Ciao, salut, hola, siwmae and all the rest. My name is Cerys and I am a Masters student at Cardiff University. After completing a BA in French and Italian at the University of Leeds I am now studying a course called Global Cultures. “What’s that?” - I get asked a lot. In a nutshell, I focus on critical and cultural theory and apply those theories to Global contexts.
I have previously written a blog, although I do find it slightly embarrassing now, about Fashion. It’s important to note that I am not embarrassed about the fact that I wrote a fashion blog, it’s more than cringe photos and my 16-year-old style. In fact, I’m sure that fashion will make its way into some posts, as my interests are quite varied and I think that it is important in the context of culture because culture comes in various different forms (hence the tagline of this blog). I believe that academia can at times fall into intellectual snobbery, and discount certain elements of what it deems ‘low culture’. However, in order to understand society fully, it is crucial to explore all elements of culture, from the tradition of going to the pub to Mozart. I am heavily inspired by the HighLow Podcast that was hosted by Dolly Alderton and Pandora Sykes, in which the two women discussed heavy topics such as race, violence against women and Zadie Smith, but they also discussed the widely frowned-upon genre of television that is Reality TV. This isn’t to say that everybody must take an interest in everything and write about everything - not at all. But we must be careful not to dismiss certain cultures on the basis of normative standards of culture set out by a small percentage of our society.
The average working person probably does not take an interest in opera for instance, but should we then dismiss their love of a pint at their local and binge-worthy crime drama? No. It is important to note that I am not stereotyping here, as this example is taken from my family and friends, and myself. Growing up in South Wales and then going to a Russell Group university highlighted many cultural differences in my upbringing compared to the cosmopolitan middle-class students that I came across. I distinctly remember one girl being shell-shocked that I had never seen Madame Butterfly before. This isn’t me putting her down though, or saying that my opera-less upbringing was better or more grounded than hers - we just grew up in very different settings, both of which are valid and should be heard. I just feel like, in the eyes of those who control culture, the wealthy metropolitan option has been favoured. This is all to say that nothing is off-topic here, and as the title of my blog suggests, I won’t be hiding from the inconvenient and ugly truth of life and culture.
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