LIBS1940: How Popular Culture Narratives Shape Identity and Humanity

This essay explores the influence of popular culture on individual identity, drawing on a narrative analysis framework. It examines how popular culture, encompassing various forms of media such as art, music, and film, shapes an individual's understanding of their role in society. The essay uses the theory of role identity to explain how interactions within social groups, such as college students, lead to the adoption of popular cultural norms. It discusses how individuals define themselves through these interactions, relating to others with similar cultural interests and values. The analysis further delves into the concepts of interactional and reflective commitment, highlighting the impact of social networks on self-concept. The essay concludes that popular culture, while influenced by broader social structures, significantly impacts individual roles and identities within society, particularly in the context of narratives and social interactions.

Running head: POPULAR CULTURE
Popular culture
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

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POPULAR CULTURE
Popular culture is usually recognized as a set of practices, beliefs and the objects that
are recognized in a society at a given point in time. The media plays a major role in it. The
popular culture is a way of influencing the attitude of an individual towards a certain aspect.
The popular culture usually transmits in the nature of the human beings once they live
in the society. The human beings dwell in a particular society and they usually inherit
the culture that is popular in the society. For example there is a huge difference between
the western culture and the eastern culture. The people living in the western countries
inherits the western culture and the person living in the eastern country inherits the
eastern culture. This is the way the popular culture helps the individuals to define their
humanity. The popular culture is usually opposite to that of the mass culture, the folk
culture, the culture of working-class. It makes an individual to understand his or her own role.
This can be helped with the understanding of a narrative. The narrative cab be the example of
the students who reads in the colleges. They interact in groups and they adapt the popular
culture that is dominant in the group (Storey, 2016).
This can be well understand by the theory of role identity. The individual students
who had to interact in groups were exposed to the ideas of the people who were part of the
groups. In this theory the people themselves were the product of the social interaction in
which the people came to know about themselves through the interactions with others. This
suggests taking the role of others. People usually interact in groups and therefore they have
distinct selves as there are distinct groups whose opinions matter to them (Thompson, 2015).
This is called the identity theory. While interacting with different people in the college an
individual comes across different ideas and sometimes could identify themselves with those
individuals. The example of this that the individuals can identify that they are the daughters
of their parents, some were sisters and some brothers to their sisters. Role identities creates a
meaning for the self. In the above narrative, the person can relate to the culture of the other

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persons who is a part of the group. The individual can identify his role. The identification of
role involves the function of the individual in the society and to his family (Ross, 2016). It
involves the culture in which the individual belongs. The culture can be stated as the financial
status and also the social status. For example, a student can love to listen to the western
music, the other individual also might love to do so. Therefore he could identify himself with
the other. This is the identification of the roles. It is the commitment of the person towards
the role. The theory include two types of commitment, one is interactional commitment and
the other is reflecting commitment. It refers to the importance of the relationships that is
associated with the identity. The person will be therefore be able to get attached to the person
who have the same culture and the same thought. It acknowledges the impact of the social
networks on the self-concepts of the people (Burke, 2017). It develops and maintains the
relationships between the people. Society therefore has a major role to play in it. The impact
of the society on the behavior of the individuals and the relationships are mediated through
the self-relevant role identities. Therefore the identity theory can be summed up as a social
psychological model of the self. It identifies the social nature of the self. It is considered to be
derived from the ones that already exists in the society and in the social world. The most
interesting fact about the theory is that they the social structure has a huge influence on them
still the individual roles of the society has a major role to play in this (Alvermann, et al.,
2018).
Therefore while concluding this can be mentioned that the term popular culture is the
accumulation of different cultures such as, art, music, dance, film, television, radio that is the
product of the society. The above discussion considers a narrative in which the culture plays a
major role in identifying the role of an individual in the society. The culture emerged after the
World War 2 when the innovations in mass media led to the significant changes in the social

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as well as the cultural change. The world is exposed to more variant popular culture in the
passing years and it is expected to witness some more in the upcoming years.

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References
Alvermann, D. E., Moon, J. S., Hagwood, M. C., & Hagood, M. C. (2018). Popular culture in
the classroom: Teaching and researching critical media literacy. Routledge.
Burke, P. (2017). Popular culture in early modern Europe. Routledge.
Ross, A. (2016). No respect: Intellectuals and popular culture. Routledge.
Storey, J. (2016). Popular Culture. Materiality and Popular Culture: The Popular Life of
Things.
Storey, J. (2018). Cultural theory and popular culture: An introduction. Routledge.
Thompson, E. P. (2015). Customs in common: Studies in traditional popular culture. New
Press, The.