Considering the ways in which television operates as both mythmaker and constructor of reality for a broad American audience is integral when confronted with fictional, televised subculture representations. This is especially true when the television series in question carries such extensive cultural cachet that critics hail it a “’dark masterpiece,’” entire cultural news media sites devote pages to it, it breaks viewership records, and even the president claims to be a devoted fan (Nussbaum; Paskin; Day). Keeping in mind the works of Raymond Williams and other prominent cultural theorists, I shall discuss the ways in which the series True Detective acts as a text that serves—through its surface renderings of outlaw motorcycle clubs (O.M.C.’s), and its implicit assumption that such representation is authentic—to actually undermine the group’s “alternative hegemony” (Marxism and Literature 111). Instead of challenging normative assumptions held by our society and media outlets to which they cater, the series’ directors engage in a method of incorporation that employs both caricature and an inaccurate, overly simplistic representation of bikers—which, in turn, support preconceptions and misconceptions about that group. Whereas the directors would like us to focus on individual identities that are hidden behind presumed subcultural facades, or “masks,” (Pizzolato) we should instead consider what Williams calls our willing “distraction from distraction by distraction” (O’Connor 5), and understand the class struggle that is occurring beyond our blind acceptance of such misrepresentation—misrepresentation that serves to alienate citizens within the same ideological framework. As Graeme Turner notes, “for cultural studies, ideology is the very site of struggle” (197). Instead of highlighting the struggle between so-called normative society and O.M.C.’s, I will emphasize the actual struggle between that particular subcultural group and the ideological apparatuses and practices that enhance its status as a cultural scapegoat.
About the presenterKathryn King
I just finished my first year as a graduate student at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, California, where I also teach Rhetorical Arts and a First-Year Seminar Writing course to college freshmen as part of my teaching fellowship. My graduate emphasis is in English and American Literature. Previously, I taught English Grammar and Literature as well as Spanish for several years to middle and high school students in Orange County, California. My graduate areas of interest are gender and cultural studies, with particular emphasis on representations of women with mental illness in the long 20th Century. I am also interested in how adaptation affects gender and subculture representation; the latter idea is explored in the paper I wish to present. I hope that my experience will place me in contact with others in my area of interest as well as lay the foundation for expanding the paper into a potentially publishable work.