The Culture Industry: Enlightenment As Mass Deception

Words: 1065
Pages: 5
Open Document
Robert Wilder Denholm
Professor Alison Trope, Ph.D
Comm 206: Communications and Culture
Due Date: 13th November 2015

The Culture Industry in Today’s Society

In “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception” by Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer, they examine society and its involvement in the entertainment culture industry. With the entertainment industry being such a key role in our society, people want to be able to be in control of what is produced. But with big companies now in charge of everything, there has been a shift in the power, from the consumer to the producer. Demonstrated in their essay, Adorno and Horkheimer’s perspective on the culture industry is accurate to this day as it is the driving force in our society that …show more content…
These different items are used to manipulate society into passivity. In the 21st century, mass media is such an influence in our society and it permeates our everyday lives. There is no such thing as freedom anymore because our lives are just constantly saturated with people telling us what to do and feeding us things. Producers are the ones with all the power. “A technological rationale is the rationale of domination itself. It is the coercive nature of society alienated from itself. Automobiles, bombs, and movies keep the whole thing together until their leveling element shows its strength in the very wrong which it furthered. It has made the technology of the culture industry no more than the achievement of standardization and mass production, sacrificing whatever involved a distinction between the logic of the work and that of the social system” (Adorno, Pg.4). While the culture industry acts as a producer with all the power, it also is a tool that help bind individuals. Humans are consumers, and no matter what their economic situations are, they are going to continue to fall under the easy pleasures that we like of popular …show more content…
Landscapes are constituted by ways of seeing, and if we know how to read them, then we can perceive in landscape representations the relations of power that underlie and constitute them. “Urban planners, real estate developers, and city officials work within the matrix of state institutions and local preferences. Both are neither free nor unfree from market forces and attachments of place” (Zukin, Pg. 42). Urban places respond to market pressures with people’s public dreams defined by private development projects and public pleasure the creative destruction. It is reflecting on an institutionalized reorientation of cultural patrons, producers, and consumers. The architects are the ones that are in control of society. In Adorno and Horkheimer’s eyes, the architect would be the producer that is holding all the power. They have the ability to shape how the city looks. For architects, architecture is their product, they see architecture as their mark on their city, and consumers don’t have a say in if they want it there or not. “We owe the clearest cultural map of structural change not to novelists or literary critics, but to architects and designers. Their products, their social roles as cultural producers, and the organization of consumption which they intervene create shifting landscapes in the most material sense” (Zukin, Pg.
Show More

Related Documents: The Culture Industry: Enlightenment As Mass Deception

Culture and Creative Industry Week 1 Essay

Week 2 2. Critical Theory and the Critique of the 'Culture Industry' This lecture considers how the Critical Theorists of the Frankfurt School sought to understand the relationship of culture and society in an age of advanced capitalism and mass media. It explores their analyses of popular culture, and poses the question of whether the term 'culture industry' has now lost its original, critical meaning. Key thinkers: Marx, Gramsci, Adorno, Horkheimer, Benjamin Seminar questions 1.Has the…

Words 2417 - Pages 10

Exam 3 Notes Essay

10/22/12-IMMERSIVE MEDIA MEDIA TYPES Static Dynamic Immersive (the 3rd one and topic of today’s notes) Environments (real or virtual) Out of home; websites (the most common) Involvement, exploration (all about the engagement) Social tie-in *tough to do well but if done well are very effective REAL PLACES FOR IMMERSIVE ENVIROS Lays Potato Chips Key message: Fresher because the potatoes are grown locally “Our potatoes are grown closer than you may think” (on the ceiling there is…

Words 4525 - Pages 19

Media Theory 1: Developing Argument?

Bibliography & Indicative Learning Resources 29 1. Introduction to the Unit Welcome to the unit Developing Arguments. The unit is an introduction to the learning processes, key concepts and critical thinking involved in studying media cultures in higher education and beyond. It will encourage you to think systematically about a range of key media concepts and to apply these ideas to your subject specialism and media practice. Foremost, the unit seeks to develop your writing and analytical…

Words 7241 - Pages 29

Essay on Midterm Study Guide

the prejudice and stereotypes. Understanding the marginalization also requires appreciating the diversity within categories - American Indians represent hundreds of different tribes; Hispanics and Asians represent dozens of different countries and cultures 4. There are connections between these systems of class, race, and gender. Few people are pure oppressors or victims, so it is a complex matrix in which all people are more aware of their victimization than of their privilege 7.…

Words 8778 - Pages 36