Author(s)

Kong Xincao ¹

Affiliation(s)

¹ Shandong Normal University, Jinan, China

Corresponding Author

Kong Xincao

ABSTRACT

True art possesses creativity and individuality, yet the cultural industry system established in capitalist societies transforms art into pure commodities, incorporating it into the process of commodity exchange. Exchange value supersedes use value, and the economic benefits of cultural products overshadow their social benefits. Through the deliberate standardization and selection of cultural products delivered to the masses, what the public perceives as leisure and free time also becomes part of a mechanized operation. These commodities have become new tools for interest groups to covertly dominate and imprison human thought. Under the worship of technical rationality, the slogans of enlightenment have turned into ignorance itself. Adorno pioneered the critique of the cultural industry, initiating a comprehensive and all-encompassing critique of mass culture with a unique theoretical perspective and sense of inquiry.

KEYWORDS

Mass Culture Critique Theory; Frankfurt School; Cultural Industry

CITE THIS PAPER

Kong Xincao, Alienation, Commodification, and Ideologization: The Convergence: Mass Culture as the "Social Cement". Journal of Sociology and Ethnology (2023) Vol. 5: 99-105. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.23977/jsoce.2023.051014.

REFERENCES

[1] Horkheimer, M., & Adorno, T. W. (2006). Dialectic of enlightenment (J. Qu & W. Cao, Trans.). Shanghai: The Commercial Press. (Original work published 1944).
[2] Jay, M. (1996). The history of the Frankfurt School (S. Shan, Trans.). Guangzhou: Guangdong People's Publishing House. (Original work published 1973).
[3] Marcuse, H. (1989). One-dimensional man: Studies in the ideology of advanced industrial society (X. Li et al., Trans.). Shanghai: SDX Joint Publishing Company. (Original work published 1964).
[4] Xie, Z. (2005). Analysis of Adorno's critical thinking of culture industry. Journal of Xiangtan University (Philosophy and Social Sciences), (2).
[5] Adorno, T. W. (1993). Negative dialectics (F. Zhang, Trans.). Chongqing: Chongqing Publishing House. (Original work published 1966).

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