Culture Lecture

The first lecture that i had and i found it quite interesting.

From what i remember we began to talk about culture and what it is. What i found interesting was the fact that we use the word all the time yet the meaning of it is so diverse and flexible that there may as well be no definition for it.

During the lecture i made a few random notes. things which were fairly pointless like animare = give soul in latin and names like Raymond Williams and Lucretius (99BC-55BC). The thing that stood out for me in the lecture though was the video clip. Not only because videos is a breath of fresh air in lectures but also because of the fact that i found it geniunley entertaining. The clips were by Georges Mieles who directed these in 1902. They were the first to use any sort of special effects and they were astonishing at the time and i think hold a certain element of charm even to this day. It was a bit quirky and funny and it was nice seeing how we got from that to special effects as we know it today. Brilliant stuff, didnt know about him before the lecture.

During the seminar, culture was brought up again and we started to discuss how our profession (animation) had anything to do with culture. I think animation has an effect on the "youth culture". Animations come in a variety of styles and are aimed at certain audiences. For example family guy  and south park are obviously aimed at teenagers +. Rude and offensive jokes as well as random clips of events or 80s references is what we sometimes think of when it comes to this show. But they also touch on subjects that are currently big att he time, like us elections and the economic crisis. May it be related to celebrities or current events, family guy always expresses an opinion on the subject and may influence the audience or even educate the audience on what is going on. I admit im not so big on reading the papers and there are some things in family guy or other shows like south park, where i get "updated".