Cultural Studies as a Political Practice

The phenomenon of politicization of humanitarian scientific thought is becoming increasingly noticeable in the modern philosophical, cultural and political science. Scientists and philosophers belonging to political parties are nothing new in the history of science. Today, however, this kind of division into separate groups reveals not only ideological, but also a pronounced political character. The example of the Western European, English-speaking humanitarian academic community appears to be particularly indicative in this regard. Apparently, the conflict between the increasingly radicalized left and right discourses within the English-speaking academic community is entering an active phase. To understand the nature of this confrontation, it is necessary both to consider these discourses as separate phenomena, and to delve into their historical roots. The political discourse of the New Left is most clearly revealed in the program of the so-called cultural studies that appeared among post-war English Marxist intellectuals and later took root in the USA. The term was popularized by Herbert Richard Hoggart a British academic who specialized in sociology, English literature, and British popular culture. In 1964 he founded the Center for Contemporary Cultural Studies in Birmingham (CCCS). The history of CCCS is strongly associated with the name of Stuart Henry Hall, who was Hoggart's assistant and headed the Center since 1971. The connection between political action and cultural studies permeates the entire history of this field of knowledge. The very formation of the discipline and its institutionalization in the UK were influenced by such political and cultural events as the post-war Americanization of English popular culture, the spread of telecommunications, the new era of multiculturalism in Britain, and new critical theories. At the same time, many post-war European countries, such as Germany and France, showed interest in research, which ultimately shaped the apparatus of cultural studies. Within the framework of this program, we can see an increasingly nature perspective on culture that combines the Marxist view on the problem of culture and the sociological one but is not reduced to either of them. In this kind of paradigm, culture is understood as a consequence of people's social actions, and at the same time, as a certain system that fixes the ways of implementing these relations. This approach differs from both classical Marxism facosed on economic relations between people and from structural functionalism, in which the concepts of society and culture are almost synonymous. The author states that the discourse of the New Left and the program of cultural studies are different manifestations of a single methodological approach or worldview. At present, this is the dominant worldview in the Western academic community. The article examines the history and main methodological guidelines of this type of cultural studies, as well as today's criticism of this approach.

1. Back, L. (2012) ‘Live Sociology: Social Research and its Futures’, The Sociological Review, 60(1_suppl), pp. 18–39. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-954X.2012.02115.x

2. Ballantine, J. H. and Roberts, K. A. (2012) Our social world: introduction to sociology. Thousands Oaks, Calif.: Pine Forge Press.

3. Barker, C. (2008) Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice. London: Sage Publications.

4. Beck, U. and Sznaider, N. (2006) ‘Unpacking cosmopolitanism for the social sciences: a research agenda’, The British Journal of Sociology, 57(1), pp. 1–23. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-4446.2006.00091.x

5. Bhambra, G. (2007) Rethinking Modernity: Postcolonialism and the Sociological Imagination. New York: Palgrave.

6. Bourdieu, P. (2007) Sociologija social'nogo prostranstva [Sociologie de l'espace social]. Moscow: Institut jeksperimental'noj sociologii Publ.; Saint Petersburg: Aletejja Publ. (In Russian).

7. Hall, S. (2000) Cultural studies: ein politisches Theorieprojekt. Hamburg: Argument.

8. Hoggart, R. (2009) The Uses of Literacy: Aspects of Working-Class Life. London, Penguin Modern Classics.

9. Kurennoy, V.A. (2012) ‘Cultural Studies: Research and Political Program’, Logos, (1), Pp. 14-79. (In Russian).

10. Milbank, J. (1990) ‘Policing the Sublime: A Critique of the Sociology of Religion’, in Theology and Social Theory: Beyond Secular Reason. Oxford; Cambridge: Blackwell pp. 101-144, (Russ.ed.: (2013) ‘Nadzor za vozvyshennym: kritika sociologii religii’, State, religion and church in Russia and worldwide, 31(3), pp. 210-284.).

11. Du Gay, P. et al. (1997) Doing cultural studies: the story of the Sony walkman. London: Sage.

12. Patterson, O. (2014) ‘Making Sense of Culture’, Annual Review of Sociology, 40(1), pp. 1–30. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-soc-071913-043123

13. Polyakov, L. V. (2013) ‘Sociologija i kul'tura: porjadok slov [Sociology and culture: word order]’, Teleskop: journal of sociological and marketing research, (4), P. 46-48. (In Russian).

14. Williams, R. (1961) The Long Revolution. New York: Columbia University Press. https://doi.org/10.7312/will93760

15. Sahlins, M. D. (2002) Waiting for Foucault, still. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press.

16. Steinmetz, G. (2009) ‘The Imperial Entanglements of Sociology in the United States, Britain, and France Since the Nineteenth Century’, Ab Imperio, 2009(4), pp. 23–79. https://doi.org/10.1353/imp.2009.0079

17. Thompson E. P. (1963) The Making of the English Working Class. London: Victor Gollancz.