{"id":280851,"date":"2026-04-22T21:04:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T21:04:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/280851\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T21:04:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T21:04:23","slug":"sdsu-professor-pioneers-pop-culture-studies-on-campus-the-daily-aztec","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/280851\/","title":{"rendered":"SDSU professor pioneers pop culture studies on campus \u2013 The Daily Aztec"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Professor Nathian Rodriguez\u2019s course, \u2018Bad Bunny: Perreo, Performance and Pop Culture Politics\u2019 at SDSU is not new<\/a>. However, this spring marks the first semester the course was offered to undergraduate students in addition to graduate students.<\/p>\n

This is also far from the first time Rodriguez has taught a course centered on a public figure. In previous semesters, he taught a class about late Tejano star Selena Quintanilla<\/a>, emphasizing the importance of Latino representation in media.<\/p>\n

\u201cI [choose] one celebrity, and they\u2019re like, the cultural anchor,\u201d Rodriguez said. \u201cIt\u2019s really to help students \u2013 to meet them where they are at and help them understand the theoretical book side. And now it\u2019s actually being applied in real time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rodriguez has always been interested in pop culture. Having studied communications, media, public relations and journalism throughout his decorated career<\/a>, he uses pop culture to teach media literacy to his students.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez mentioned that, despite being a Hispanic-Serving Institution<\/a>, SDSU lacked courses regarding Hispanic\/Latino culture. While the graduate version of the course received a lot of buzz<\/a> on local media in 2022, he noted a change in student enrollment since opening up the course to undergraduates.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have students from all across campus,\u201d Rodriguez said. \u201cThere\u2019s some from criminal justice, nursing, business, computer science, English, poli-sci, music, etc. \u2026When they see themselves represented, they want to know more about the culture. So, of course they\u2019re going to take this elective.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recent studies<\/a> show that students excel in academic settings when engaging with material that is representative of themselves and their interests.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez\u2019s courses go beyond revolving around just ethics or culture. He specifically highlights how media plays an intrinsic role in pop culture, distinguishing his courses within the School of Journalism and Media Studies, rather than a traditional humanities course.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have language, we have all these identities embedded in culture,\u201d Rodriguez said. \u201cTelevision, movies, radio\u2026 I think pop culture is inherently media, and media is inherently pop culture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Students who take Rodriguez\u2019s courses watch and analyze music videos, social media presence, commentary and the overall reputation of the artist to better understand the interpersonal dynamics between pop culture and media. His main goal for his students is to walk away with improved media and cultural literacy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want students to be able to recognize it in the media, critique it, improve it and when they create it, have more of this critical, literal mind,\u201d Rodriguez said.<\/p>\n

He will be teaching a new course starting this fall semester about RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race; incorporating queer journalism, politics and culture into his academic atmosphere. Topics in this course will include the show\u2019s judging panel as \u2018cultural gatekeepers,\u2019 with a focus on mediation and conflict.<\/p>\n

Rodriguez looks forward to teaching this course in the fall, given the current sociopolitical atmosphere surrounding queer culture and journalism in general.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so much misinformation about LGBTQ individuals, specifically about trans individuals,\u201d Rodriguez said. \u201cThere just needs to be more cultural literacy on this subject.\u201d<\/p>\n

As long as Rodriguez continues to teach at SDSU, he will not halt his calling towards pop culture, media and representation. For him, these topics are quintessential in not just society, but in journalism.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf pop culture wasn\u2019t powerful, then they wouldn\u2019t try to be silencing it or regulate it,\u201d Rodriguez said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Professor Nathian Rodriguez\u2019s course, \u2018Bad Bunny: Perreo, Performance and Pop Culture Politics\u2019 at SDSU is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":280852,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[74,76,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-280851","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-san-diego","9":"tag-san-diego-headlines","10":"tag-san-diego-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280851\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/280852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}