Culture Is an Ecosystem: A Manifesto Towards a New Cultural Criticism

The problem here is our obsession with popularity. We’ve been imbued with popularity contests since the beginning of our social lives. We’ve been primed to assess cultural output by how many others liked it. Movie and music studios, fashion conglomerates, publishers, social media, and other cultural industries generate efficient formulas to create ... See more

In the new cultural economy, the culture is the product. It is composed of practices, ideas, and discourses. Products are auxiliary, supportive, but not the main event. And most importantly, people now opt into these designed cultures with full knowledge and awareness that these cultures might change who they are. The authenticity-driven culture o

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Here is where culture enters the picture. I mean“culture” in its anthropological rather than artisticsense. What values and practices can hold people to-gether as the institutions in which they live fragment? My generation suffered from a want of imagination inanswering this question, in advancing the virtues ofsmall-scale community. Co

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Why are we seeing a global homogenizing of culture across every dimension that counts? Why has Hollywood become so creatively bankrupt that nobody bothers watching that oh-so-predictable-52nd sequel to a superhero movie? Why have pop songs become so objectively similar? Why is everyone following the same formula for their posts on Instagram and hum... See more