XULAneXUS Volume 9 | Issue 1 Article 8 12-1-2011 The rF ankfurt School and the Problem with Popular Culture: The ulturC e Industry as Mass Deception Revisited Nelantha K. Riley Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.xula.edu/xulanexus Recommended Citation Riley, Nelantha K. (2011) "The rF ankfurt School and the Problem with Popular Culture: The ulturC e Industry as Mass Deception Revisited," XULAneXUS: Vol. 9 : Iss. 1 , Article 8. Available at: https://digitalcommons.xula.edu/xulanexus/vol9/iss1/8 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by XULA Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in XULAneXUS by an authorized editor of XULA Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Riley: The Frankfurt School and the Problem with Popular Culture: The Cu ! Volume 9, Issue 1, December 2011. Scholarly Note. 9-18. ! <http://xulanexus.xula.edu/textpattern/index.php?id=121> ! The Frankfurt School and the Problem with Popular Culture: The Culture Industry as Mass Deception Revisited Nelanhta K. Riley, Psychology Faculty Mentor: Dr. Christopher Faircloth, Sociology Abstract The turn to the 21st century and the technological advances that came with it have made the culture industry a force to be reckoned with, but at the same time changing the dynamics of the marketing Nelanhta Riley is a Psychology arena. Now more than ever, the Internet has become a marketing major with a minor in Sociology entity in its own right. The varying industries of culture are no from New Orleans, LA. Upon longer the gatekeepers of public opinion and product critique. graduating from Xavier in 2012, With this change, some in the sociological field question whether she hopes to earn a Ph.D. in a or not the theories developed by Horkheimer and Adorno can related field. Riley is currently a account for these changes. The purpose of this paper is to research assistant in Tulane’s reexamine the critique of culture production within The Dialectic social psychology lab. Her of Enlightenment and utilize current articles to support the theories research interests revolve around that Horkheimer and Adorno put forward. The overarching goal personality disorders. This past of this paper is to use the most recent empirical work to posit that summer Riley participated in the concepts Horkheimer and Adorno developed can go beyond Louisiana State University’s time differences and still accurately apply to modern culture Pre-Doctorial Scholars Institute production. This article addresses the roles that economic and program where she studied cultural trends have in the production of culture. From the present recognition memory and research, it seems as if the critical theory presented by Horkheimer criterion shift as a research and Adorno still provides an accurate prediction of the growth in assistant to Dr. Jason L. Hicks. the culture industry and its powers of mass deception. As a result, Riley also had the opportunity to present the Key Terms: research results from Dr. Hicks’ • Cultural Production • Mass Media lab at the 2011 California • Cultural Consumption • Capitalism McNair Symposium at • Culture Industry University of California, Berkeley. ! "! Published by XULA Digital Commons, 2011 1 XULAneXUS, Vol. 9 [2011], Iss. 1, Art. 8 10 N. Riley ! The overarching goal of this paper is to use the future founder, Felix J. Weil, German the most recent empirical work to posit that the sociologists specializing in Marxist Theory came concepts Horkheimer and Adorno developed can to these meetings to exchange ideas or have go beyond time differences and still accurately discussions regarding articles they published (Jay, apply to the production of culture in late 1973). The first week of meetings was so capitalism (modernity). However, to promote a successful that Weil was encouraged to make more well rounded view of the social influences them a permanent fixture in German academia, that inspired the work of Horkheimer and Adorno, thus, the Frankfurt Institute was founded in 1922 this paper will give a brief history of the Frankfurt (Inglis, 1993). Not only was the Institute focused Institute for Social Research and discuss the main on perfecting and extending Marxist Theory, it objective behind The Dialectic of Enlightenment was also established to break the tradition of (Horkheimer & Adorno, 2001). educating students in narrow minded theoretical courses and address social topics these universities After World War I, sociologists and social ignored as well (e.g. anti-Semitic attitudes in theorists found themselves in a state of German society) (Jay, 1973). The ultimate goal disillusionment when the revolutionary changes was to create scholars that promoted social change Marxism promised did not become a reality (Jay, and challenged the status quo (Jay, 1973). 1973). Instead of creating a socialist utopia, Germany (and the rest of Europe) was focusing on However, under the direction of Carl holding war torn areas together and rebuilding Grunberg, the institution’s initial focus was on severely weakened social infrastructure. But what historical aspects of the labor movement in happened? Why didn’t society reform itself after Germany (Jay, 1973). It was not until Max the war broke the hold of capitalist ideology? To Horkheimer replaced Grunberg in 1931 that the find the answers to these questions, sociologists Frankfurt Institute focused on theoretical reanalyzed Marx’s theoretical concepts and found scholarship (Inglis, 1993). From then on, a that the problem dwelled within the spaces where revitalization of Critical Theory occurred through theory and praxis should have combined, but the work of the Institute’s members (Jay, 1973). failed to do so (Jay, 1973). Praxis was an essential According to Arato and Gebhardt (1982), Critical component to making Marxism a reality because it Theory is a combination of Kant’s critical encompasses both practical thought and the philosophy and a Marxist critique of Germany’s implementation of that thought; praxis is the political economic structure. With such a physical means in which philosophical thought is foundation, critical theory provides the put into action. However, connecting Marxist intellectuals of Frankfurt with the perfect arena for theory to praxis was easier said than done because critiques of theoretical thought, praxis, and social it lead to criticizing the newly formed political functioning (Arato & Gebhardt, 1982). parties in Germany, which later became a threat to German solidarity. Forsaking political solidarity After Hitler’s Nazi Regime came into for intellectual gain, the Frankfurt Institute for power, the Institute went through a period of Social Research dedicated itself to successfully nomadism, eventually resettling in New York linking Marxist Theory with praxis (Inglis, 1993). (Inglis, 1993). During this time there was a change in Horkheimer’s, and by extension the Institute’s, The Frankfurt Institute for Social Research literary tone. Such changes included censorship of first started as a week-long series of meetings discourse utilizing words like Marxism, called the First Marxist Work Week. Hosted by communism, or social collapse and shifts of XULAneXUS: Xavier University of Louisiana’s Undergraduate Research Journal https://digitalcommons.xula.edu/xulanexus/vol9/iss1/8 2 Riley: The Frankfurt School and the Problem with Popular Culture: The Cu SpecialCulture RelationshipsIndustry 11 ! interest toward cultural critique (Jay, 1973). This society has of such corruption is the culture was also a time when Adorno gained attention industry. with the Institute for his work on culture and artistic expression (Jay, 1973). The Enlightenment, Culture and Mass Production Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno were born into elite society and had firsthand The culture industry is a system of experience with the power struggle between the production and consumption that assimilates mass social classes (Inglis, 1993). They observed how culture, turning it into products that can be sold to those who controlled the means of production the public (Adorno & Rabinbach, 1975). produced and reproduced culture for capitalist Corporations like Sony, Walt Disney, and Coca- gain. Horkheimer and Adorno pointed to the Cola are examples of the culture industry because culture industry’s reliance on “advertising, popular they create products that are sold for public music, and the glamour of cinema to invent new consumption (Grazian, 2010). Horkheimer and (and largely useless) desires for consumer goods, Adorno described how the media in the 20th all to be fulfilled through shopping and century was becoming a powerful force that fueled entertainment” (Grazian, 2010, p.48). Grazian the culture machine. The turn to the 21st century (2010) states that thorough the use of advertising, and the technological advances that came with it popular music, and film, the culture industry have made the culture industry a force to be creates markets for “products sold by department reckoned with, but at the same time changing the stores, fashion houses, jewelers, cosmetic firms, dynamics of the marketing arena. Now more than tobacco and liquor companies, the automobile ever, the Internet has become a marketing entity in industry, and, of course, the film studios and its own right. The varying industries of culture are record companies that helped to manufacture the no longer the gatekeepers of public opinion and desires for such things in the first place” (p.49). product critique. With websites like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, culture From such observations, Horkheimer and industries have to compete with the all-powerful Adorno analyzed mass cultural production to shine blogs of the consumer. Grebb (2004) states that: light on the intellectually restrictive contradiction of the culture industry to society (Inglis, 1993). The Internet is by far the biggest, baddest, The objective of their work in The Dialectic of most incredibly influential monster to Enlightenment was to show how the utterly turn a multi-billion dollar industry Enlightenment’s (and society’s) emphasis on upside down since… well, since never, reason was the source of this restriction really… It’s a new world.