This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the fashionable concept of culture. It argues that culture has many different meanings - derived from areas as diverse as philosophy, aesthetics, literary criticism, anthropology and sociology - and that culture is a concept to be viewed within traditions, not as a modern invention. Features: examines culture's relation to social structure, literary study, postmodernism, idealism and materialism addresses cultural populization and cultural reproduction provides the grounds for understanding modern work rather than a competitive review of the new' in cultural studies provides readers with a clear and compelling assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the cultural studies approach Chris Jenks has taught undergraduates on courses in communication studies and sociology for a decade, helped to establish and teach a successful Masters degree programme in communication, culture and society, taught courses on cultural reproduction and has recently edited a text entitled Cultural Reproduction .