overriding theme:
the concentration of culture production within an industry that is
dominated by a few corporate producers [Disney+ABC+MacDonald's] who manufacture,
own the rights to and distribute a vast number of the mass-mediated cultural
products that are found in the world. The consequences of such concentration
are viewed as leading to a process of standardization of form and homogeneity
of content. The impact is perceived as, at best giving the consumer little
real choice, at worst promoting cultural forms that are dulling our ability
to think critically about the world in which we live and reducing the diversity
of values, beliefs and customs across the world.
…TThis chapter will trace a broad theorectical shift from approaching
the production of culture through a macro perspective which stresses social
and organizational structures and economic relationships, towards a more
micro approach which focuses on everyday human agency and the making of
cultural meanings. The first approach foregrounds the issue of control
over production and constraint on creative practices; the second emphasizes
human autonomy and the active ability to engage in creative activities
despite such constraints.
Culture industry
'production line' and 'sausage machine'--music industry, book publishing
business and Hollywood film production
Adorno and Horkeimer
--how culture is industrialized
--the impact of [industrialization]on how cultural items were created
and consumed.
Mass culture'in which cultural production had become a routine, standardized
repetitive operation that produced undemanding cultural commodities which
in turn resulted in a type of consumption that was also standardized, distracted
and passive.
background
[against instrumental rationality prevalent in the first half of 20th
century.]
[personal history: witnessed 1914-1918 war, fled from Nazism in 1938
to the U.S. to find both the Nazi party and the U.S. make massive use of
media technologies.
Summary of the Three major arguments: production-creation-consumption
From a political-economy analysis which draws on Marx, they
argue that the concentration of culture production in a capitalist industry
results in a standardized commercial commodity.
Free and autonomous art against the repetitive and unchallenging culture
produced as a commodity
cultural consumption has become a de-concentrated activity leading
to passive and 'obedient' types of social behaviour.
Further explanation of standardization and pseudo-individuality
standardization: there is nothing
spontaneous about the process of cultural production: it has become a routine
operation that can be carried out in an office by the application of specific
formulae. E.g. production procedure, plan, repetitive sequences and frequently
recurring refrains.
Examples: Artist and mass production:
Springsteen and music video such as "Dancing in the Dark" "Born in the
U.S.A."; the textbook's example: jazz improvization, psalm, traditional
song, 'easy listening' -regressive listening
consequences: passive, obedient and easily manipulated consumption--e.g.
listen
to the refrains and hooks of a hit song;
pseudo individuality--trade marks of car, music
and stars' images
"The constant pressure to produce new effects (which must conform to
the old pattern) serves merely as another rule to increase the power of
the conventions…}Pseudo individuality is rife: from the standardized jazz
improvization to the exceptional film star whose hair curls over her eye
to demonstrate her originality. "
criticism:
-
popular culture--not always standardized, controlled;
-
Do we need meaning and self-awareness in every activity, including entertainment?
-
distinction between the standardization of 'functional artifacts' such
as a car and 'music texts' such as songs.
-
Gendron (textbook p. 82): his point is that the standardization of components
in the car is qualitatively different to that in a song. How do we
interprete the 'part interchangeability' of music elements?
-
There is a limit in this productionist perspective. -- Different ways of
consumption
|
The
debate between productionism and consumptionism