Communication of the popular

Abstract

The article deals with the problems of the communication of popular culture. It considers the more specialized meaning of popular culture, which primarily encompasses the works of artistic forms which have a popular character - easily understandable and entertaining contents and wide audience. The aesthetic communication of the popular through popular literature, film, pop and rock music is examined. The paper is divided into three parts. The first parts deals with the aesthetics of the communication of popular culture. It contains the analysis of the major formal-aesthetic procedures embedded in the creative expression of the popular. In the part which is dedicated to social aspects of the communication of popular art, the author examines the industrial, market and commercial principles upon which this whole culture is based. It is a time of new technologies and mass consumption, which represent, in the words of Eric Hobsbawm, a 'cultural landscape' that has transformed the manner in which a new audience experiences the artistic. Finally, popular culture stars are observed as communicators. The author adds them as a new, even crucial, link in the already known chain of communication comprising the author, the work and the audience. Stars (film, popular music) are active factors of communication as well as its bearers. They are the intermediaries through which the audience establishes relationships with the authors (writers, directors, composers) and the works in which those stars appear. Stars as 'new Olympians' (Morin) are, indeed, another significant category that distinguishes the communication of popular culture.