The lecture and the seminar about Benjamin and Adorno & Horkheimer was very helpful. Through the lecture I got a much better understanding of the context, the lecture was not just about the two texts, it was also about the author’s philosophy and the environment that influenced them.
“Dialect of enlightenment” was written during World War II, in California. Adorno & Horkheimer were fascinated about the California consumer culture therefor they aimed to develop an understanding about problems in capitalist societies. They understood culture in modern society in two ways; as ideology, the need to legitimate various form of social and political action and as commercialism, art has become an object for sale. People did not rule the cultural industry anymore it was ruled by profit. What was going on with the society? The media industry had become a giant and it was a creature of capitalism. Mass production producing products that are consistent and renewable which tends to suppress any kind of creative or expressive form of art, and it liberating people from the potential of thinking. Adorno & Horkheimer were also concerned that mass production refusing diversity. They talk about the content of the whole system, how the market is interesting in one thing: money and people are shaped by this system. Adorno questioning how we can be as blind in capitalism, why are people not interesting in knowledge? They care more about being rich, having a nice house and car. He was very concerned about the social passivity.
Before the lecture I was focusing on the details of dialect of enlightenment, after I had a better perspective of the author’s philosophy. Now I understand the background and time when the work was created better, which is important for its context. At the first blog post I reflected about the work as different parts (dialect, enlightenment, myth etc.) not as an entirety, but now (as I wrote above), I have the capability to analyze Adorno & Horkheimer’s work into a perceptive of their time and thoughts. I can grasp their thinking better. The connections and differences between Adorno & Horkheimer and Benjamin’s works become much more clear. Adorno & Horkheimer refer the cultural industry as standardization of products. Capitalism makes money of what used to be culture, art become commercialized. Benjamin on the other hand claims that what’s new for art is the possibility of mechanical reproduction. When reproducing art we will miss the present in space and time, and the object loses its aura. But for Benjamin the mechanical reproduction of art also democratizes culture, it makes it available for everyone. Before it was only rich people that had access to art. Benjamin tries to inform the people where we are going in our society. Adorno & Horkheimer on the other hand have no purpose to prevent a solution, they post critic against things that did not work.
I agree with you that the lecture help, especially with the focus on the surrounding environment that influenced Benjamin and Adorno and Horkheimer. The historical context in which the texts were written of course has a major impact of the authors reasonings. Sometimes it is easy to forget that these texts were written 70-80 years ago when the society looked entirely different in comparison of today. Your reflection shows your ability to reflect on the texts as an entirety as well as the connections and differences between Benjamin and Adorno and Horkheimer. Good job!
SvaraRaderaI agree with you and the comment above that the lecture was very helpful, and made the historical context a lot clearer. You seem to have a very good grasp on this weeks theme and I agree that seeing the text as a whole, and not just separate parts is very important, and I think that was much easier after the lecture. You wrote this post very well and made some interesting points, as well as explained what you learned and what you thought very well!
SvaraRaderaHi! It's really interesting what you highlighted about the society of capitalism and that A&H was concerned about what happened to society? Why media and technology started to rule the world? Why it became more important than society itself? Reading your text made me think that the circle of myth and enlightenment (mimesis) is the same as consumerism - people gain more money, they spend more money, they start needing more and more things, they want to be rich and they become socially passive. They become subordinate to the consuming mechanism. Furthermore, I found Benjamin's idea that art can democratize society very fascinating, that's why culture was and always will be important for a strong and developed society. Thanks for a great text!
SvaraRaderaPleasure to read your blog post! You explain things very clearly. With regard to the previous comment, although society is indeed diffrenet from what it was before and during WWII, it's scary how some of Adorno and Holkheimer's observations are very much true today. Like standartization and pseudo-individualization in popular music and consumer fetishism...
SvaraRaderaI agree that putting the texts in a societal and historical context provided extra depth to the readings and added new perspectives. While Adorno and Horkheimer focused on the US capitalistic model, Benjamin focused on how fascism introduced aesthetics into political life. During the lecture another perspective was mentioned when Henrik talked about the rise of futurism in Italy and Mussolini's influences from Freud when enhancing that the ground from which the new society should be rebuilt upon was on emotions, rather than rationality. Looking back at history reminds us about the importance of not repeating the same mistakes again. Looking at news reports today, which often alludes to emotions, medias current role in society can be questioned. What about rationality?
SvaraRaderaThank you for the way you have structured your post. The historical algorithm you follow makes it so much easier to understand by using it as a starting point when analysing.
SvaraRaderaWhat your reflection made me instantly think of is how differently one reacts when feeling oppressed and when feeling "free". The example which came to my mind is again of a historical background. I come from a former communist country where the 80’s were a time of an epogey of the national cinema and film industry. It were films in its purest form of art (yet again there were some used as a propaganda for the regime but people were giving their best by avoiding so using imagination). The boundaries and limits of the regime made people be creative and come up with numerous amazing ways to express themselves while living in times of oppression and control. The nowadays democratic model, however, seems to changed people by turning them into consumers and targets for gaining profits. The ideas in the nowadays productions are dry, lacking those doses of imagination (I am focusing on my country in specific) and it is all about the action, the effects and the explicit content.I am sharing this because I felt that it is a very sad yet interesting analogy when compared to Adorno and Horkheimer’s disappointment after their encounter with the US capitalism.