A Theory of Mass Culture Western Culture • High Culture • chronicled in the textbooks • Mass Culture • manufactured wholesale for the market The Nature of Mass Culture Historical Reasons for the Growth of Mass Culture • Political democracy and popular education • Business empires found a profitable market • Advance of technology made cheap production possible • Modern technology created new media (movies and TV) Kitsch: German term for Mass Culture • draws on its own past and evolves far away from High Culture as to appear quite disconnected from it • fabricated by technicians hired by business • audiences are passive consumers • participation limited to the choice between buying and not buying • exploits the cultural needs of the masses in order to make a profit and/or to maintain theur class rule Gresham's Law in Culture • bad stuff drives out the good, since it is more easily understood and enjoyed • Good art competes with kitsch • going to the movies or to a concert • reading Tolstoy or a detective story • looking at old masters or at a TV show Why? How? • facility of access makes kitsch sell and prevents it from achieving quality What does kitsch do to High Culture? • threatens high culture by its sheer pervasiveness, its brutal, overwhelming quantity Homogenized Culture • Mass culture is a dynamic, revolutionary force, breaking down the old barriers of class, tradition, taste, and dissolving all cultural distinctions. • It scrambles everything together, producing a homogenized culture. • It is very democratic. It refuses to discriminate against, or between, anything or anybody. Academicism and Avantgardism Academicism • an attempt to compete by imitation • imitating High Culture by manufacturing cheaper cultural goods for the masses • Examples: • painters, composers, and poets/writers imitating the great artists Avantgardism • withdrawal from competition • encouraged rebellion or experiment in either art or politics Example: Life Magazine • It appears on the mahogany library tables of the rich, the glass end-tables of the middleclass, and the oilcloth-covered kitchen tables of the poor. Opinions. Do you agree or disagree? Why? You may give examples to concretize your claim/s. • 1. Some scholars say that popular culture is a weapon of consumerism because if "forces people to buy a particular product /avail of a certain service just because it is popular or trendy. People buy because they want to become part of a group and be considered "in" Opinions. Do you agree or disagree? Why? You may give examples to concretize your claim/s. • 2. A homogenized culture as a result of popular culture is a danger to individualism. Popular culture has a tendency to unite people together and create a shared set of values and beliefs; therefore, by doing so, people lose their sense of individuality because they become like the others -they become homogenized.
