Les Miserables? Tell ya what: I read the book, and yes, it is very good. I have no desire to see a shortened, chopped down version of that work of art, performed by dudes in tights singing tunes that could have been composed by Bernie Taupin on a hung-over Sunday morning (hey, this is still the Pit, right? ;)).
Jesus Christ Superstar? Read the book too, but decided that I didn’t like it all that much. I don’t really see what a few cheesy songs would change there. 
i really liked rent, coldie, and i heard the producers is way funny…
Just see them, Mister Ippity-Pippity. Then we’ll talk.
Esprix
Okay, I’m checking into this thread really late, so I’m going to be unhip and chat about the OP for a bit.
dalovindj, you say that pop culture references are important, but despite the scores of posts to this thread, I fail to see how. You say in one of your posts that a knowledge of pop culture can change your life in very significant financial ways, and I’ll give you that, provided that your career is in the field of popular culture.
To elucidate, you say that knowledge of new/popular movies is important in the movie industry. Well, no shit. That doesn’t mean that knowledge of pop culture is inherently important. If you’re making a living as a web developer, for instance, you have to know hundreds of tags, commands, as well as a smattering of languages and multimedia programs. Sure this’ll make you a ton of money, but it doesn’t mean shit unless you’re talking shop with other web developers or trying to impress a potential client. In other words, it’s not something that you should expect everybody to know, nor be terribly disappointed in their not knowing. (Okay, the chick in your OP was an aspiring actress. She, you can be disappointed in.)
Later, you go on to quote the statement that ignorance of one’s culture is not cool, and that one needs to experience the art of a culture to appreciate its fullness. IMHO, you’re stressing the wrong half of the term “popular culture.” A quick look at popular culture tells you more about what is popular in a culture than what is important in that culture.
“Ah,” you may say, “but that is the same thing, is it not? For knowing what is popular in a culture is to know what the people of that culture value.” Yes and no. If there is a pop culture icon that is universally accepted and that has undeniable cultural importance, then, yes, that particular piece of pop culture can tell you something about the culture from which it originated. But seeing as how few movies, books, or television shows have universal appeal, intimate knowledge of these cultural artifacts can only give you insights about the people who find them particularly important. For this, you need fairly detailed knowledge, including the demographic for whom a pop culture item is important and why it is so. And once you have this knowledge, you’ve gone past mere knowledge of the pop cultural icon available from visiting the material yourself and set foot into the realm of sociology. Thus while knowledge of popular culture is not entirely worthless, it is, on its own, lacking in the ability to truly inform anybody about its parent culture.
sigh Well, I had more to say about that, but it’s 4:30 AM here, and coherence isn’t my strong suit at this hour. I will just append, then, to what Medea’s Child has said, that “culture,” a catch-all term almost synonymous with “society” in the way you’ve been using it, is something that can be understood simply by observing the interaction between people. Societal rituals and mores can be acquired through observation of simple mundanity, and the artistic (and certainly the pop cultural) works of that society are largely unnecessary in this. In other words, until one wishes to join a more specialized group of people (i.e., movie buffs, or those in “the industry”), popular culture is mere clutter and serves, at best, as conversational shorthand.
I’d also like to add that I find it quite amusing that your selections for canonical pop culture books/short stories do not contain a single entry that strikes me as being an example of popular culture. Popular culture is, by definition, rarely taught in literature classes unless said class is focusing exclusively on popular culture. The divide between popular (or genre) fiction and literary fiction is fairly well documented and seeing as how your list does, as somebody mentioned, smack strongly of required high school reading, I really think that you should either rethink your entries for this category or rethink your definition of popular culture entirely.
Disssapointed, if we are going to be literal, is a strong word for my emotions in this case. It’s the pit so I stated the OP with attitude for fun, but in reality it DOESN’T really make me mad or even unhappy. I just think some people are missing out.
I think “universally accepted” is a technical impossibility (especially here on the dope). I speak of examples that large portions of the population have ususally experienced. And like them or not, you should at least see them as they tend to influence art and literature that comes out later.
I think you and some others bring up a good point about the problems of the phrase “pop culture”. It is the best two words I can think of to describe the body of work to which I refer. But ideally it does lead to sociology type thoughts. To see and expereience a movie like reservoir dogs, combined with the knowledge of it’s popularity, you can glean something about the culture that makes that type of thing successful. He used radical film-making (read: storytelling) techniques (which he jacked from other places) to create a truly brilliant, shocking, and extreme film. To see this movie is to learn about where film has been, and where it is going.
Some can, some can’t. You won’t get jokes or references to a movie if you haven’t seen that movie. You may be able to pick up on things after watching a couple of conversations and hold your own, but after a conversation comes up a few times, instead of trying to bluff your way through, I reccomend actully seeing the piece in question. Then you can speak intelligently with the people on the merit of the work in your opinion.
It is true that one could make it through life without ever even seeing any movies or shows and still be successful and happy. They would, however, be missing out. If you don’t want to relate the way certain people do, fine. But if you can relate with them as well as with whomever you DO wish to join, you are better off and more well-rounded.
And now we come to the definition part of our thread. I would say that what is taught in Literary classes IS popular culture, regardles of it’s age. When I say Pop Culture I am referring to the body of art that is hard to be an american and not have experienced.
I am making a master list for the Cafe thread (it’s getting real big). The OP was written quickly, and I threw up examples of art that I just find it really hard to believe people haven’t seen or read. The fact that they are 9th grade reading assignments is the point. How could anyone (like the girl in the OP)have missed that? How could you be a high-school graduate, and not read Macbeth? Or Catcher in the Rye. Regardless of what you think of those works, they should at least be read so you can form an opinion. I mean we are talking bare minimum here. But to really be a well-rounded conversationalist, you would have an extreme working knowledge of both popular art and classical art (some debate about where the line gets drawn between the two).
If there is anything the Cafe thread has showed me, it’s that I have to read up on a few more of the “classics” to hold my own in conversation with people who spent large amounts of time in academia. This is cool with me (I’m going to the worlds largest book store later today), I just think that knowledge of the current art of this country (Im about to get started on foreign films too - I hear great things) is equally important conversation wise. In the end none of it is REALLY life defining (unless you’re in the industry), or terribly important. It just adds to how you can relate to people, which to me is what life is all about.
DaLovin’ Dj