increasingly interconnected as multinational
corporations transcend the traditionally bounded structure of the nation-state. Google is the perfect
example of media and advertisings hegemony over information. In Spite of all of Googles claims of it
being fair in dealing with rankings and private information on the net, it is known that much of the
information displayed on its pages is paid for and the advertising displays also work in a similar manner.
Google today has a global hegemony over content. It is Google who decides what one views on Youtube
or for even a simple assignment or project. Thus it has the power over us in deciding whether we should
get access to a particular set of information or not.
Mass media can be seen as having an important role in justifying the rule of dominant groups by
supporting their claims to superiority, and in trying to persuade the dominated to consent to this
justification. People who specialize in formulating and disseminating ideas (such as journalists, priests,
public relations companies, politicians, advisers, and academics) are constantly engaged in interpreting
current events and debates so as to fit dominant conceptions and categories.
To give an example of how hegemony works for audiences and how ideologies are expressed in media
texts, consider the movie, Bridget Joness Diary. In this case, members of then audience typically hope
that Bridget will end up with Mark Darcy and they feel happy when she gets what she wants. The
pleasure that audiences feel when an ordinary girl gets a great guy, and when our quirky heroines
desires are fulfilled is a good example of hegemony at work.

Other such instances can be pointed out by saying a violent incident in Iraq is interpreted as further
evidence of worldwide terrorist conspiracy; economic crises are blamed on outsiders or seen as
inevitable; national sporting successes vindicate political systems.
Hence it can be said that Mass media can be seen as having an important role in justifying the rule of
dominant groups by supporting their claims to superiority, and in trying to persuade the dominated to
consent to this justification.

Reference

Books:
A critical introduction to queer theory - By Nikki Sullivan
Simulacra and simulation - By Jean Baudrillard
Links:
http://www.cla.purdue.edu/academic/engl/theory/marxism/modules/althusserideologymainframe.htm
http://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/postmodernism/modules/baudlldsimultnmainframe.html
www.theory.org.uk/ctr-quee.htm
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queer_theory
www.queertheory.com/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony
dictionary.reference.com/browse/hegemony
www.wisegeek.com/what-is-hegemony.htm
www.suite101.com/content/hegemony-and-media-studies-a52278
www.blackwellreference.com/public/tocnode?id=g9781405124331...
www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/.../marxism10.html
www.academon.com/Essay-Media-Hegemony-in.../89910
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hegemony
poq.oxfordjournals.org/content/48/2/476.full.pdf
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation