The high culture It is a concept that brings together a series of manners, attitudes and works that are made by the aristocracy for their own consumption, in an exclusive system that only a few can access. This culture admits within itself the topics around the fine arts: cinema, music, sculpture, theater, paintings, literature and others..
It also includes scientific, social and humanistic theoretical contributions. The valuation of high culture is considered sophisticated and for elites and, therefore, it elevates itself to mass culture or popular culture, which are labeled as low culture because they are aimed at the people and anyone has easy access to it..
A basic difference between the two cultures is that the high - symbolically - is expressed in closed places such as museums, cultural centers, schools or other buildings; while the low can usually be seen in open places and outdoors.
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The origin of the concept of high culture dates back to the 18th century, when the bourgeois social class began to emerge and consolidate in Germany, that stratum that was economically strengthened thanks to the capitalist model of the time.
Mathew Arnold was the first to use the term in English high culture in his work Culture and anarchy. There he defined it as "an effort without interest in human perfection." Later he stated that "culture" is knowing the best that has been thought and said in the world..
His conception of the term is the one that has become the most widespread and has been the dominant one in studies of the field, since, in addition, Arnold identified it as an element that favors morality and social policy.
In 1948, T. S. Eliot published Notes towards the definition, a writing that obtained great influence and that proposed a fusion between high culture and popular culture to create a complete culture.
Another author who came up with ideas about the concept was Richard Hoggart (1957) in The uses of literacy, in which he expressed concern about the cultural access of those working class people who attended university.
For their part, authors such as Harold Bloom and F. R. Leavis, with ideas similar to those of Arnold, agreed on a centrality in cultural production and came to the term of "western canon".
Because it is an exclusive concept, high culture supposes a set of its own characteristics that define it and make the difference with other cultural movements.
- It is representative of the aristocracy and intellectuals.
- Is dominant.
- It is socially influential.
- Control the masses.
- She is financially rich.
- Lacks ignorance.
- It is avant-garde.
- It has quality of services.
- Education is essential and paramount.
- It is superior to any culture.
- It is mobilized by the intellect and the economy.
- It is innovative and technological.
By high culture is understood, then, those complex artistic manifestations that only the most cultured are capable of understanding, appreciating and enjoying. And these cultural events are usually of various types:
- Music. In this area, classical genres of music that include composers such as Mozart, Beethoven, Vivaldi, Bach, Verdi and Chopin are considered high culture..
- Literature. In writing, beyond talking about authors, a difference is established between well-written texts, with content that contribute to the intellect, and well-known ones best-seller (best sellers), since the latter have a large mass reproduction and, generally, are channeled to generate sales and not offer great content.
It can also be differentiated by genres such as philosophy, science, social sciences, academic subjects, essays, history and other topics that are also called high culture.
- Paintings. As one of the oldest expressions in the world, art has a large number of variants and artists that fall within high culture such as Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Van Gogh, Caravaggio, Goya, Picasso and many others who, in their specialties , applied aesthetic techniques that distinguished them and marked a milestone in the history of art.
- Sculptures With their different functionalities and materials, the sculptures are a classic in the fine arts of high culture and their creators are, generally, the same artists of classic paintings who reinvented their way of expressing
- Architecture. Since its various historical periods, architecture has been a benchmark in terms of its functionality and its representative structure of important historical buildings around the world..
- Dance. Classical dance and ballet are the two most representative expressions for this type of culture as a form of aesthetic corporal expression..
- Theater. The staging of the performance -and also of the dance or the opera- is characteristic for its milestone marked in various European countries such as Greece, France and Italy and takes great playwrights such as Shakespeare, Aeschylus, Sophocles, among others..
However, for these areas to be considered high culture, they must lack cultural democratization, that is, they must not be massively reproduced for popular culture and reach a large number of viewers.
The objective of this is to prevent it from losing its exclusive character and for people to stop appreciating the true content of what the fine arts contribute, to only satisfy a need for entertainment, as stated by the Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa in his work The society of the spectacle.
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