Theme 2: Critical Media Studies

• What is Enlightenment?

Enlightenment is an attempt to remove mythology and religion as a way of explaining the world, and rather focus on science and “real truths”. It is supposed to incite a mastery over nature through knowledge and dispel the fear of that which is unknown.

But according to to Adorno and Horkheimer the Enlightenment is in its essence itself a myth. For most people science is just something we are told to believe in by people that actually do the science. Science isn’t necessarily true, and science still doesn’t explain every part of the world to us. Therefore science itself can be considered to be a myth which makes the Enlightenment a myth.

• What is the meaning and function of “myth” in Adorno and Horkheimer’s argument?

Myth is a thing which the Enlightenment strives to remove, as said above. A myth is an attempt, just as the Enlightenment, to explain the world, but the myth instead makes use of deception to explain, it does not speak of the real truths or use definite knowledge.

But, according to Adorno and Horkheimer, the myths which the Enlightenment sought to remove were actually themselves products of the Enlightenment. The function of a myth is to report, to name, to tell of origins, and it does this by the means of narrating, recording and explaining, and therefore the goals doesn’t differ much from the Enlightenments. The real difference lies in that the magic and the spirits and the demons have been replaced but what science deems to be facts, rituals become experiments.

• What are the “old” and “new” media that are discussed in the Dialectic of Enlightenment?

I cannot find if Adorno and Horkheimer actually mention anything being specifically “old” or “new” media, but my interpretation is that the authors imply a difference in the way that the media is being used. Radio and TV (which was literally new back then) can be consider new media and I believe Adorno and Horkgeimer imply they strive for mass production, quantity and standardization, where there is a smaller consideration to whether or not the material produced is good as long as it reaches out to a big crowd. Older media had a focus on quality, it was the creation of art, and it could not be mass produced in the same way.  

• What is meant by “culture industry”? What is the relationship between mass media and “mass deception”, according to Adorno and Horkheimer?

 With the “new” media’s mass production of material, the production of culture becomes more of an industry. The focus turns to commercialism and the reaching a wide public, and it is controlled only by a few individuals. Adorno and Horkheimer comment on the problems that lie therein. The mass media could easily be used to manipulate the consumers. The people running the industry can themselves decide what culture should be, and culture can therefore also be altered to fit the standardization that comes with mass production, which in turn allows for an even greater spread of media and an even greater control over it. The consequences may be that culture suffers, becomes simplified and even dumbed down.

There is a pretty simple connection between mass media and mass deception. The former can be used to create the latter, as stated above. When there is a mass production of media and the media reaches the wide public, the producers gain a great power when deciding what kind of culture and which influences the general population should be exposed to.

• Please identify one or two concepts/terms that you find particularly interesting. Motivate your choice.

Personally I think it could be very interesting to view the concepts of culture industry and mass media, that Adorno and Horkheimer presented, but in our day and age. Today the mass media is even more widespread and information move even faster, but one big difference might be that the sources of information can be practically anyone. Today anyone can spread their art – in whatever form it might come - globally by just the push of a button. The big question then may be: have we moved even further away from “old” media and managed to mass produce even art, or have the mass media perhaps advanced and transformed into a place where the “old” media can be a part of the new?