Arthur Asa Berger

Instead of summing up the various perspectives of scholars and the variety of ideas to which the term postmodernism has been assigned, this text lets this diversity speak for itself. By bringing together articles and essays on the impact of the postmodern temper on an eclectic range of subjects, Berger presents a few of the many ways different theorists have come to terms with postmodernism, while examining manifestations of postmodernism in the culture of everyday life.

Readings on Postmodernism in American Culture and Society

The Postmodern Presence

From AdBusters to viral marketing, this brief dictionary of ideas and concepts contains over 100 extended, illuminating entries to bring the novice up to speed on the advertising/marketing world and the ideas that underlie it. For the neophyte professional, it describes the various players and strategies of the industry. For the student, it summarizes the key ideas of the most important cultural theorists introduced in advertising and marketing courses. For everyone, it helps explain the cultural, economic, and psychological role that advertising concepts play in society. A handy introduction for students and a quick reference for young professionals.

Dictionary of Advertising and Marketing Concepts

About the Author Arthur Asa Berger is the author of more than one hundred articles and more than seventy books on pop culture, media, cultural studies, humor and tourism. If you count second, third, fourth and fifth editions of books, he has published more than ninety books. His books have been translated into ten languages, with fourteen of his books translated into Chinese and five into Farsi. One of his favorite articles was titled" "The Evangelical Hamburger."" It was a study of McDonald's hamburgers and American culture, published in 1964. He also wrote an article published in the "Los Angeles Times" about some sexual aspects of video games. His book "Bloom's Morning" psychoanalyzed kitchen appliances and other household objects and rituals and includes drawings he made for each chapter. When he gave a reading on the book in Vietnam, someone in the audience asked him if the book was a work of fiction. That is the way many serious scholars in the United States look upon all his writings. He delights in taking obscure theories generally written in impenetrable prose by European scholars and pushing them to absurd results. He has explained the way he writes as follows- "I make everything up as I go along and throw in charts and diagrams to fool social scientists." Jean Baudrillard writes in his "Fragments," "He who speaks of himself should never say the whole truth, he should keep it secret and divulge only fragments." Berger has taken this advice to heart. Reviews ""Writing Myself into Existence" is no ordinary biography. Professor Berger is an "unclassifiable adolescent" who has published 70 books to date. Whether you are in the English-speaking world or in China, you'll admire this "assassin of academics" legendary experience, profound knowledge and thoughts, great humor, and critical thinking that shines a light of wisdom throughout the book." Junchao Wang, Professor of Media Criticism at Tsinghua University "In Berger's memoir you'll learn the truth about his killings of academic colleagues." Dirk vom Lehn, Sociologist, author, Professor at King's College London "As sophisticated, humorous and semiotic as all Berger's other writings, and produced by the right publishing house - since poiesis also means modifying environment. Once again, Arthur manages to change the academic environment in communication and semiotics." Christo Kaftandjiev, Professor of Marketing Communications at Sofia University (Bulgaria) and Tomsk University (Russia) "An entertaining mosaic of intellectual and personal autobiography, flitting from talking theory with Umberto Eco to the symbolic meaning of hamburgers, from analyzing Jewish humor to the importance of personal journals. Considering he callously killed me off in one of his novels after I published over 20 of his books, you can believe me when I say this book is well worth the read." Mitch Allen, Publisher, Left Coast Press, Inc. "Almost to spite his critical acumen, and the nonstop clamor of ideas for his immediate attention, Berger presents himself, his friends, and his studies sunny-side up. For Berger, "existence" means getting the rest of us to smile." Elihu Katz, Professor Emeritus, Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Writing Myself Into Existence

This book deals with tourism, popular culture and everyday life in Japan. It offers some interesting statistics about Japanese life and society, discusses popular kinds of tours in Japan, considers images of Japan found in guidebooks about the country, and discusses the pleasures people get from travel in Japan. The book interprets various aspects of Japanese culture and provides an analysis of popular visitor destinations. It is written in an accessible style and thus will be of interest to tourists considering visiting Japan, Japanophiles, social scientists and humanities scholars with interests in Japan, and students taking courses in tourism, Japanese culture, cultural studies and consumer culture.

An Ethno-Semiotic Analysis

Tourism in Japan

Taste is an enigmatic topic. We recognize that taste plays an important role in our life in that everything we buy and many things we do are governed by our sense of taste. But what exactly is taste? How do we get our sense of taste and how does it affect our everyday lives? Does it evolve as we grow older or is it a constant in our lives? Is it affected by all the “influencers” to whom we are exposed as we watch TikTok and commercials, or do influencers merely spark some kind of inner sense of taste that was with us all the time? Is our taste based on our social and economic status or something else? What role do income and cost have in determining what we choose to buy? What role do the qualities of what we buy and the choices we make shape our decisions? Is taste based on logical thinking about things we wish to do or buy upon emotions we have generated by things like identification, status, or cultural imperatives? Taste always involves some element of choice, because if there is no choice, taste is irrelevant or moot. But what are the determinants when we compare things to buy or get or do when we have choices to make? This book takes its point of departure from the work of the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, whose book 'Distinction' is considered a classic work of sociological analysis. The topics dealt with are shown in the table of contents below. The book is distinctive in that it offers discussions of four methodologies/theories used in discussing taste: semiotics, psychoanalytic theory, sociological theory and Marxist theory and then applies these theories in the second part of the book to a variety of topics involving taste, such as yogurt, dogs, the singer Celine Dion, ocean cruises, brands, smartphones, men’s facial hair, and so on. Readers of the book will learn four methodologies they can use in analyzing taste and see how these methodologies were applied.

A Cultural Studies Analysis

TASTE: Why You Like What You Like

The island of Bali has long been characterized in the West as the last “paradise” on earth, but there is far more to this small Indonesian province. Bali Tourism presents an enlightening ethnographic study of some of the most important icons—for tourists and locals alike—in Balinese culture and society and explores the growth of this island as an “exotic” vacation destination. In addition, it offers a firsthand look at many aspects of daily life, a semiotic analysis of its dominant cultural symbols, and insights into tourists’ perceptions of Bali. A thirty page photo section offers a unique glimpse at this remarkable island. Through a distinctive use of cultural analysis and psychoanalytic modes of interpretation, Bali Tourism offers an in-depth study of Balinese tourism, society, and character. This handy, easy-to-read text is an essential overview of what the island has to offer tourists and looks at the exciting possibilities—and the potential pitfalls—of visiting this extraordinary land. The book paints a vivid portrait of this country’s hidden gems and popular tourist destinations, exploring the ways visitors see Bali—and how the Balinese see visitors—as well as the promise and problems Bali faces in developing its tourism industry. Bali Tourism is an ideal book to read before visiting Bali yourself—or recommending/planning a trip for others. The fresh insights it presents will help make any trip to the region more rewarding for the traveler. It is also a unique scholarly resource, complete with informative tables, references, and a bibliography, for academics and students at all levels of tourism studies.

Bali Tourism

This book is about cowboy Western books and two important Western films, Shane and High Noon. Its focus is on the psychological, social, and cultural significance of Westerns, a narrative genre of major importance in American popular culture. What you will find, as you read this book, is that while the stories may have relatively simple plot lines, compared to classic novels, and are based on certain formulas, their psychological significance and cultural importance is a very complicated matter. Fans of Westerns read them to entertain themselves but, as will be shown—in considerable detail—there’s more to reading Westerns, or any novel, than meets the eye. This text presents the idea that people read Westerns because these stories provide certain psychological and social pleasures, payoffs, and benefits.

The Social, Psychological and Cultural Significance of Westerns

From their inception, video games quickly became a major new arena of popular entertainment. Beginning with very primitive games, they quickly evolved into interactive animated works, many of which now approach film in terms of their visual excitement. But there are important differences, as Arthur Asa Berger makes clear in this important new work. Films are purely to be viewed, but video involves the player, moving from empathy to immersion, from being spectators to being actively involved in texts. Berger, a renowned scholar of popular culture, explores the cultural significance of the expanding popularity and sophistication of video games and considers the biological and psychoanalytic aspects of this phenomenon.Berger begins by tracing the evolution of video games from simple games like Pong to new, powerfully involving and complex ones like Myst and Half-Life. He notes how this evolution has built the video industry, which includes the hardware (game-playing consoles) and the software (the games themselves), to revenues comparable to the American film industry.

A Popular Culture Phenomenon

Video Games

Political Culture and Public Opinion

Are Americans obsessed with shopping? Shop 'til You Drop is a lively look at our consumer culture and its role in our everyday lives and society. Is the United States different from other first-world nations in the amount of time we spend shopping or in our attitudes toward consumption? Are we one unified consumer culture or are several cultures operating and battling against one another? Arthur Asa Berger uncovers the answers to these and other questions, considering the sacred roots of consumer culture, the demographics of consumption, theories about competing cultures, and the semiotics of shopping. Accessibly written and entertaining, Shop 'til You Drop is ideal for courses in cultural studies, advertising, and American studies, as well as for anyone curious about our nation's drive to consume.

Consumer Behavior and American Culture

Shop 'til You Drop

Media and Communication Research Methods, Fourth Edition is a concise and practical text designed to give students a step-by-step introduction to conducting media and communication research. Offering real-world insights along with the author’s signature animated style, this text makes the discussion of complex qualitative and quantitative methods easy to comprehend. Packed with detailed examples and practical exercises, the Fourth Edition of this bestselling introductory text includes a new chapter on discourse analysis; expanded discussion of social media, expanded coverage of the research process, and more. Ideal for undergraduate and graduate students conducting research for the first time, this accessible text will help students understand, practice, and master media and communication research.

An Introduction to Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches

Media and Communication Research Methods

"This brief introduction to the field of communication has the advantages of Arthur Asa Berger's informal writing style and a flair for popular culture examples that will interest students. Designed for the basic course in communication departments, the volume introduces the key theorists who shaped our concepts of communication as he describes the varied processes and settings in which communication occurs. Chapters on social media, on communication and identity, and on visual communication address key contemporary topics. A specialist on mass media and author of over 75 books in communication and popular culture, Berger's examples range from advertisements to folk tales to James Bond films. Student exercises, quotes from key theorists, and cartoons make this a strong option for instructors who wish to explore alternatives to the standard encyclopedic textbook"--

An Introduction to Communication

Messages

You and your students are invited to join the detective, Solomon Hunter, in his hunt for knowledge and a killer. Ettore Gnocchi, the famed postmodern theorist, has been murdered at his own dinner party. To find out who killed Gnocchi, the detective Solomon Hunter must first explore postmodernism itself. What is it? Who are Baudrillard, Foucault, and Habermas, and what do they think? Why does any of this matter, anyway? Teach your students postmodern theory with this fun and enlightening text.

Postmortem for a Postmodernist

In Blind Men and Elephants, Arthur Asa Berger uses case histories to show how scholars from different disciplines and scholarly domains have tried to describe and understand humor. He reveals not only the many approaches that are available to study humor, but also the many perspectives toward humor that characterize each discipline. Each case history sheds light on a particular aspect of humor, making the combination of approaches of considerable value in the study of social research. Among the various disciplines that Berger discusses in relation to humor are: communication theory, philosophy, semiotics, literary analysis, sociology, political science, and psychology. Berger deals with these particular disciplines and perspectives because they tend to be most commonly found in the scholarly literature about humor as well as being those that have the most to offer. Blind Men and Elephants covers a wide range of humor, from simple jokes to the uses of literary devices in films. Berger observes how humor often employs considerable ridicule directed at diverse groups of people: women, men, animals, politicians, African Americans, Jews, Catholics, Protestants, gay people, straight people, and so forth. The book also explains the risk factor in ridicule as a humorous device. Blind Men and Elephants depicts how one entity or one situation can be viewed in as many different ways as the number of people studying it. Berger also shows how those multiple perspectives, the Rashomon Effect, can be used together to create a clearer understanding of humor. Blind Men and Elephants is a valuable companion to Berger's recent effort about humor, An Anatomy of Humor, and will be enjoyed by communication and information studies scholars, sociologists, literary studies specialists, philosophers, and psychologists.

Perspectives on Humor

Blind Men and Elephants

Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture is an engaging cultural studies critique of advertising and its impacts on American society. Arthur Asa Berger looks at marketing strategies, sex and advertising, consumer culture, political advertising, and communication theory and process to give an accessible overview of advertising in America. He explores how advertising works and how society does or doesn't respond to it, and he gives two detailed interpretations of ads to offer readers step-by-step frameworks for decoding print ads and television commercials.

Advertising's Impact on American Character and Society

Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture

Coffee, comforters, king-sized beds, gel toothpaste, razors, underwear, the morning shower-all activities and objects we have tended to pay no attention to-until the publication of this book. In a series of short vignettes endearingly illustrated by the author, Arthur Asa Berger gives Americans a profound way to understand their morning rituals. Have you ever considered, for instance, that the digital clock, by producing free-floating liquid numerals disconnecting us from both time past and time future, could be interpreted as a metaphor for the alienation many people feel in contemporary society? Or consider our nightclothes: The pajama is the most immediate witness to our sexual activities; thus, we cover our pajamas with a bathrobe to guard against the anxiety of being revealed to other family members. The pajama is intricately connected to human shame. Bloom's Morning, with thirty-six short chapters bracketed by brief essays on the nature of semiotic analysis, is a perfect book for the inquisitive mind. It is chock-full of valuable and quirky nuggets from this most interesting of social commentators-items that, taken together, give us a new vision through which to understand ourselves.

Coffee, Comforters, and the Secret Meaning of Everyday Life

Bloom's Morning

The Mass Comm Murders is a novel way (both literally and figuratively) to introduce students to mass communication theory. Berger's latest comic murder mystery again features Inspector Solomon Hunter and his sidekick, Sergeant Talcott Weams, in the search for who is snuffing out a group of media theorists--though only after each, in turn, explains his or her theory of mass communications. Highlighting theories from semiotics to the spiral of silence, Berger combines theoretical discussion with a satire of academia and a parody of the mystery genre, complete with eccentric professors and international intrigue. This fun and accessible text is an ideal supplement for courses in mass communication and communication theory.

Five Media Theorists Self-destruct

The Mass Comm Murders

'Solid and elegantly written introduction to its subject, up to speed with the current movements in the field, this is an excellent textbook for first-year students. The layout is well-conceived, and interspersed with Berger's own whimsical cartoons' - Sight and Sound

Essentials of Mass Communication Theory

From their inception, video games quickly became a major new arena of popular entertainment. Beginning with very primitive games, they quickly evolved into interactive animated works, many of which now approach film in terms of their visual excitement. But there are important differences, as Arthur Asa Berger makes clear in this important new work. Films are purely to be viewed, but video involves the player, moving from empathy to immersion, from being spectators to being actively involved in texts. Berger, a renowned scholar of popular culture, explores the cultural significance of the expanding popularity and sophistication of video games and considers the biological and psychoanalytic aspects of this phenomenon. Berger begins by tracing the evolution of video games from simple games like Pong to new, powerfully involving and complex ones like Myst and Half-Life. He notes how this evolution has built the video industry, which includes the hardware (game-playing consoles) and the software (the games themselves), to revenues comparable to the American film industry. Building on this comparison, Berger focuses on action-adventure games which, like film and fiction, tell stories but which also involve culturally important departures in the conventions of narrative. After defining a set of bipolar oppositions between print and electronic narratives, Berger considers the question of whether video games are truly interactive or only superficially so, and whether they have the potential to replace print narratives in the culture at large. A unique dimension of the book is its bio-psycho-social analysis of the video game phenomenon. Berger considers the impact of these games on their players, from physical changes (everything from neurological problems to obesity) to psychological consequences, with reference to violence and sexual attitudes. He takes these questions further by examining three enormously popular games-Myst/Riven, Tomb Raider, and Half-Life-for their attitudes toward power, gender, violence, and guilt. In his conclusion, Berger concentrates on the role of violence in video games and whether they generate a sense of alienation in certain addicted players who become estranged from family and friends. Accessibly written and broad-ranging in approach, Video Games offers a way to interpret a major popular phenomenon. Arthur Asa Berger is professor of broadcast and electronic communication arts at San Francisco State University, where he has taught since 1965. He is the author of more than one hundred articles and forty books on media, popular culture, humor, and everyday life.

Humor permeates every aspect of society and has done so for thousands of years. People experience it daily through television, newspapers, literature, and contact with others. Rarely do social researchers analyze humor or try to determine what makes it such a dominating force in our lives. The types of jokes a person enjoys contribute significantly to the definition of that person as well as to the character of a given society. Arthur Asa Berger explores these and other related topics in An Anatomy of Humor. He shows how humor can range from the simple pun to complex plots in Elizabethan plays.Berger examines a number of topics ethnicity, race, gender, politics each with its own comic dimension. Laughter is beneficial to both our physical and mental health, according to Berger. He discerns a multiplicity of ironies that are intrinsic to the analysis of humor. He discovers as much complexity and ambiguity in a cartoon, such as Mickey Mouse, as he finds in an important piece of literature, such as Huckleberry Finn. An Anatomy of Humor is an intriguing and enjoyable read for people interested in humor and the impact of popular and mass culture on society. It will also be of interest to professionals in communication and psychologists concerned with the creative process.

Arthur Asa Berger

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