Dance party as a popular youth Culture in the great Gatsby and saturday Night Fever

Abstract

This research work examines dance party as a popular youth culture in Luhrmann directed The Great Gatsby and John Badham directed movie Saturday Night Fever. This study examines the inherent connections between the dance party and American life of the youths. It implies how dance party as a popular youth culture becomes integral part of American life in twentieth century urban America. Exploring the cinematic techniques of camera and its movement, it applies the theoretical approaches of popular culture defined by John Storey in his book Cultural Theory and Popular Culture who views popular culture as widely favored or well-liked by many people. It also studies how dance parties as a popular culture is represented in both movies by the lens of the camera and its techniques. While doing this, it has applied the theoretical approach implied by Stuart Hall in his book Representation: Cultural Representation and Signifying Practices. Hall argues that representation is an essential part of the process by which meaning is produced and exchanged between members of a culture. The chief beneficiaries of this research work include culture researchers, concerned stakeholders, humanities students and policy makers. It has a tremendous prospect to promote dance parties as a popular youth culture. Keywords: popular youth culture, movies, dance party, representation