Raymond Williams Culture Is Ordinary By Raymond Williams

Raymond Williams’ Culture is Ordinary, is one of the early defining texts of cultural studies, in which Williams conveys an understanding of his dislikes of different interpretations of culture at the time it was written. Williams begins by introducing his working class family roots in rural Wales, and describes his personal history and connection to the land whilst expressing his perspective of culture. This description reinforces Williams’ fundamental argument that “culture is ordinary”, as Williams states that his experiences growing up in an ordinary agricultural area allowed him to see the “shape of a culture, and its modes of change” as advances from industrialisation lead to growth and change within their culture (Williams, 1989, p92). …show more content…
Teashop culture refers to those who demonstrate an “outward and emphatically visible sign of a special kind of cultivated people” and those who view culture as solely high culture, a notion which Williams rejects as he views it as a pretentious means of maintaining inequality of power between the cultivated and working class (Williams, 1989, p93). The drinking-hole culture, contrastingly, refers to the ‘bad-mouthers’ who felt threatened by culture as purely high culture, and label such practices as the work of “highbrows” and “superior prigs” (Williams, 1989, …show more content…
In terms of Marxism, Williams evaluates three points which he believes to be of importance. The first stated that culture must be “interpreted in relation to its underlying system of production”, a claim Williams agreed with (Williams, 1989, p95). Williams argues culture as a “whole way of life”, in which economic changes influence society and the arts (Williams, 1989, p95). The second point Williams outlines is the concept of the “ignorant masses”, and while Williams agrees that a “class-dominated culture” was present and access to education was restricted to those with power, Williams refutes the idea that the masses are ignorant, suggesting that working class are not limited, but are in fact gaining admission to their own learning institutions and are subsequently developing their own culture (Williams, 1989, p95). Williams furthers his point suggesting that the best basis for future cultural development should work to accentuate working class culture values such as neighbourhood, mutual obligation and common betterment (Williams, 1989, p96). The final Marxist premise, suggesting a person must think, learn and write in particular imposed ways in order to achieve socialism, was also rejected by Williams, who depicts culture as the product of individual and collective meanings and experiences which is continuously