Page 125 - Decoding Culture

118 D E C O D I N G C U L TURE

features of structuralist thought, all notable because they stand in
stark contrast to key presuppositions of culturalism. These three
virtues, in Hall's account of them, are: first, a renewed emphasis on
the importance of conceptualizing determinate conditions in cul­
tural analysis; secondly, a recognition of the inevitability of
abstraction in revealing otherwise concealed relationships and
structures, thus allowing specific practices to be understood in the
context of the larger 'totality'; and lastly, the 'decentering of expe­
rience' and consequent theorizing of it as a product of ideology.
The significance of these features to Hall and to the CCCS' devel­
oping position lies in their potential for 'correcting' perceived
limitations in the culturalist paradigm.
First, culturalism can fall all too easily into what Hall describes
as 'na"ive humanism', overstating the freedom of agency and con­
sciousness and thereby neglecting 'the fact that, in capitalist
relations, men and women are placed and positioned in relations
which constitute them as agents' (ibid: 67) . Secondly, culturalism is
also prone to resist abstraction, failing to recognize the necessity
for a methodology of analysis that permits understanding across
and between different levels of abstraction. Without such a method
and a concomitant conception of the complex totality of human
relations, culturalism is incapable of properly grasping the charac­
ter of specific social practices in their larger context. Thirdly,
although the concept of ideology does feature in the work of the
culturalist tradition, their central concern with the category of
experience 'imposes a barrier between culturalism and a proper
conception of "ideology'" (ibid: 69) . So, in all three areas, struc­
turalist thought can provide a significant corrective to the inherent
limitations of culturalism.
This is not just a straightforward task of synthesis, however,
and Hall is careful to suggest that neither paradigm as presently
constituted would provide adequate conceptual foundations for

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