Folk & Popular
Culture
Why is Popular Culture Widely
Distributed?
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Popular culture varies more in time than in place
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What does this mean???
Material Posessions
Unlike folk culture, pop culture does NOT reflect the
local environment; looks the same everywhere
Some regional differences in MDCs, but much less
than in past;
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Food
Clothing
Shelter
Popular Housing Styles
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Influences of shapes, materials, detailing etc.
Modern house styles (1945-60)
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“Family room” added in 1950s
Neo-eclectic house styles (since 1960)
Clothing Styles
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Clothing habits as reflection
of type of work rather than
environment (suit vs. jeans)
Higher income = up-to-date
wardrobe (especially
women)
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Communication speed,
manufacturing
Diffusion; Travel, TV,
Internet
Can you think of a clothing
style that was adopted from
folk costume?
Jeans
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Became mainstream in US in 1960s
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Price of jeans??
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Used to be associated with low status, manual
laborers
$10-????
Value of Levi’s around the world
What do jeans have to do with communism??
Popular Food Customs
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Consumption patterns of alcohol & snack-foods
Fast-food/Restaurants
Variations within US much less significant than
differences between US & LDCs
Alcohol Preferences in the U.S.
Fig. 4-12: Per capita consumption of rum (top) and Canadian whiskey (bottom)
show different distributions and histories of diffusion.
Diffusing Popular Culture
Through TV
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Significant pop. custom for 2 reasons
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TV’s in US in 1930s but diffusion blocked
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Most popular leisure activity in MDCs
Most important mechanism for diffusing culture
1945 = 10,000; 4 years later…1949 = 1,000,000
1951 = 10,000,000
1959 = 50,000,000
Internet follows similar pattern
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More rapid pace
Diffusion of TV, 1954–1999
Fig. 4-14: Television has diffused widely since the 1950s, but some areas still have
low numbers of TVs per population.
Gov’t Control of TV
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Private corporations vs.
Government owned
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How do they make $$
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CTV, CityTV, VS. CBC,
TVO
Ads, licenses
Satellites banned
(China, Saudi Arabia)
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Gov’t censorship