Blog 2: Adorno and Horkheimer

First of all, I'd just like to say that I don't agree with Adorno and Horkheimer's article. They view capitalism as a bad thing, which it isn't, it's not perfect but it is better than the alternative. The alternative being Adorno and Horkheimer's marxist views. The two theorists do make sensible points however, that culture has become subject to market forces with the affects of advertisment, film etc. on mass produced products; the corporations manipulating the consumer for its own gain. Another point made is that of high culture (the arts and music) that has been hijacked by the capitalist movement, allowing modern trends to takeover. There may be some truth in this idea perhaps back when this article was written, but societies change over time and the culture of 50/60 years ago is different from today, what was perceived as high culture then may not be now and the reverse can also be said. Take these two images for example:

                     


The one on the left is Starry Night (1889) by Vincent Van Gogh. On the right shows a girl searching a soldier by graffiti artist Bansky (2007).

Many would perceive Van Gogh's paintings as high culture, after well over a century his work is still viewed as high culture. The work of Bansky and other graffiti artists is more recent and perhaps classed as low culture. However Van Gogh has become more mainstream and is a part of mass culture today, practically everyone has heard of Van Gogh and Starry Night; its even entered popular culture and is the basis of the Don McLean song 'Starry, Starry Night', while Bansky is highly rated as an artist for his art but also what his art expresses. Many graffiti artists, like Bansky, have successfully had their art enter galleries alongside the works of such artists as Van Gogh.
This is why I think Adorno and Horkheimer's thoughts are inaccurate when describing culture; they believe mass culture to be wrong and false, but I think that mass culture will benefit society and enrich both high and low culture, and maybe even allow both groups to cross like in the images shown above.
Also, the idea that Adorno and Horkheimer believe that:

"Movies and radio need no longer pretend to be art",

is not true in my opinion. I don't think that movies and radio have ever pretended to be art, they are forms of art. They express an idealogy that allows people to form their own views and opinion which they can also express through various types of media, especially today with the invention of the internet and YouTube.

Adorno and Horkheimer's views that 'culture has been industrialised' isn't entirely wrong; the industrial revolution has drastically changed the world and spawned capitalism, but why should that be a bad thing? I feel that it only heightens the ways in which people can express their ideas, their beliefs through various forms of media that were not around prior to the industrial revolution such as radio, television, film and the internet. This, I believe, intensifies and fuels the hunger people have to learn more about their society and the world they live in and to spread culture to the masses. 

Blog 1: The Analysis Of Culture

Raymond Williams evaluates culture into three categories; the ideal, the documentary and the social. I feel that culture cannot be merely summarised into these three groups, but there is definitely some valuable infomation we can extrapolate from the text. The 'ideal'; that culture is a process of human perfection is something that I do not entirely agree with, yet society is constantly trying to better itself and evolve, by learning new values and new cultures society can try to accomplish this human perfection. At the same time however, if society ever reaches this human perfection, will people cease to learn more, to learn more cultures and therefore grow as a culture?

I don't think of it as human perfection but more like human evolution.

The 'documentary' explores the history and past records of culture, yet I think that this is largely irrelevant, as the culture of 20 years ago is very different from today, you cannot learn of a person's culture from a book unless you have experienced it yourself. The 'social' deals with the interests and beliefs of society rather than the bodies of work, which is more of a by-product. I agree that to understand culture you should try to relate the three groups together, but even then, you may disagree with these ideas or not believe they have anything to do with your culture; your thoughts and feelings. I feel that culture cannot be defined by these groups either alone or together, but by your own experiences and of the experiences of the people around you.