Culture Shaping

So, tomorrow I am chatting with Gordon Pennington, a man who is using marketing to shape the culture.

I just listened to two brief lectures posted on his company's website: http://www.burningmediagroup.com/. Below are two of the statements that I found most compelling:

"i hope you're living a better lifestyle...because isn't that what it's all about in the end?" (Pennington is questioning the oft-assumed end goal of American consumerism, materialism, and power mongering)

"if you don't know what your operating software is philosophically...you're simply a reactive creature."

Pennington argues that if we are not shaping the culture, then the culture is shaping us, whether we realize it or not. That is pretty powerful. Additionally, exploring Pennington's work gives me a strong appreciation for high-quality, articulate, and thoughtful branding and marketing. People with such gifts are necessary to make any culture shaping initiative effective.

In getting to explore my passions and unique giftings through looking for a job the past few months, I feel as though I have opened a pandora's box of excitement. Between setting up meetings with Pennington and local designers, and reading almost anything published by the NEA or Mako Fujimura, I feel a sense of thrill. Last week I posted on my gmail away message the following: "The pallete of interests is as diverse as a rainforest. Is that necessarily a bad thing?" I wrote that message because I feel as though my interests are broad reaching, but, I also feel, intertwined. Think about a rainforest-it is not a plethora of independent units, rather it is a place of many diverse species, all interconnected and all dependent. I want to do something using the arts for community development; some people say that's a pretty specific end goal but then I sit them down and tell them what I want to do and they usually respond with "you're going to need to pick one or two of those things and work towards those ends." However, i'd say that my vision is pretty broad, and necessarily so. It involves architecture, art, music, food, city planning, marketing, drama, anthropology, media, the list goes on...all necessary pieces for an effective community development puzzle. Maybe i'll discuss this idea more in a future post.

After that aside, I will say this...listening to what Pennington has to say about shaping our culture, while also reading about how to change communities through the arts and how to design better cities (only moments prior), makes me feel more alive.

How do I turn this into a job? I still don't know, but I know I have to start somewhere. Probably one day i'll help start an organization that focuses primarily upon my goals, right now i'd say i'm pretty content to chat it up with Pennington.