HSE Publishing House

Until recently it was thought that intellectuals do not like and can not and should not love popular culture. Those who love it for some reason no matter what, find it guilty pleasure. However, in the last twenty years intellectuals in the west began to conceptualize popular culture, discovering its philosophical depth, hidden or open propaganda. Noting that the pleasure of popular culture and its major form – cinema – is not shameful, author, combining film studies with philosophical and socio-political analysis, shows how political philosophy can work with mass culture nowadays. Using the methodology of marxist philosophers Slavoj Zizek and Fredric Jameson, author politically and philosophically reads contemporary American cinema and some cartoon series. Using specific examples the author explores how the specific ideologies work in Hollywood movies: radicalism, conservatism, patriotism, liberalism and feminism. Author also shows the transition from the modern to postmodern in American cinema and notes how the postmodern era in some low genres and phenomena without being widespread in the 1970s suddenly became mainstream.

The book will be interesting for young philosophers, political scientists, culturologists, film critics and for all who not only like to watch movies but also think about it. The text will be useful mainly for those who with or without guilty pleasure enjoy popular culture. Reading this book will help you to find intellectual justifications for your guilty pleasure.