Page 77 - Critical Theories of Mass Media

JOBNAME: McGraw−TaylorHarris PAGE: 1 SESS: 9 OUTPUT: Mon Oct 8 09:03:55 2007 SUM: 435F5CD8
/production/mcgraw−hill/booksxml/tayharris/chap03

3

Theodor Adorno and the culture

industry

Introduction

The work of Theodor Adorno (1903–69) represents one of the first
sustained meditations on the effects of mass media on culture and
society. As a result it has had an enduring influence on cultural
theory. Adorno’s account of mass media, or what he called the
culture industry, was developed in the context of the work of the
Frankfurt School and their project of critical theory. The Frankfurt
School was a group of German intellectuals who participated in the
Frankfurt Institute of Cultural Research, a privately funded research
group affiliated to Frankfurt University. Among its ranks were many
of the most powerful minds in European intellectual life, and many
of them, both within and outside the Institute, had a major impact
on twentieth-century thought. The Institute began from a broadly
Marxist position, however, they recognized that the direction in
which Western societies were developing could not be accounted for
by orthodox Marxism. This was a response to the apparent diver-
gence between Marxist theory and the developmental trajectory of
advanced capitalist societies, in particular, the integral role of culture
in this context. Various phenomena, such as the emergence of
avant-garde modernism, and the burgeoning influence of a range of
technological media, raised questions that highlighted the inad-
equacy of treating culture as a superstructural expression entirely
determined by the economic base. Cultural production and con-
sumption were playing an increasing central role in capitalist socie-
ties and, as a result, a new set of theoretical tools were required to
analyse these developments, as ‘individual consciousness and uncon-
sciousness were encroached upon by agencies which organize free
time – for example the radio, television, film and professional sport
industries – the Frankfurt theorists stressed the urgency of develop-
ing a sociology of “mass culture” ’ (Held 1980: 77).
In the 1930s the Frankfurt School’s continued existence in Nazi
Germany became untenable, and it was forced into exile, eventually

Kerrypress Ltd – Typeset in XML A Division: chap03 F Sequential 1

www.kerrypress.co.uk - 01582 451331 - www.xpp-web-services.co.uk
McGraw Hill - 152mm x 229mm - Fonts: New Baskerville