Genre - Popular Culture

Popular Culture

Outside of the academic field, genre regularly affects societal popular culture. The mass media uses genre to classify forms of art such as music, film, television, books, etc. Favoritism plays an important part of distinguishing one genre from another; fans of Horror look differently upon comedy than fans of romance do. Genre has also been used to shape differences in cultural aspects of these popular subjects. American comedies are distinctly different from French ones, as country music is noticeably unlike Irish folk music. Genres sort media efficiently, especially when following trends set by society. From walking in to the nearest movie rental store to searching for music via iTunes, genres are applicable in everyday life as organized classification systems. Even in places such as grocery stores or clothing stores, genres are utilized to form an ordered flow to determine the differences between smaller classes within one particular subject, pointing out the differences between fruit and dairy, and punk to mod. In modern culture, sub-genres often arise to prevent a feeling of homogenization and loss of identity. As the rate of global communication continues to increase, the creation of new pop-culture sub-genres per year does in near perfect tandem.