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Although the vast majority of people have never been in a CIA torture prison, they still have an image in their heads of what it was like there - thanks to relevant TV series such as "24" or "Homeland". Although it is impossible to travel back in time, we think we believe what it was like back then - because we have read historical novels such as "The Medicus" or "The Name of the Rose".
"Products of popular culture exert a strong influence on our image of society," says Prof. Dr. Niels Werber, spokesperson for the "Popular Cultures" Collaborative Research Center at the University of Siegen. This influence not only affects the arts and media, but now extends far into the worlds of politics, medicine and business. And yet, not only among the cultural elite, but also in academia, there has long been a general suspicion of what the masses liked: "Something like that can't be good! Something like that can't be a worthy subject of research.
Literary and media scholar Nils Werber sees things differently. In his Collaborative Research Center established in 2015, researchers from a wide range of disciplines work together to take an interdisciplinary approach to the phenomenon of popular culture. An elementary question that arises: How is the term "popular" to be understood today?
Harry Potter and Hulk as objects of research
"Until well into the 20th century, the popular, i.e. that which inspired the masses, the rabble, was seen as something that stood in contrast to high culture and was per se dismissed as unworthy and vulgar," says Werber. This can no longer be maintained because the popular, which attracts a great deal of attention, can no longer be dismissed and popularity values themselves have become a hard currency. "We therefore want to set up research that sees its popular research subjects as just as much of a scientific challenge as a Kafka novel or a Tarkovsky film."
Werber's research subjects therefore include Harry Potter novels, blockbuster superhero films such as "Hulk" and "Ant-Man", or the German sci-fi graphic novel series "Perry Rhodan", which is also close to Werber's heart. As of 2016, around two billion copies of the most popular series in German-language literary history, which has been published without interruption since 1961, have been sold. "However, the enormous popularity of the series has usually been interpreted by researchers as evidence of its cultural worthlessness," says Werber. "It hasn't even occurred to people that 'Perry Rhodan' could be a relevant universe in literature in its own right."
It has long been time to rethink the popular. After all, the wind has shifted not so secretly, quietly and silently - and the consequences can be felt everywhere in society: "The asymmetry between high and mass culture has come under decisive pressure - if it has not already completely dissolved," states Werber. The cultural tensions resulting from this are a fundamental topic of the research center.
The power of rankings
Whether theaters, museums or universities - unlike in the 19th century, the old institutions of high culture that used to define quality are now highly scrutinized and have to justify that their offerings deserve attention based on their popularity ratings. Their challengers: leaderboard rankings that dominate the internet, hard-to-understand algorithms that influence our behavior. "We go to the doctor with the best ratings on Jameda, book the most popular hotel on Trip Advisor, and follow the people with the most followers on Twitter."
This has also changed the perception of what is popular. "Nowadays, popular is first and foremost what attracts attention, what is popular in a quantitative sense." This working definition of the research center decouples the term from a judgmental classification, seeing it first and foremost in a very sober way.
A sobriety that Werber believes could also help to avoid old normative reflexes outside of literary studies. In political science, for example: "There, populists are initially seen as people who do something wrong, who violate the rules of democracy. And their supporters are seen as a 'deluded and manipulable bunch' in contrast to a morally superior, enlightened elite." However, it is precisely this lapse into the old hierarchical asymmetry that leads to a dead end. According to Werber, it is striking that high popularity is considered desirable almost everywhere. Being at the top of the rankings is valued. However, if you look at what is highly popular but should not be considered, populism immediately comes to mind. The Siegen researchers are therefore examining Donald Trump's populism as a case of undesirable popularity. Trump's millions of followers are seen by his many fans as proof of the legitimacy of their political position, but by everyone else as a threat.
According to Werber, the fact that popularity is increasingly being used as the sole indicator of quality is a massive challenge to our culture: "Is the number one bestseller really the best quality book? In this context, the question also arises as to which authority can and should determine what is good quality and what is bad."
Werber believes that renegotiating this is one of the great challenges of our generation. People will not want to leave themselves to the algorithms of popularity determination, which tirelessly determine and communicate on all digital platforms what is popular (a film, a book, a share, a tweet, a politician) and should therefore be followed. However, these values cannot be ignored either - not even by established institutions of high culture. In the end, only one thing is certain: the debate remains exciting.