The coeditors are successful textbook authors who, between them, have over fifty years of teaching experience in the college classroom. Sonia Maasik, a lecturer in the UCLA Writing Programs, has taught writing from developmental to advanced levels, and coordinates training for UCLA writing programs' teaching assistants. Jack Solomon, a professor of English at California State University, Northridge, teaches literature and critical theory, along with his graduate and undergraduate classes on popular cultural semiotics, and is often interviewed by the media for analysis of current events and trends. He is the author of The Signs of Our Time (1988) and Discourse and Reference in the Nuclear Age (1988). The two together have published Signs of Life in the U.S.A.: Readings on Popular Culture for Writers, Sixth Edition (Bedford/St. Martin's, 2009) and California Dreams and Realities, Third Edition (Bedford/St. Martins, 2005).
Signs of Life in the USA, 8th editionTable of Contents
* = New to this edition
Contents
Preface for Instructors
INTRODUCTION
Popular Signs: Or, Everything You Always Knew about American Culture (but Nobody Asked)
Writing about Popular Culture
Using Active Reading Strategies
Prewriting strategies
Developing Strong Arguments about Popular Culture
Conducting a Semiotic Analysis
Reading Visual Images Actively
Reading Essays about Popular Culture
Amy Lin, Barbie: Queen of Dolls and Consumerism [student essay]
*Rose Sorooshian, The Walking 99 Percent: An Analysis of The Walking Dead in the Context of the 2008 Recession [student essay]
*Ryan Kim, A Reading of Gran Torino [student essay]Conducting Research and Citing Sources
Scott Jaschik, A Stand against Wikipedia
Patti S. Caravello, Judging Quality on the Web
Trip Gabriel, Plagiarism Lines Blur for Students in Digital Age
Synthesizing Sources
Chapter 1
Consuming Passions: The Culture of American Consumption
Laurence Shames, The More Factor *[e-reading] Gene Brockhoff, Shop ‘Til You Drop [documentary film clip]
PAIRED READINGS: UNDERSTANDING SHOPPING
Anne Norton, The Signs of Shopping
Malcolm Gladwell, The Science of Shopping
*Jon Mooallem, The Self-Storage Self
*Stephenie Clifford and Quentin Hardy, Attention, Shoppers: Store Is Tracking Your Cell
Thomas Hine, Whats in a Package *James A. Roberts, The Treadmill of Consumption (from Shiny Objects)Phyllis M. Japp and Debra K. Japp, Purification Through Simplification: Nature, the Good Life, and Consumer Culture *Steve McKevitt, Everything Now Thomas Frank, Commodify Your Dissent
Chapter 2
Brought to You B(u)y: The Signs of Advertising
Jack Solomon, Masters of Desire: The Culture of American Advertising
PAIRED READINGS: CREATING CONSUMERS
James B. Twitchell, What We Are to Advertisers
Steve Craig, Mens Men and Womens Women
*[e-reading] Ford, Two-Ford Freedom [vintage TV ad]
Jennifer L. Pozner, Doves “Real Beauty” BacklashGloria Steinem, Sex, Lies, and Advertising*Juliet B. Schor, Selling to Children: the Marketing of Cool*Joseph Turow, Introduction to The Daily You: How the New Advertising Industry is Defining Your Identity and Your Worth
Julia B. Corbett, A Faint Green Sell: Advertising and the Natural World
*Portfolio of Advertisements
Chapter 3
Video Dreams: Television, Music, and Cultural Forms
*Nick Serpe, Reality Pawns: The New Money TV
PAIRED READINGS: SOUTHERN WOMAN
*Claire Miye Stanford, Youve Got the Wrong Song: Nashville and Country Music Feminism
*Michelle Dean, Here Comes the Hillbilly, Again
* [e-readings] THIRTEEN, TV Gone Wrong [advertisements]
Carl Matheson, The Simpsons, Hyper- Irony, and the Meaning of Life
Natasha Simmons, Mad Men and the Paradox of the Past
*Jane Hu, Reality Hunger: On Lena Dunhams Girls
*Willa Paskin, “Devious Maids” Skewers the One Percent
Neal Gabler, The Social Networks
Chapter 4
The Hollywood Sign: The Culture of American FilmLinda Seger, Creating the Myth* [e-reading] Louis J. Gasnier and Arthur Hoerl, Reefer Madness [film clip]
* [e-reading] George A. Romero and John A. Russo, Night of the Living Dead [film clip]
PAIRED READINGS: GENDER AND RACE IN FILM
Jessica Hagedorn, Asian Women in Film: No Joy, No Luck
*Helena Andrews, “The Butler” vs. “The Help”: Gender Matters
Matt Zoller Seitz, The Offensive Movie Cliché that Won't DieMichael Parenti, Class and VirtueDavid Denby, High- School Confidential: Notes on Teen Movies*Michael Agresta, How the Western Was Lost—And Why It Matters*Christine Folch, Why the West Loves Sci-Fi and Fantasy: A Cultural Explanation
Chapter 5
The Cloud: Semiotics and the New Media
S. Craig Watkins, Fast Entertainment and Multitasking in an Always-On World
PAIRED READINGS: FACING FACEBOOK
International Center for Media & the Public Agenda, Students Addicted to Social Media
*Simon Dumenco, If Were All So Sick of You, Facebook, Why Cant We Quit You?
danah boyd, Implications of User Choice: The Cultural Logic of MySpace or Facebook? *Salvador Rodriguez, In the Digital Age, Breaking Up Is Hard to Do*Richard Rushfield, Toward a Unified Theory of How the Internet Makes Everything Terrible
*Daniel DAddario, Everything Is “Trolling” Now
Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture
* [e-reading] Ben Lewis, Polar Star Films, and BLTV, Google & the World Brain [documentary film clip]
*Chapter 6
Heroes and Villains: Encoding Our Conflicts
Robert B. Ray, The Thematic Paradigm
*Stevie St. John, Out of Character: Wonder Womans Strength Is Her Humanity—What Happened?
PAIRED READINGS: LOVING THE SINNER
*Laura Bennett, Against Antiheroes
*Heather Havrilesky, No Sympathy for the Devil
*George Packer, Celebrating Inequality
*Noah Gittel, The Lone Ranger Seals It: Americas New Favorite Villain Is a Rich Guy
*Tim Layden, A Patriots Tale
*Lorraine Devon Wilke, Snowdens a Hero, Obamas a Villain
* [e-reading] U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, iGuardians [video]
Chapter 7
My Selfie, Myself: Constructing Identity in the Age of Entertainment
*Rachel Lowry, Straddling Online and Offline Profiles, Millennials Search for Identity
PAIRED READINGS: PERFORMING GENDER
Aaron Devor, Gender Role Behaviors and Attitudes
Deborah Blum, The Gender Blur: Where Does Biology End and Society Take Over?
* [e-reading] Sut Jhally, The Codes of Gender [documentary film clip]
Kevin Jennings, American Dreams Mariah Burton Nelson, I Won. Im Sorry
Alfred Lubrano, The Shock of Education: How College Corrupts
Michael Omi, In Living Color: Race and American Culture*Dani McClain, Being “Masculine of Center” while Black
*Theresa Celebran Jones, Sanjay and Craig: Nickelodeons Hilarious New Mixed-Race Heroes
*Aymar Jean Christian, The End of Post-Identity Television
Glossary
Index of Authors and Titles