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“Popular culture and politics exist on the same wavelength and work together to shape our shared consciousness. The fantasies we buy into with our attention and money condition our sense of what it is possible or permissible to imagine. And the imagination of Hollywood in the franchise era — the age of I.P.-driven creativity and expanded-universe cinema — has been authoritarian, anti-democratic, cynical and pseudo-populist.”


A.O. SCOTT, NEW YORK TIMES

A SUMMER WITHOUT SUPERHEROES
2020

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“Since pop culture in a liberal capitalist society is synonymous with commercial culture, it is frequently thought of as part of the problem: a distraction from ‘real’ issues at best and ideological garbage celebrating the rich and privelaged, the sensational, and the violent at worst. In order to bring about democratic social change, [...] to reach [the] majority, you need to be able to understand their passions and speak their languages. Pop culture– as popular culture– can help activists and artists do this.”


STEPHEN DUNCOMBE, NYU PRESS 

“TRAINING ACTIVISTS TO BE FANS”
POP. CULTURE AND THE CIVIC IMAGINATION
2020