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Power, Culture, and Memory

Author(s): Jackson LearsSource: The Journal of American History, Vol. 75, No. 1 (Jun., 1988), pp. 137-140Published by: Organization of American HistoriansStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1889658 .

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Power, ulture, nd Memory

JacksonLearsItisrefreshingo find omeonewith good word o sayfor heconcept fculturalhegemony.ven hough eon Finkmisconstruesy rgumentn certainways, eand I share lot of commonground more, think, hanhe realizes.Certainlyhe is more sympathetico Gramscian deas than someAmerican ntellectualhistorians avebeen.Theyhavetended o doubt that he concept anbe wieldedwith ny precision.n ThomasL. Haskell'swickedlyunny ormulation,or x-ample,Gramscianisms to Marxisms Unitarianisms to Christianity:"featherpillow" o catch hose alling rom hetrue aith. rom hispointofview, hecon-ceptof cultural egemonys too soft ut also toovolatile. Likedry ce,"Haskellwrites,hegemonylwaysends oward ublimation,ecomingmerely diffuses-pect of the humancondition atherhana distinct eaturef particularocietiesthatone couldever ointto in explanationfspecificvents nd actions."'That criticisms accurate ut misconceived. s I havealready cknowledged,tis probably ruethat no organized ociety an existwithoutgovernance y ahegemonicroup.2 here snoexplanatoryowernheringnwords rphrasesike"hegemony"r "historical loc" anymorehan n "modernization,"false on-sciousness,"consensus,"r "social ystem." ramscianerms rovide theoreticalvocabularyhat cquiresmeaning nlynspecificontexts;hevalue f hat ocabu-larys that thighlightshe relation etween ulturendpowerwithout educingmental nd emotionalife oa mere piphenomenonfeconomicsrdemography.There s little oint n asking:Do we seehegemonic rocessesperatingn this rthat ociety?That s whatAileenKraditorncereferredo as a "yes-type"ues-tion.3) hemore alient uestions re: Whichgroups omposed hegemonicorcounterhegemonic)istorical locatparticularistorical oments? owwere lli-ancesforged through hatcombinationf economicnterests, oral mpulses,ethnic ies, ommon rejudices,ollectiveantasies? owwere hose lliances is-solved rreshaped?Whydid somegroupspeel away nd others emain?Fink's ccount ftherise ndfalloftheKnights fLaborposesthose uestionsinprovocativeays.He correctlyocuses nthe"processesywhichmeaningswereJackson ears s professorfhistoryt Rutgers niversity.

I ThomasL. Haskell, ConventionndHegemonic nterestn the Debate overAntislavery: Reply oDavisand Ashworth,"mericanHistorical eview, 2 (Oct. 1987), 829-78, esp. 834, 835.2 T. J.Jackson ears, The Concept f CulturalHegemony: roblems nd Possibilities,"mericanHistoricalReview, 0 (June1985), 567-93, esp. 579n25.3Aileen S. Kraditor,American adicalHistoriansn TheirHeritage,"ast ndPresentno. 56, 1972),136-5 ,esp. 137.

137

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138 TheJournalf American istory

organizedndempowerednAmericanife," iscoveringhe ourcesf heKnights'strengthn theirapacityo mobilize traditionalalues" s the ement or broad-basedchallengeo concentratedower.He traces he decline f themovemento"a declining aseoforganized onstituents,ooptationf aborprogramsnd can-didatesby hemajorparties,ndthe abor ulture's wn mbivalenceowardtateaction nd party ormation,"uggestinghat "craft nions, thnicpolitics, ndfraternalrreligiousssociation"isplaced lass ssues s thekey ource fworkers'social dentity.4am not sure hat canaccept heargumentn all of tsdetails.LikeotheraborhistoriansntheThompsonianmold,Fink ometimestill eemsto assume hat lass onsciousnessrovidedhefirmestasis or adical olitics, venwhenhisown videncemay uggesthat ocal ources f olidarityeremorempor-tant han heabstract otion fclass.Nevertheless,amimpressed ithhisargu-ment's apacity o illuminate hemaking nd unmakingf a counterhegemonicculture.Fink nd share hebelief hat ultural alues recriticallymportantnshapingandenergizinglabormovement.utwhatmakes noppositionalulturendure?Intellectualoherence? hat swhatFinkbelieves have rgued.Maybe do over-valueclaritynd underrate onfusion: hat s an occupational azardofphiloso-phersnd ntellectualistorians,homaybe seducedbywhatWilliamJamesalled"thesentimentfrationality"venwhenthey eclare hemselvespponents f arationalist orld iew.5ut nthis aseFink's omplaintsa littlemisplaced. citedthe onfusionsntheproducerulturerimarilyo show he imited ndambiguousnature fworking-classonsent o dominant roups' egemony.also observedasFinkdoes) that he notion f divided onsciousnessuggested nly slightly oresophisticatedersion ffalse onsciousness,hat tstillmplied he existencefanideologicallyorrectunified onsciousness"o be promoted y revolutionaryan-guard.To overemphasizehe mportancef intellectual oherencen an opposi-tional ultures to resurrectheghost fLenin,who continuedostalk hepagesofGramsci's risonnotebooks.But f ntellectualoherencesnottheglue thatholds culture ogether,hatis? Obviously,here an be no single nswer o such sweeping uestion.But themost omprehensiveffort ouldhave to begin by acknowledginghatnearly llthemost esilientppositionalultures ave been rootedncollectivememory,n"precipitatesfpasthistoricalxperience,"o use Barrington oore's anguage.Such n admissionsdifficultormodernizersf nypolitical ue,whodismissnyattachmentothepastas "nostalgia"a word hatneeds longvacation rom on-temporaryublic discourse).n themodernizers'iew, nythingessthanfull d-justmento "thepainful rdealofchange" onstitutesscapism. hepassive ub-mission othe llegedlynevitable orces fhistorynvolveshe ort fdeterministic

4 Leon Fink, TheNew LaborHistorynd thePowers fHistorical essimism: onsensus, egemony,nd theCase ofthe Knights fLabor," ournal f AmericanHistory, 5 (June1988), 115-36.5 WilliamJames,TheSentimentfRationality,"1879] nWilliamJames,ollected ssaysndReviewsNewYork, 969), 85.

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Power, ulture,nd Memory 139

thinkinghat sedtobeconsideredheexclusive ropertyforthodoxMarxists;nfact, tpervades he entireWesterniberal radition.6Inrecent ears, hough, ocial nd cultural istoriansavebegun o reshufflea-miliar iberal ategories.hediscoveryhat adical rotest as often ad conserva-tive ourcess one ofthemajorhistoriographicaldvances f the asttwodecades.Now we need to carry he implicationsf thatdiscoverynto the even moreproblematicrenaofthetwentiethentury-aperiodwhen ocally ased popularculture as beengradually arginalizedynational nd atermultinationalorpora-tions,when ollective emory as beendevalued y dvertisingnd themassmedia,whenthepain of separationrom hepasthasbeen airbrushedrom he conog-raphy f "economic evelopment."he closer ne gets o the present, he harderit s to find enuinely opular ources fbroad-based adical issent; hevernacularvoices fprotestreeloquent in the abor trugglesfthe1930s, hecivilrightsmovement,heefforto end theVietnamWar),but they reoften ifficulto hearabove hebuzzofbackgroundoise the officialersion fevents rovided y hecorporate edia. So it s perhaps ut ofdesperationhatmany eft cademics avebegun o ookfor videncefpopular rotestntheveryitadels f orporateower:intelevision,adio, nd othermass-marketedorms f ulture. heir uesthas beeninspired y he theoretical ork f Mikhail akhtin nd Frederic ameson, mongothers. ollowing akhtin, hey ave rgued hat venmass ulturesnotmonolog-icalbutdialogical, hat verytterances addressed o an audience hatmay einter-pret r ubverthe peaker'sntendedmeaning. ven pparently onologicaltate-ments, rom hisview, an imply heir pposites. ollowing ameson, heyhaveinsisted hat dominant ulture akes oot,not by mposing deology, ut by d-dressing topian ongings; nd those ongingsmayhave subversivemplications.Armedwith hese nsights,eft ultural istoriansavediscoveredracesf ollectivememorynHollywood ilms,arly etworkelevisionrograms,nd otherupposedcitadels f ocial mnesia.7 amintrigued y hese ftenngenious rgumentsnd

impressed ythevarietyf formsrdinary eoplehavepreservedo expressheirattachmentso thepast.Neverthelessthink uch rguments ay xaggeratehesignificancef thedis-sent mbodiednmass ultural orms. here s too trong tendencyo elevatewhatis often univocal, losed ystem f mageryntoan elegant akhtinianonversa-tion,whereveryeofascisttteranceyClint astwoodmplies counterfascistri-tiqueof "latecapitalism." ontemporaryultural istoriansoooften orgethatthemassmediaare, mong ther hings, xpressionsfconcentratedower. herearetimes,n the current ulturaltmosphere, hen yearn or doseofvulgarMarxism. s an attorneyriend f mine oncetoldme after andlingyet nother

6 Fink, NewLabor Historynd the Powers f Historicalessimism,"28-31,124.7 Mikhail akhtin, he Dialogic magination: ourEssays, rans.MichaelHolquist nd CarylEmerson, d.MichaelHolquist Austin, 981);Frederic ameson, hePoliticalUnconscious: arratives a Socially ymbolicAct Ithaca,1981), sp. ch. 6. The deathatmass ulture romotes kind f ollectivemnesia s mplicitn manyof thewritingsf theFrankfurtchoolnotablyMax Horkheimernd T. W. Adorno, ialectic fEnlightenment,trans. ohnCummingNew York, 982).

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evictionaseforNew HavenLegalAid,from isperspectiveulgarMarxismookedlike pretty owerfulnterpretiveool. Amid brilliantly anipulatedmages ndchants f iberationhroughonsumption,t seasy o forget ow ystematicallyur"abundance"s entwinedwith mperial tructuresfpower.Theremay be counterhegemonicendencies ven n thecorporatemedia, butit wouldbe a mistakef nourzeal touncoverhemwe overlookedhesources fdissentnthe ntersticesfour ociety,ngroups hathavebeenexploitedr implyignored ymodernizinglites. thinkwe should ry odistinguishetween enu-inely opular ulturend the orporate-sponsoredass ulturehat sso oftenmis-taken or t.Butweshould lsoacknowledgehecapacityfmass ulture o shapepopular ttitudes. his s not o exhume henotion fmonolithicocial ontrolthefavoriteead horse ashedbycontemporaryultural istorians),r to deny hattwentieth-centuryeoplehavepreservedheir ignitynd autonomy gainst heclaims fthemodern orporationnd thebureaucratication-state.t issimplyoreassertherelevancefGramsciannquiriesnto herelationsetweenulturendpower.Without igeonholingveryxpressiveestures either accommodation"or "resistance,"eneed tocontinue onderingheconnectionsetween heglit-teringurfacesf mass culture nd the mechanismsf coercion hey onceal.