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AVetsch5y ago
To the average businessman running a journalistic news website, it often does not seem necessary to extend the audience of the news site to readers who like to read about art. After all, why should journalism sites devote to permitting critics informing film, TV or book lovers if the latest blockbuster/primetime event/bestseller is worth their time. Is it even worth it for journalism.
Given the frenzy journalism has dealt with the past five years, they have increasingly devoted their resources to covering politics and news. President Trump naturally expresses/ed* a desperate craving for media attention. Media companies, attempting to maintain coverage of the president's remarks and actions, shifted more of its resources from cultural criticism in favor of political news coverage.
*I'm not sure how to label President Trump in past or present tense at this point, given he is still currently holding office as of this writing but is due to leave within a week.
If a journalist news site is to survive, should it cut out cultural criticism a dispensable aspect of its site? Should it forgo all its resources devoted to reviewing the latest movies released on Netflix in favor of covering Biden's Inauguration.
At face value, this is a tempting decision for someone running a journalist site that needs to do what it can to gain attraction. Perhaps real world events should get more coverage than cultural events. After all, once I start thinking about what the job of a movie critic entitles, the more odd I came to find it. A person is paid a salary to simply make an educated decision to tell readers if they should go see one movie over the other? That's a job?
In the case of cutting resources as a necessity to divert attention on different topics, that I agree. But dispensing cultural criticism altogether, I argue, is inherently wrong.
I came across an article I read by one of my favorite entertainment critics, Emily Todd VanderWerff. In a piece titled "Cultural Criticism Matters". In the article, VanderWerff laments that cultural criticism gave her "other ways of looking at and understanding the world, which is core to journalism's mission statement" (VanderWerff).
Culture Criticism is vital for journalism because it reports how artists are expressing their views of the current situation of the world they inhabit, and can be expressed by their individual viewpoints.
It can be a lens to which how one's understanding of a piece of literature can enhance a reader's own understanding of the same text.
And that understanding can be a drive to how we understand each other's viewpoints.
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EmmaMon5y ago
I definitely agree Andrew! I think that while it is important to understand and keep on top of global affairs, cultural criticism offers a vehicle to emphasize that art and culture are also vitally important aspects of daily human existence - important enough that they need to be reported on as equally as news.
The music we listen to and the books we read, also shape our ideas and identities as people. Cultural criticism holds art and culture accountable for the ideas it presents to its audience - for example a critic pointing out the racial inequalities in a film cast can alert people to this as an issue in the film industry. This could pave the way for change if the critique accumulates enough attention.
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JenReneeGilley5y ago
> "*I'm not sure how to label President Trump in past or present tense at this point, given he is still currently holding office as of this writing but is due to leave within a week."
I think it's safe to still address him as President Trump. I saw something on TV the other day (can't remember what), where they called in Obama for an interview, and they introduced him as President Obama despite him having been out of office for this long.
> "A person is paid a salary to simply make an educated decision to tell readers if they should go see one movie over the other? That's a job?"
It *is* a funny thing, isn't it? And critics' opinions aren't always right. They do offer a valuable insight from the POV of filmmaking techniques which average moviegoers aren't familiar with, though. And they're not the only profession to get paid for expressing their opinions -- magazines, newspapers, websites, etc. feature opinion pieces all the time, and I would assume that their authors get paid, at least for the big name media companies. Some people even get paid to troll social media sites like Twitter and Facebook -- or so I've been told. I can't actually verify that. But I wouldn't doubt it.
> "Culture Criticism is vital for journalism because it reports how artists are expressing their views of the current situation of the world they inhabit, and can be expressed by their individual viewpoints."
Excellent point. I don't think I even need to say anything else. What you said stands for itself.
**Edit:** A point I just thought of -- There's also an important place for more lighthearted pieces of Culture Criticism, because in the face of such trying times, sometimes people need a distraction, if only for the sake of their mental health. Dwelling on real-world issues 24/7 can only cause stress, mental fatigue (if not physical in some cases), anxiety, and depression. People being in isolation only exacerbates these problems. So, without -- say -- an article analyzing where [Coco succeeds and fails at representing Mexican culture](https://www.teenvogue.com/story/disney-pixar-coco-mexico-representation) to lighten the mood and uplift the spirits, *while also serving an important function as Culture Criticism*, people wouldn't have any outlets in journalistic media in which to escape the world's current problems. So, we *need* lighthearted Culture Criticism pieces to keep us mentally sane and reasonably happy.
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