"In the publication Inventing Popular Culture, the author's purpose is to demonstrate that the current term 'Popular Culture' is the current derogatory term used by the elite in control of society to try to downgrade and keep underfoot the mass of society who support those who, by hook or by crook and other devious means, have usurped power."
I've been struggling to disentangle this sentence ever since I encountered it last night. First, let's get rid of the obvious redundancies. Let's assume that "the current term" does not need to be repeated, that "by hook or by crook" includes the idea of "other devious means," and that a "derogatory term" is, by defintion, a term used to "downgrade" others. Let's also tighten up the syntax in the opening phrase and replace "the elite in control of society" with something more concise. This gives us a sentence something like this:
"The author of Inventing Popular Culture proposes to demonstrate that 'Popular Culture' is the current term used by the powerful elite to denigrate and dominate the mass of society who support those who, by hook or by crook, have usurped power."
This makes the syntax a bit more straightforward, but it does not clarify the content. Who are the "elite in control of society" and how do they differ from "those who, by hook or by crook, have usurped power"? The sentence seems to be saying that powerful people use the term "popular culture" to denigrate those who have put them into power, which is an interesting insight except I'm not sure it's what the author intended. Clearly, this sentence is desperately in need of attention from an editor.
But wait--this sentence was subject to the attention of an editor! It appeared not in one of my students' papers but in an academic journal, and it was written by a respected senior scholar! Who am I to subject an academic demigod to this kind of critique! I should be ashamed!
Well, someone should be ashamed, but far be it from me to name names.
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