Thorny Issues
‘JUST as some films are worthy of Oscars, other elements of popular culture are worthy of study.
| Putting their girlfriends into comas |
Caitlin Moran, writing in the Times, is right when she says that the elements of popular culture deemed worthy of academic appraisal and investigation are invariably the stuff that academics like.
So it is of little surprise that the work of the Smiths, the band that is routinely termed important by nodding heads on cheap telly shows, is to be the topic of academic debate.
In an event entitled Why Pamper Lifes Complexities, academics, egg-heads and boffins who never liked Wham! will deliberate the Smiths at a two-day symposium.
Held at Manchester Metropolitan University in the bands home town, deep thinkers from around the world will debate what Morrisseys quiff and cardigan meant to the word at large.
Kieran Cashell, of the Limerick Institute of Technology, will deliver his lecture on Subjectivity, Suicide and the Smiths.
And Tonje Hakensen, of Oslo University, will use her considerable intellect to dissect the poetry of The Boy with the Thorn in his Side.
Lifting his head from his black shoes and removing his cans, Justin OConnor, director of the Universitys Institute of Popular Culture, explains.
They looked like nobody else and sounded like nobody else and their music had an emotional depth that moved people in a way that no band has managed before or since, says he.
Or, to put things another way, when he was younger, he liked them and thought they were really, really cool…
Paul Sorene is the Anorak’
Posted: 29th, March 2005 | In: Uncategorized Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
