Cultural Studies; Why?

I chose this class initially because I had to take it to earn a required credit. I, and I've been told I'm not alone in this, thought it was a world studies class, in the traditional sense; This week, we'll be covering Africa. Next week, Asia, etc. You get the idea. While I'd be willing to bet that the world is going to be fairly well incorporated, it's been made pretty obvious that the rest of my thoughts are not the case. Now knowing what this class is, I can say why I would have chosen it. Or, at the very least, I can bullshit a very convincing facsimile of why I would have chosen it.

Culture is something that is obviously worth studying. We do it every day, whether we know it or not. Simply by living in it, we are, to an extent, studying the culture around us. What I find so fascinating about culture, particularly modern culture, is how it's defined. Not in the, "Culture means," sense; No, more along the lines of who is a member of what culture(s), and what that culture likes, dislikes, etc. Culture is constantly shifting; each culture is a result of all the ones around it. A culture is almost certainly defined by what it isn't more than what it is.

As for what I think culture is, I think culture is everything. Not being glib. Culture is the attitudes of the people in that culture, the things they do, the music they listen to, the movies and shows they watch, the words they say, the way they say them, etc., etc. It'd be easier to define what culture isn't, but I can't think of anything that isn't defined by culture. Maybe breathing. Yes, we all breathe. That's not really culture-related. Everything that isn't breathing is culture.