The Frankfurt School Date:2011/11/21
The Frankfurt School • The Frankfurt School is the name given to a group of German intellectual associated with the Institute for Social Research at the University of Frankfurt. The Institute was established in 1923. Following the coming power of Hitler in 1933, it moved to New York, attaching itself to the University of Columbia. In 1949 it moved back to Germany. The Institute’s work on popular culture is mostly associated with the writings of Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Max Horkheimer, Leo Lowenthal and Herbert Marcuse.
Against the culture industry: • The culture industry discourages the “masses” from thinking beyond the confines of the present. • The culture industry, in its search for profits and cultural homogeneity, deprives “authentic” culture of its critical function, its mode of negation. Commodification devalues “authentic” culture, making it too accessible by turning it into yet another saleable commodity.
“Culture” and “mass culture” according to the Frankfurt School Culture
Mass culture
Real
False
European
American
Multi-dimensional
One-dimensional
Active consumption
Passive consumption
Individual creation
Mass production
Imagination
Distraction
Negation
Social cement
The culture and civilization vs. the Frankfurt School • They condemn the same things, but for different reasons. The “culture and civilization” tradition attacks mass culture because it threatens cultural standards and social authority. The Frankfurt School attacks mass culture because it threatens cultural standards and depoliticizes the working class, and thus maintains the iron grip of social authority. • Arnold and Leavis see “anarchy”, but the Frankfurt School see “conformity.” • Source: Cultural Theory and Popular Culture pp. 85-94