Exploitation culture  

From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

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exploitation

My interest in regional exploitation or pulp culture is that what it tells about the region where it is produced. In search of national stereotypes by way of their exploitation culture; regional stereotypes deduced from regional fears and desires (horror and eroticism).

Parent categories

fiction - low culture

By medium

exploitation (economics) - exploitation film - pulp fiction

Main themes

sex, drugs, violence, true crime

Related

blaxploitation, artsploitation, b-movie, cautionary tale, comics, cult films, "dime novels" and "penny dreadfuls", escapist fiction, erotic horror, fantasy, fantastique, giallo, gore, gothic, grindhouse, horror, mondo films, Nazi exploitation, nunsploitation, pornography, prostitution, pulp, sensationalism, sexploitation, shock, slasher, snuff film, trash, video nasty, violence, white slavery, women in prison, working class culture

Introduction

While the term exploitation was initally coined in the 1950s to describe 1930s and 1940s (the classical era of American exploitation film), the practice of exploitative fiction is as old as fiction itself. Areas of interest in this field include grub street hack writing, dime novels and pulp fiction, paperbacks and white slavery films, blaxploitation, Grand Guignol and slasher films.

Sensationalism

Sensationalism is a manner of being extremely controversial, loud, attention-grabbing, or otherwise sensationalistic.

The term is commonly used in reference to the media. Critics of media bias of all political stripes often charge the media with engaging in sensationalism in their reporting and conduct. That is to say they charge that the media often chooses to report on shocking or attention-grabbing stories, rather than relevant or important ones.

Exploitation films

Exploitation cinema has three main themes: sex, drugs and violence. Erotic horror is a subgenre of exploitation/horror.

These movies - from 1930s cautionary tales about venereal diseases to 1970s porno chic — were initially shown by itinerant carnival people, later in so-called grindhouse theaters and drive-in theatres — until their death-by-video in the 1980s.

The academic interest in this genre of films began in the 1990s, where it is a subgenre of paracinema.

See main articles: early exploitation films and exploitation film.

See also

• Low culture
• Exploitation film
• Early exploitation film

Exploitation by region

American exploitation culture is well-known throughout the world, European exploitation culture less so.

• American exploitation
• European exploitation
  • British exploitation
  • French exploitation
  • German exploitation
  • Italian exploitation
• Japanese exploitation