Introducing Cultural Studies: Learning through Practice

"An outstanding entry level text aimed at those with little or no cultural studies knowledge... Innovative, creative and clever." - Times Higher Education  "The ideal textbook for FE and first year HE cultural studies students. Its quality and character allow the reader to ‘feel’ the enthusiasm of its author which in turn becomes infectious, instilling in the reader a genuine sense of ebullient perturbation." - Art/Design/Media, The Higher Education Authority An introduction to the practice of cultural studies, this book is ideal for undergraduate courses. Full of practical exercises that will get students thinking and writing about the issues they encounter, this book offers its readers the conceptual tools to practice cultural analysis for themselves. There are heuristics to help students prepare and write projects, and the book provides plenty of examples to help students develop their own ideas.   Written in a creative, playful and witty style, this book:  Links key concepts to the key theorists of cultural studies. Includes a wide range of references of popular cultural forms. Emphasizes the multidisciplinary nature of cultural studies. Includes pedagogical features, such as dialogues, graphs, images and recommended readings. The book′s skills-based approach enables students to develop their creative skills, and shows students how to improve their powers of analysis generally.

Table of Contents:
PART ONE: HIGH CULTURE GLADIATORS: SOME INFLUENTIAL EARLY MODELS OF CULTURAL ANALYSIS Culture and Anarchy in the UK A Dialogue with Matthew Arnold The Leavisites and T.S. Eliot Combat Mass Urban Culture Adorno, the Frankfurt School and the ′Culture Industry′ PART TWO: THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF WORKING-CLASS CULTURE From a Day Out at the Seaside to the Milk Bar Richard Hoggart and Working-Class Culture E.P. Thompson and Working-Class Culture as a Site for Conflict, Consciousness and Resistance Towards a Recognizable Theory of Culture Raymond Williams PART THREE: CONSOLIDATING CULTURAL STUDIES: SUBCULTURES, THE POPULAR, IDEOLOGY AND HEGEMONY Introducing Stuart Hall The Importance and Re-evaluation of Popular Mass Culture Youth Subcultures and Resistance A Dialogue with Quadrophenia Subcultures and Widening Horizons Further Strategies for Practice How to Dominate the Masses Without Resorting to the Inquisition Antonio Gramsci and Hegemony Theory A Few Ways You Might Adapt Ideas from Louis Althusser to Cultural Studies a Dialogue with Dr Jeckyll and Mr Hyde PART FOUR: PROBING THE MARGINS, REMEMBERING THE FORGOTTEN: REPRESENTATION, SUBORDINATION AND IDENTITY Crying Woolf! Thinking with Feminism Adapting Theory to Explore Race, Ethnicity and Sexuality The Case of East is East PART FIVE: HONING YOUR SKILLS, CONCLUSIONS AND ′BEGIN-ENDINGS′ Consolidating Practice, Heuristic Thinking, Creative Cri-tickle Acts and Further Research

About the Author :
David Walton has a degree in English Literature (University of Wales 1985) an M.Phil (University of Oxford 1987), a Certificate in Education (University of Greenwich, London 1988), and a TEFL qualification (University of Aston, Birmingham 1987). He was awarded his doctorate in 1992 by the University of Murcia. He began his teaching career in further education in Britain before being contracted as an associate lecturer in the English Department of the University of Murcia in 1989. He became Senior Lecturer in the area of Cultural Studies in 2001 and has promoted the area in Spain for more than ten years. He is one of the founder members of the Culture and Power group which has organized annual conferences in Spain and Portugal every year since 1995 and has contributed to most of the publications to come out of these conferences. He is a founder member and President of the Iberian Association of Cultural Studies (IBACS). He has co-organized conferences on English-speaking cultures and co-organized two International Conferences on cultural studies for IBACS, both held at the Universidad de Murcia. Apart from his undergraduate teaching, he has taught audiovisual translation at M.A. level and has given doctorate courses on the construction of national identity and given many conference papers. He currently teaches cultural studies at undergraduate level and postmodern theory and culture at M.A. level. He has published widely, his publications reflecting his research interests which include literary and cultural theory, cultural studies, popular culture, visual culture and postmodern theories of culture. His latest books are ′Introducing Cultural Studies: Learning Through Practice′ (SAGE, 2008) and ′Doing Cultural Theory′ (SAGE, 2012). He has a chapter on Chris Morris′ satire which will appear in ′No Known Cure: The Comedy of Chris Morris′ (edited by James Leggott & Jamie Sexton (Palgrave Macmilan, 2003), and has a number of other chapters which are in print on the interfaces between philosophy and cultural studies and graffiti and popular culture.

Review :
An outstanding entry level text aimed at those with little or no cultural studies knowledge... Innovative, creative and clever THE Times Higher Education What a weird and wonderful book. It is the Ronseal of Cultural Studies Literature; it does what it says on the tin... the ideal textbook for Further Education and first year Higher Education Cultural Studies Students... It is also a brilliant revision and essay writing tool for more advanced learners. It is concise, honest and straightforward in its aims and content and witty in its approach... This does not mean however that its content is ‘dumbed down′. It valiantly manages to retain all the highly academic information required for this area of study and does not shy away from using the appropriate terminology and language that Cultural Studies students must familiarise themselves with. The ‘Oversimplification Warnings’, ‘Practice Exercises’, illustrations and ‘Notes’ act as practical or cognitive revision for the body of text rather than as a ‘gutter press’ substitute... this is a highly successful book, in that it has accomplished its intentions, but it is also a motivational book. Its quality and character allow the reader to ‘feel’ the enthusiasm of its author which in turn becomes infectious, instilling in the reader a genuine sense of ebullient perturbation Art/Design/Media The Higher Education Authority It does not attempt to be in any way exhaustive, as it shows a constant awareness of "what′s been left out", but, working towards "interpretive independence", it aims to provide students with sufficient notional skills to start doing their own cultural criticism… Like the best cultural studies works, Walton′s exhilarating book may leave the student wondering what cultural studies actually is, perhaps undecided about a final definition, but nonetheless confident enough to start practising it ATLANTIS Journal of the Spanish Association of Anglo-American Studies Ideal for courses linked to the ECTS (European Credit Transfer System) laid down by the Bologna process that is transforming university education in Europe, epecially as the author shows a constant awareness of teaching in terms of developing students′ critical competencies J. Rubén Valdés Miyares Universidad de Oviedo