Does the very idea of culture encompass all humanistic experiences and/or expressions? Mass media, science, religion, sports, fine arts, not so fine arts, poetry, music, graffiti, and so on. Do they belong under the umbrella of culture? If they do, and I’ll argue with sincerity that they do belong there, how are they communicating with humanity? Mostly in visual terms?
No matter how hard some ultra-conservatives try to stop it, culture, of course, is always changing. In any given society the arts, beliefs (i.e., ideology), customs, various technologies, traditions, and private, as well as public institutions (e.g., marriage and church) change. These are not fixed solid entities. They are liquid. They change shape, and the pipes leak or get filled with other liquids, mixing cultures.
I should like to define culture as the “collective” form of expression that we (individuals and groups) use to assign meaning to our lives and make sense of given values and facts we encounter.
How do we do this? Mostly with images!
Do we understand this process? To what extent do we understand it? Is it even important to understand it? Or should we submit to its force and be carried by it, like a leaf in the wind. Are we the leaf and visual culture the wind? Don’t we produce this wind? Are we able to get out of the fish tank and see other fish swimming in it? How can we comprehend the gravity of visual culture?
Indeed, in relation to visual messages, we are not dupes, as some rigidly ideological critics would claim. We conduct negotiated readings with the visual, and our plastic brains are very good at this. This, however, begs the question, which is twofold.
How aware are we of this process? And how can we increase this awareness?