CULTSTUD-L . . .
. . . began life in January 1996 as an online discussion list for a cultural studies graduate seminar offered by the Department of Communication at the University of South Florida. When the course ended, there was enough interest in continuing the list to merit opening it up to a broader group of participants. Today, CULTSTUD-L has more than 2300 subscribers from over 40 different countries. More detailed information about the list (how to join, how to update your subscription information, what the list is for, etc.) can be found below.
[N.B.: Once upon a time, the website for the list included several pages of links to a wide variety of cultural-studies-related resources. Alas, maintaining such a repository proved to be one of those tasks that was a great idea in theory, but almost impossible to keep updated. The new, trimmed-down version of the list's online presence has abandoned any pretense of being able to stay on top of such a herculean task. Sorry.]
Point your web browser here, click on "Join or Leave CULTSTUD-L," complete the form on the subsequent page, and then click on the "Join CULTSTUD-L" button. LISTSERV (the software that runs the list) will then send a confirmation message (with instructions on how to activate your subscription) to the email address you provided. To prevent mischievous/malicious subscriptions by third parties, your subscription will not become active until you formally confirm that you wish to subscribe to the list.
To login, point your web browser here, enter your email address and password, and click on the button that says "Log in." This will take you to a page where you can access and adjust your subscription settings.
If you have not set up a LISTSERV password, or if you have forgotten or lost your password, click on the "get a new LISTSERV password" link, fill out the subsequent form, and follow the instructions.
Only subscribers are allowed to post messages to CULTSTUD-L, and any such posts must come from the exact address that is on record for your subscription. If you have multiple email accounts or if your subscribed email address has multiple aliases, you may have difficulties posting, since LISTSERV has no way to recognize that mail from those different (or different looking) addresses is coming from the same person.
New subscribers will have their first few posts "moderated" by the list manager prior to distribution. This policy helps to screen out spam, advertisments, and misdirected personal messages, as well as reducing the potential for trolling and flame wars. In most cases, any "moderated" post that doesn't clearly violate the guidelines laid out in this FAQ will be approved without any problems. [N.B.: Once upon a time, under a previous software regime for the list, the "number moderation" process was semi-automated, insofar as members were automatically cleared to post directly to the list after a fixed number of messages from them had been approved. LISTSERV doesn't have this particular feature, and so the process of moving people from "moderated" to "unmoderated" status now depends on the list manager doing so by hand.]
As only subscribers are allowed to post messages to CULTSTUD-L, you should make sure you're subscribed to the list (see above) before trying to post to it.
Send your post as an email message to CULTSTUD-L@lists.umn.edu -- it's just that simple.
Listmembers whose posting status is still "moderated" (see above) can still submit posts, but their messages will not be distributed to the list until they've been approved by the list manager.
The default setting for CULTSTUD-L is for all posts to the list -- including any that you may send yourself -- to be emailed to you as soon as the server receives them. To change these settings, login as described above, and adjust your subscription options as you see fit.
More information on LISTSERV commands can be found in the LISTSERV reference card, which you can retrieve by sending an email to listserv@lists.umn.edu that contains the phrase "INFO REFCARD" (without the surrounding quotation marks) in the body of the email.
There are a few possible explanations:
Login as described above. From there, click on the "Leave CULTSTUD-L" button at the bottom of the page.
Login as described above using your old address [N.B.: this simply involves typing your old address into the login form, even if you're using a different account to access the Web]. From there, enter your new address in the (surprise!) "Email address" form, and then click on the "Update Options" button at the bottom of the page. This method should work even if you don't have access to your old email account anymore.
There are several possible answers here. In rough order of likeliness, the explanation here is probably:
The list manager is Gil Rodman, associate professor of Communication Studies at the University of Minnesota. Questions, problems, criticism, complaints, suggestions, etc. can be sent to him at gbrodman@mindspring.com. While he's not a computer programmer, he'll be happy to try and help with any technical problems you may have.
This list is intended for the discussion of virtually anything pertaining to the broad and varied range of intellectual and political work known as "cultural studies" (see below for further explanation of what cultural studies is and isn't): from conversations about works in progress to syllabi exchanges, from calls for papers to debates over cultural theory, from job announcements to discussions of what people on the list are currently reading . . . and then some.
By and large, no. The list is configured to automatically filter out that include file attachments, but the vast majority of messages sent to the list are not screened before being distributed (the major exceptions to this policy are described above). The statements and viewpoints expressed in posts to CULTSTUD-L are not necessarily those of either the list manager or the University of Minnesota.
On a related note, please bear in mind that CULTSTUD-L is a semi-public forum, not a one-on-one conversation, and that anything you post to the list can be read by (or at least available to) everyone subscribed to the list . . . and potentially beyond. Messages sent via email can all too easily be reproduced and circulated beyond their originally intended audience, and neither the list manager nor the University of Minnesota are responsible for consequences arising from list messages being redistributed in such a fashion.
There is no hard-coded restriction on the length of posts sent to the list, but it is still bad form to send messages that are more than 15K in size. Such messages run the risk of overtaxing the server (even for a fast machine, sending a 15K message to more than two thousand subscribers takes a lot of time) and have a tendency to fill individual subscribers' inboxes beyond their quota.
If you have a very long message (e.g., a full-length essay, which can easily run 20-50K in size, even in plaintext format) that you'd like to share with the list, the preferred procedure is to post a short abstract to the list and ask interested parties to contact you offlist for a copy of the full text.
Again, this being an unmoderated list (more or less), there are no formal prior restraints in place here. Because the primary function of this list involves scholarly dialogue, however, commercially-oriented posts (e.g., "MAKE MONEY FAST!!!") are not welcome. Admittedly, there are some fuzzy lines here -- announcements of new and noteworthy books, journals, conferences, job openings, and the like are perfectly appropriate contributions to the list -- but posts of a clearly mercantile nature are not. Announcing the publication of your new book (for instance) with a conversational post is generally acceptable, but simply forwarding the promotional information that your publisher has generated on your behalf is not a good idea. Similarly, announcements for journals (new or otherwise) are much more welcome when they recognize that listmembers are potential contributors (e.g., "send us your essays") and not just sources of revenue (e.g., "send us your subscription orders").
There are a few varieties of posts that have resulted in reprimands and/or loud grumbling (from the list manager and/or other subscribers), most of which are violations of general "netiquette":
Yes . . . but also don't send flocks of students to the list without giving them some sort of guidance first. Encourage them to "lurk and learn" before they leap into the fray with quips and questions. Make sure they know some basic rules of "netiquette." Don't send them to the list expecting immediate help with projects that have impending deadlines. And definitely have them read the FAQ.
Here we get into one of the grayer areas of what counts as proper list conduct. The short answer would be "Yes, if you do so carefully." The longer answer (including what "doing so carefully" entails) follows.
Listservs can be marvelous resources when it comes to "Calls for Help" (CFHs), and CULTSTUD-L is no exception to this rule. Even if only a tiny fraction of the list's subscribers respond to a given CFH, the collective knowledge of those who do reply can be quite valuable when it comes to compiling lists of "films about class struggle," "songs about witchcraft," "sitcoms with single fathers," and the like.
At the same time, there's a major difference between CFHs that actually stimulate on-list discussion (which are Good Things) and CFHs that treat the list as a pool of knowledge to be tapped at will (which aren't so good). So here are some basic guidelines for posting CFHs to the list:
No. File attachments sent to listservs tend to be a Very Bad Thing™. Why?
As with long messages, if you have a file attachment (e.g., a desktop-published essay saved as a PDF) that you'd like to share with the list, the preferred procedure is to post a short description of the file to the list so that interested parties can contact you offlist for a copy.
In theory, CULTSTUD-L is configured to automatically reject posts that include attached files -- but the algorithm here may not be perfect. Subscribers who manage to circumvent the anti-attachment filters run the risk of having their subscription restricted and/or cancelled, at the list manager's discretion.
You may find yourself removed from the list if your subscribed email account generates repeated "bouncebacks" (e.g., "cannot deliver" error messages) due to "unknown user," "unknown host," "disk quota exceeded," or the like. This is an automated feature of LISTSERV and should only come into play if your subscribed account bounces posts back to the server on a recurring basis for an extended period of time. Once the problem with your account is fixed (e.g., the server downtime that caused the bouncebacks ends, you get your account back under quota, etc.), you will be free to resubscribe to the list once more.
The list manager also reserves the right to remove and/or ban people who engage in abusive or inappropriate behavior that, in his eyes, is detrimental to the overall viability of the list.
If you think you've been wrongly removed from the list (for whatever reason), contact the list manager.
Yes. To access the archive, log in to the list's web interface as described above and click on the "CULTSTUD-L Home" link. Posts prior to the list's most recent move (March 2012) are not publicly archived. Sorry.
As a general rule, no. If you're not a listmember and want to send something to the list, you should subscribe and post your message yourself. If you are subscribed to the list, you should sort out whatever difficulties you may be having in sending messages to the list (instructions on how to solve the most common posting problems are in this FAQ) and post your message yourself.
No. To be sure, most (if not all) instances of cultural studies somehow address the question of culture, but not all studies of culture count as cultural studies. This sort of hyper-literalness, after all, doesn't apply to other fields: not all studies of women are examples of women's studies, not all studies of America or Americans are examples of American studies, and so on. As it is, "studies of culture" also encompasses far too broad a turf. After all, given the range of common meanings for the term "culture," anyone in the humanities, almost anyone in the social sciences, and a fair number of natural scientists can reasonably be said to be "studying culture" in one form or another. If this is all it takes to be doing cultural studies, then most scholars have been doing cultural studies all along -- which renders the term effectively meaningless.
Again, no. There are a number of university presses and wanna-be-hip bookstores (among others) who seem intent on normalizing this definition of the field through institutional fiat by simply slapping the cultural studies label onto whatever titles they sell that deal with TV, rock 'n' roll, and other such phenomena. Yes, cultural studies often deals with the popular, but not all studies of popular culture are examples of cultural studies. At the very least, cultural studies has traditionally had both a theoretical and political component to it that not all pop-culture-oriented scholarship can be said to share. Moreover, cultural studies doesn't necessarily have to be about what is typically called "popular culture": its specific objects of study can include (for example) art exhibitions, canonized literature, (post)colonial history, and other phenomena that have no clear connection to the pop culture terrain.
As an inter-, multi-, and sometimes even anti-disciplinary set of projects, cultural studies has never had a disciplinary home to call its own. A partial list of fields that have historically been associated with cultural studies (in one form or another) includes:
American Studies | Communication | History | Psychology |
Anthropology | Education | Literary Criticism | Rhetoric/Composition |
Black Studies | English | Philosophy | Sociology |
Cinema Studies | Ethnomusicology | Political Science | Women's Studies |
Not surprisingly, however, few (if any) specific instances of cultural studies will successfully be able to cross all those disciplinary borders at once.
While cultural studies isn't theory-phobic, it's also not synonymous with "critical theory." To paraphrase Stuart Hall, cultural studies isn't interested in theory for its own sake; rather, its commitment to theory is a pragmatic one. Theory isn't the ultimate destination that cultural studies is trying to reach as much as it's a territory that cultural studies must pass through in order to address the concrete, real-life questions that motivate its projects in the first place.
There is no such thing as "the cultural studies method," and there is no single or simple answer to the question of how to do cultural studies. As Larry Grossberg puts it, "cultural studies is radically contextual," which means (in part) that whatever questions it is trying to answer at a given point in time need to be approached using whatever method(s) are most appropriate to the specific project at hand. In one study, close readings of contemporary media texts might be the method of choice; in another, nothing less than a full-scale ethnographic project will do; in yet a third case, the most fruitful approach might entail digging through historical archives and institutional records, and so on.
To be sure, cultural studies is a politically-motivated project (or, more precisely, a range of them) and, historically, its politics have been leftist in nature, but not all leftist scholarship is cultural studies, and cultural studies isn't simply the intellectual component to what is presumably a non-intellectual leftist political agenda.