ABSTRACT
'Popular culture' is a problematic term, and both of its components have provoked heated debate. This chapter aims to denote those beliefs, values, customs and practices that were distinct from the culture of the 'elite' or 'learned' minority. Two influential studies published in the 1970s, by Robert Muchembled and Peter Burke, painted a sharp binary division between elite and popular culture. Burke posited a medieval culture that had embraced the whole of society, except a tiny handful of learned schoolmen or theologians. Urban culture developed its own character, focused on the guilds and associations of journeymen and apprentices. Proverbial sayings such as 'drunk as a Lord' and 'to swear like a Lord' suggest that respectable, middling-sort culture might stand equally distant from the worlds of both the disorderly poor and the profligate rich. Cultures are always evolving, both internally and in response to outside pressures and influences.
