a2 comms marxism frankfurt school

8/3/2019 A2 Comms Marxism Frankfurt School

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Marxist critique of the CultureIndustries


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The idea that the mass media andsystems of cultural production have donea great deal to prevent the collapse of

capitalism predicted by Marx wasdeveloped by the theorists of theFrankfurt School. This group of

intellectuals were active from theinception of the Frankfurt Institute forSocial Research in 1923 and their work

has been highly influential in Marxist


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Through radio, TV, movies and forms ofpopular music like jazz, the expandingculture industries were disseminating ruling-

class ideologies with greater effect thanMarx could have envisaged. The furtherdevelopment of consumer society in thetwentieth century powerfully aided the

process of working-class incorporation bypromoting new myths of classlessness, andwedded the working class even more tightlyto acquisitive and property owning beliefs.

Even oppositional and critical forms of


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Even Anti-fashion is re-cycled as HighFashion and then High Street fashion


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The Frankfurt School are (on the whole)highly dismissive of popular culture becausethey see the culture industry and the

products that it churns out as being littlemore than propaganda for capitalism. Thisapproach leads Theodor Adorno, inparticular, to make some damning

indictments of popular culture. Listeners topop music are infantile and fans of thejitterbug dance craze were described asretarded, their dancing having convulsive

aspects reminiscent of St. Vitus dance or


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The very fact that popular culture isneither difficult nor demanding and that itoffers simple and direct pleasures

contributes to its complicity in capitalistideology. According to Adorno, we cravestandardised cultural products becausethey seem to validate lives that are

themselves standardised. At work we arealienated by dull, repetitive andundemanding tasks, but this alienating

effect is relieved by dull, repetitive andundemandin cultural roducts like o


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Popular cultural products may seem to offerus freedom of choice and aid to self-expression, but for Adorno, this is an

illusion; a phenomenon he terms pseudo-individualisation. In singing along with a popsong or in recognising a particular variationon a theme we enjoy the feeling that we are

finding expression for own individualemotions, but in reality we are simplyimitating others. Our consumption of popularculture simply makes us docile, apathetic

and passive, hence more susceptible to


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Bands like Kraftwerk have focused on therelationship between industry, machines,robots and popular culture

This is also expressed in many forms ofdance

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1088521/breakin_turbos_broom_dance/
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1088521/breakin_turbos_broom_dance/http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1088521/breakin_turbos_broom_dance/http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1088521/breakin_turbos_broom_dance/http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1088521/breakin_turbos_broom_dance/


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Critics of the Frankfurt School analysis ofpopular culture have argued that it is justtoo negative and too sweeping in its

characterisation of cultural products andcultural practices as tools of capitalism.It is difficult to find evidence amongsttodays consumers of popular culture of

the unqualified conformity that Adornoand Horkheimer argued was responsiblefor adjusting us to the norms and values

of the social system.


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It would be just as easy to find evidence ofdiversity, creativity and, even, resistance todominant ideology in contemporary popular

cultural pursuits. This is not to say thatcultural practices have no ideologicalsignificance far from it.

Rather, the critics of the Frankfurt School,

still working in a broadly Marxist tradition,have suggested a more subtle relationshipbetween culture and ideology; one whichrecognises the active role of consumers and

users of cultural products in creating


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a2 comms marxism frankfurt school

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