The Essence Of Pop Culture Essay -- essays research papers fc

â€Å"Talk about Pop Music, Talk about Pop Music†¦Ã¢â‚¬  was one of the most catchy phrases of the 1980’s. Just as in the 80’s, today we see many characteristics of â€Å"pop culture† effecting our lives. But, what is â€Å"pop culture?† I spent some time online trying to answer my question and time after time I was led to the same direction: pop culture is what we see, hear, speak, and are otherwise exposed to on a daily basis. The infomercials we see late on television, the billboards we see on the side of the road, the junk mail we receive, the links on the web pages we visit, and the radio commercials we hear all tie together to form this idea of pop culture. These, plus many other aspects, form our minds and teach us how to be culturally smart. To be culturally smart is to understand and know pop culture. For example, if someone were to say â€Å"BUD!† it is automatically assumed that they would get a â€Å"WIES† in reply. If a person were to say â€Å"Just Do It!† Nike would be directly thought of. What elements define â€Å"Pop Culture?† Television stars, such as Drew Carey; musicians, such as Santana; public figures, such as Monica Lewinski; politicians, such as Bill Clinton; athletes, such as Michael Jordan; large corporations with their slogans; and movies are all, but not limited to, pop culture. In a Journal I found online of a study of pop culture, it compared the link of religion and a pop culture icon, Star Wars. The study was conducted with people and it read: â€Å"The comparisons and shared philos...

Sexual Identity in the Arab World

The ways in which regimes of law, cultural identity and state governance shape understandings of Muslim or Arab sexualities are many. In his article â€Å"Re-Orienting Desire: The Gay International and the Arab World† Joseph Massad outlines some of these regimes. Massad argues that western orientalists and colonialists altered the way Muslims viewed their own sexuality by bringing into consciousness the idea of gay rights and thus homosexuality where it did not previously exist. Because of this, Massad argues that the western influence completely transformed how Muslims understood their own sexuality.In the beginning of his article Massad points out how Arab and Iranian men would engage in both gay and heterosexual practices while simultaneously rejecting the ‘Western identity’ of gayness. While this opposes the idea of Western homosexuality it reflects an Arab understanding of sexuality as being fluid and not tightly restrained by identifying as either ‘gay ’ or ‘straight. ’ This changed over time as Western influence became more prevalent in the Arab world through culture exchange.Massad refers to this cultural exchange by introducing the Gay International, a sort of missionary group who aims to ‘stabilize’ the sexual instability found within Arab societies. In other words, the Gay International aims to promote its views on sexuality and liberate Arabs into the Western world of homosexuality. This highlights how sexual identities can be created and can travel between societies through the work of individual groups. The Gay International succeeded in creating and dividing Arabs into two new forms of identity -both homo and hero sexuality, where previously these were unfamiliar concepts.As opposed to Western societies, Massad notes how the Arabic language only recently adopted words for homosexuality and heterosexuality. Further, the word for sexual deviance was only coined in the mid 19050 and is unders tood to refer to the Western concept of homosexuality. These examples of language show how Western concepts shape Muslim understandings of sexuality by introducing certain terms that reflect Western born concepts. By forcing Muslims to identify as homosexuals this placed them into a social group that could be targeted by police and government agencies.As noted in the article, police were able to target men â€Å"who identify as ‘gay’ on a personal level and who seek to use this identity as a group identification†¦ † The labeling of Arab men as homosexuals made them vulnerable to police attacks against this ‘socially deviant’ behavior. As a result of the introduction of Western cultural concepts of sexuality, Arab men were subsequently subject to repression by state government forces. Police targeting is not the only form of a state government’s control over sexual identity.Because homosexuality in the Arab world was transformed from a pra ctice into an identity this made it also subject to antihomosexual laws. The Western concepts of sexuality have thus created a new cultural identity that is regulated by law and enforced by state governments in the Arab world. Nadine Naber’s paper entitled â€Å"Arab American Femininities: Beyond Arab Virgin/American(ized) Whore† highlights the conflicting identities of homo and heterosexuality while also showing how individuals deal with and combat socially constructed norms in an Arab context.Nadine analyzes ideas about virginity and homosexuality by interviewing young women who grew up surrounded by these issues. One of Nadine’s interviewees, Lulu, a gay Arab woman, describes how the connotation of homosexuality as being a Western concept was so engrained in her upbringing that she felt she could not be gay and Arab at the same time as they were such opposing identities. In Lulu’s case, she was able to resist the exorcising identity of being gay in an Arab family by seeking support from queer Arab groups.She was able to form a family with other socially ostracized women who were also shunned by the Arab belief that homosexuality is a Western born and promoted idea. By choosing these women as her ‘family’ Lulu is able to resist the patriarchal and heterosexual ideals of Arab culture. Lulu insists that ‘queer Arabs exist’ which is in itself an act of resistance against homophobic Arab understandings of sexuality. Because many Arabs view homosexuality as being created by Western culture they are able to sustain their cultural views on exuality by blaming gay identifying Arabs as being Americanized. This is one way Arabs are able to resist the Western binary form of identity as either a hetero or a homo sexual. Gay Arabs are simply non existent without American influence. In terms of the gay individuals themselves, they must also choose to resist or assimilate -or a combination of the two- into Western ideas of sexuality in order to understand their own sexual identity. In Lulu’s case, she chooses to resist the ‘normal’ path of an Arab women -who is to remain a virgin until she is married off- by openly identifying as gay.In the eyes of her parents she has chosen sex over her family and thus rejected her Arab family and culture. In her family’s view there is no way to combine a gay identity with the socially constructed views on sexuality found in Arab culture. Lulu rebels from her family’s views on Arab sexuality by embracing the identity of a gay Arab woman. Not only does Lulu rebel by identifying as gay but by doing this she simultaneously rejects the ‘virgin until married’ ideal bound to the heterosexual norm of Arab identity.While Massad’s work identifies the structures behind the creation of sexual identities and how these travel beyond state lines, Nadine’s paper shows how these constructed sexual identities affect ind ividual’s understandings of their own identities in their every day lives. Nadine’s paper gives a personal face to sexual identity issues, showing how the cultural understandings of sexual identity laid out in Massad’s article effect those who are marginalized by the very dialogue that is used to define them.

The Evolution Of Human Origins - 1179 Words

Initial ideas of human origins are reflected in the ancient mythologies. Later on, religious versions of human origins appeared. One of the most popular religious theory is creationism. According to it God had created men and everything else in the world. There are two types of creationism, young earth creationism and old earth creationism . Ancient philosophy first proposed ideas of the natural origins of men. Most of its ideas were speculative. It was the product of the ancient philosophers` imagination, but not a result of researching of objective data. Next Charles Darwin offered the Theory of Evolution. Until now this theory is the one of the best substantiated theories in the history of science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including paleontology, geology, genetics and developmental biology. His theory explains how unguided, natural mechanism could structure all the processes in the world, while operating in accordance to the laws of natu re . Despite the wealth of evidence from the fossil record, genetics and other fields of science, some people denounce the theory, invoking a higher being as a designer to explain the complex world of living things, especially humans. School boards debate whether the theory of evolution should be taught alongside other ideas, such as creationism. Mainstream scientists see no controversy. Today a lot of people have deep religious beliefs and also accept evolution . There is also a theory ofShow MoreRelatedHuman Origins : The Cusp Of Evolution Essay731 Words   |  3 PagesSummer Musser Human Origins F15 The Cusp of Evolution The past works in mysterious way allowing small pieces to leak through to the surface that will one day reveal the answers to the most prominent questions. Ian Tattersall made the claim that in 2012 â€Å"†¦there is nothing in the fossil record that we can regard as a convincing intermediate between any australopith or â€Å"early Homo† and the Turkana Boy (Tattersall, 2012, p.94).† In his argument it was difficult to find the missing link that pulled theRead MoreThe Origin of Language in Human Evolution Essay1209 Words   |  5 Pagescommunication, suggesting that only humans with complex brain system were capable of developing (Ulbaek, 1998). Whereas other animal species communicate through vocalised sounds, songs, or gestures specially primates such as apes. Similarly gestures and hand gestures were the form of communication used by early hominids, but Homo habilis and Homo erectus started to use vocalisations and decreasing the frequent use of simple hand gest ures for communication. 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But what doesRead MoreThe Evolution of Evolution1188 Words   |  5 Pagescreation of humanity have rapidly changed since the discovery of evolution. Nevertheless, there was a time before the world did not know the theory of evolution and the theories demonstrated by Sir Charles Darwin. Before the evolution, there were people who were subjected to religious ideologies of how mankind was created, they believed that the upper class was known to be â€Å"divine creatures†. However, the introduction of evolution leads the theory to be the base of biology and changes the minds ofRead More Human Evolution Essay1020 Words   |  5 PagesHuman Evolution   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  When people take a look at African history in general many topics and ideas come to mind. How the people of Africa lived, how they developed civilizations and cultures, and how their oral traditions came about are just a few examples. When I am trying to learn about different groups of people and different areas of the world I most likely start at the very beginning of their existence. Africa being the origin of man and the home for the majority of developments of early humansRead MoreIntelligent Design: A Bona Fide Theory Essay1278 Words   |  6 Pagesstate, and ID should not be taught due to the significant amount of evidence supporting the theory of evolution. Those for ID being taught in public schools argue that intelligent design is a scientific theory employing the methods commonly used by other historical sciences to conclude certain feature of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause that evolution cannot explain. Int elligent design does not discuss specifically who or what designed the universe, simple