Page 123 - Cultural Studies and Political Economy

112 Chapter Three

the other hand, the prospects for cooperation and integration between cultural
materialism and critical political economy are very positive.

NOTES

1. Carey’s remarks addressed the split between cultural studies on the one hand,
and “abstract economistic Marxism” on the other. Carey was certainly no Marxist, but
he was an admirer of Innis. In chapter 1, I quoted Carey as crediting Innis as being
the founder of media imperialism (dependency theory). One wonders, then, why he
did not even mention Innis in his treatment of critical political economy. Had he done
so, it is likely his position would have changed significantly.
2. Nicholas Garnham, “Political Economy and Cultural Studies: Reconciliation
or Divorce?” Critical Studies in Mass Communication 12, no. 1 (1995): 62. Garnham
here is citing James McGuigan.
3. Angela McRobbie, “Post-marxism and Cultural Studies: A Post-script,” in Cul-
tural Studies, ed. L. Grossberg, C. Nelson, and P. Treichler (New York: Routledge,
1992), 719; quoted in Garnham, “Political Economy and Cultural Studies,” 62.
4. McRobbie, “Post-marxism and Cultural Studies,” 62.
5. Stuart Hall, “Cultural Studies and its Theoretical Legacies,” in Cultural Stud-
ies, ed. L. Grossberg, C. Nelson, and P. Treichler (London: Routledge, 1992), 277–94;
quoted in Garnham, “Political Economy and Cultural Studies,” 62. Hall’s position is
restated in his “Two Paradigms” article: “[Williams] is arguing against the literal op-
erations of the base/superstructure metaphor. . . . That is to say, his argument is con-
structed against a vulgar materialism and an economic determinism. He offers, in-
stead, a radical interactionism: in effect, the interaction of all practices in and with one
another, skirting the problem of determinacy.” Stuart Hall, “Cultural Studies: Two
Paradigms,” Media, Culture and Society 2 (1980): 60. Carey, too, lauded cultural
studies’ break with “abstract economistic Marxism,” but for that remark to be perti-
nent in the current context it would need to be established that inaugural political
economists specializing in media were, in fact, “abstract economistic” Marxists. See
note 1, above.
6. Theodor Adorno, “The Stars Down to Earth: The Los Angeles Times Astrology
Column” (1952–1953; reprint, The Stars Down to Earth and Other Essays on the Ir-
rational in Culture, by Theodor W. Adorno, edited with an Introduction by Stephen
Crook, New York: Routledge, 2007), 46.
7. Ben Agger, “Critical Theory, Poststructuralism, Postmodernism: Their Socio-
logical Relevance,” Annual Review of Sociology 17, 1991. www.uta.edu/huma/illu-
minations/agger2.htm (accessed June 10, 2008).
8. Lawrence Grossberg, “Cultural Studies vs. Political Economy,” Critical Stud-
ies in Mass Communication 12, no. 1 (1995): 75–76.
9. Garnham, “Political Economy and Cultural Studies,” 69.
10. Garnham, “Political Economy and Cultural Studies,” 65.