In class we talked about ideology and how it becomes ‘natural’ and without question. In class I saw a few people chewing gum. I didn’t even question it, then it reminded me of a story when Dr. Casey was talking about punishment in school when he was a kid. My parents never chew gum and I never thought too question why. My mom told me a story about when she was in grammar school she got in trouble for chewing gum and had to go up to the chalk board, and had to stick her gum on the board in the middle of a traced out circle and had to put her nose on it until she was sent back to her seat. There are a drew generational and ideological differences going on in this story. One, chewing gum is a punishable offense. Two, the degree and means of punishment is wildly different than it is today. And three, they had chalk boards, not a dry erase boards or powerpoints.
In the same way as we see the unacceptable and flawed ideologies of past generations, those same generations are frowning on ours. We talked about sub cultures and dress in class. Although we see subcultural Marylin Mansons as deviant, some of the things that we say and the way we dress are deviant to the past generations as well. The best example I can think of is theme parties. I view theme parties in the way I view Halloween – it’s an excuse to dress up as something else and it’s fun playing that different role. The traditional witch, for example, has transformed to a large pointy hat, long gown and black lipstick to a skin tight, thigh high dress and ruby red lipstick. It’s almost like you have to set the label ‘witch’ to let others know what you are. A generation ago this would have been completely avant-garde for a theme party, but in today’s day and age, it’s merely ideological.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Happy Birthday!, 3/22/09
Today in class we discussed why society does not question simple tasks and habits in our life; instead these habits/acts are deemed as “natural”. The question is, how did we learn to live naturally? I believe we all have different hobbies, habits, rituals, and certain qualms about us that explain where we are from and how we were raised not only by our parents but by the society surrounding us. For example, my friend from England cannot stand the fact that I say “yall”…in his culture they say “you all”. It’s not that I chose to say yall because I thought it sounded cool, it’s simply the way I learned language from my parents and society around me.
“Those who are in ideology believe themselves by definition outside of ideology”. (48)
Althusser is making another great point with this quote, that also helps explain my example above. We are ALL from and submerged into different ideologies… whether one is born out in the country on a farm or in NY city, chances are they will be saturated with a unique ideology that was formed based on who they surrounded themselves with and what’s natural in their society. If for some reason no one abided by a type of ideology…our world would be completely different. It would be full of chaos, there would be no order, probably no class structure—things would be more stressful and hectic.
“Those who are in ideology believe themselves by definition outside of ideology”. (48)
Althusser is making another great point with this quote, that also helps explain my example above. We are ALL from and submerged into different ideologies… whether one is born out in the country on a farm or in NY city, chances are they will be saturated with a unique ideology that was formed based on who they surrounded themselves with and what’s natural in their society. If for some reason no one abided by a type of ideology…our world would be completely different. It would be full of chaos, there would be no order, probably no class structure—things would be more stressful and hectic.
000ooo000ooo Horkheimer and Adorno
My thought first thought upon reading "The Culture Industry" was that it could have been greatly reduced in length. The authors have just a few major points that they draw out for much longer than needed. This is a common practice in academia, where the culture tells us that longer pieces must be more in-depth and therefor better. Keeping in line with the culture, Horkheimer and Adorno make their piece nearly 30 pages. This just goes to show how deeply culture runs in us when a critique of culture still falls into its parameters.
One quote that I found particularly compelling can be found on the bottom of page 47 and onto page 48: "The great artists were never those whose works embodied style in its least fractured, most perfect form but those who adopted style as a rigor to set against the chaotic expression of suffering, as a negative truth. In the style of these works expression took on the strength without which existence is dissipated unheard. Even works which are called classical, like the music of Mozart, contain objective tendencies which resist the style they incarnate. Up to Schonberg and Picasso, great artists have been mistrustful of style, which at decisive points has guided them less than the logic of the subject matter."
I can tell that this quote is getting at one of the most important points in the piece - change and how it comes about. However, I am not sure I fully understand what is being suggested. I have two interpretations.
First, the authors could be saying that the culture industry makes it difficult for anything truly "new" to come about. This idea is reminiscent of Habermas. Culture is quick to label anything "new" and challenging as wrong, immoral, risky, etc. To break through this it takes the work of a genius like Mozart, Picasso, or Schonberg. These men were able to create something that was both new and aesthetically pleasing enough to break through the culture industry. This would be a significant point because the authors then go on to explain how new media forms attempt to dull the differences between different media and create a sort of "unified" media whose main goal is to stop people from thinking too much, greatly reducing the chances of someone coming up with the next industry breaking genre or artwork.
Another way I interpreted this was that in order to break through the culture industry one must "incarnate" a style, yet include subtle "objective tendencies which resist the style they incarnate". In other words, you can't come up with something that is entirely avant-garde because then it will either be labeled as such (and once its avant garde it fits comfortable into a cultural mode for this style) or it will be entirely rejected by people because it feels so unnatural.
One quote that I found particularly compelling can be found on the bottom of page 47 and onto page 48: "The great artists were never those whose works embodied style in its least fractured, most perfect form but those who adopted style as a rigor to set against the chaotic expression of suffering, as a negative truth. In the style of these works expression took on the strength without which existence is dissipated unheard. Even works which are called classical, like the music of Mozart, contain objective tendencies which resist the style they incarnate. Up to Schonberg and Picasso, great artists have been mistrustful of style, which at decisive points has guided them less than the logic of the subject matter."
I can tell that this quote is getting at one of the most important points in the piece - change and how it comes about. However, I am not sure I fully understand what is being suggested. I have two interpretations.
First, the authors could be saying that the culture industry makes it difficult for anything truly "new" to come about. This idea is reminiscent of Habermas. Culture is quick to label anything "new" and challenging as wrong, immoral, risky, etc. To break through this it takes the work of a genius like Mozart, Picasso, or Schonberg. These men were able to create something that was both new and aesthetically pleasing enough to break through the culture industry. This would be a significant point because the authors then go on to explain how new media forms attempt to dull the differences between different media and create a sort of "unified" media whose main goal is to stop people from thinking too much, greatly reducing the chances of someone coming up with the next industry breaking genre or artwork.
Another way I interpreted this was that in order to break through the culture industry one must "incarnate" a style, yet include subtle "objective tendencies which resist the style they incarnate". In other words, you can't come up with something that is entirely avant-garde because then it will either be labeled as such (and once its avant garde it fits comfortable into a cultural mode for this style) or it will be entirely rejected by people because it feels so unnatural.
coolbeans, 3/22
In Thursdays class, we discussed how everyone is a follower of an ideology. The more I thought about this, the more I realized that this is true. It is true that those who are a part of a subculture follow an ideology also even though it is not the hegemonic ideology. They are still subscribing to a set of different beliefs. But one might ask then, “what about those who do not believe in anything?” Well even those people are conforming to the ideology of not believing in anything. Everyone is a follower of ideology in a way because everyone believes in something and most likely there are other people who also believe in the same things. This is similar to Lyotard’s view that postmodernism causes the disappearance of the avant-garde. A subculture is seen as avant-garde until it becomes another social group for people to join. An ideology is seen as unique until other people start to follow the same ideology and then it becomes a part of the mainstream. When it becomes a part of the mainstream people forget the meaning behind the reason why people did what they did and instead they just do things because that is what people associate the culture with. For example, people who were considered to be followers of the “punk rock” subculture originally dressed the way that they dressed and did their hair the way that they did their hair in order to make a statement of rebellion against the establishment. They did it as a political message. These days it seems that the whole message of “punk rock” has been commodified and it has become a social group to subscribe to. Television shows, music videos, and movies about high school commodify the different social groups, telling people how they should act and what they should dress like to be in a particular social group. For example, through these media outlets athletes are told that they need shove smart kids into lockers and wear Abercrombie and Fitch, people who follow the subculture known as “gothic” are told that they must wear black and be angry at the world, and the smart kids are told that they must be powerless and have a poor sense of clothing coordination. The different subcultures have been commodified and people lose their originality by trying to conform to what media tells us these people should be like.
WoolyBully7, 3/22
In Thursday’s class we did not get to the closing slides of the Hebdige powerpoint of all the different kinds of body art which I think we should have. I just thought of that because of an experience I had on Saturday. I was in a Five Guys restaurant having lunch and while I was eating I saw this girl walk in and everyone else dining there looked at her. It was probably because this high-school aged girl had a huge black Mohawk over a foot in height. I had thought to myself how ironic that was considering our class all about subcultures from Thursday. People were looking more at her hair than the picture of Ozzy Osbourne biting the head off of a bat on her black t-shirt.
Our class on postmodernism has showed us what our era or generation is really about, individuality, imagination and expression. The Mohawk was once considered original but now it considered by many to be cliché and very mainstream. This hairstyle is so “mass-produced” so that it doesn’t represent its founding subculture, of Native-Americans, but now is represented in a variety of subcultures such as rock/punk music, extreme sports, anarchists, wrestling, expressive arts and many more.
Volosinov argues that sign is the arena of the class struggle. Is a Mohawk a sign in that sense? Since none of the subcultures previously mentioned are associated with a certain class, I don’t think the Mohawk is a sign of the arena of class struggle. I think the Mercedes-Benz vs. GM example does a better job at that. If anything, the Mohawk represents youthful generations as compared to socioeconomic class.
Our class on postmodernism has showed us what our era or generation is really about, individuality, imagination and expression. The Mohawk was once considered original but now it considered by many to be cliché and very mainstream. This hairstyle is so “mass-produced” so that it doesn’t represent its founding subculture, of Native-Americans, but now is represented in a variety of subcultures such as rock/punk music, extreme sports, anarchists, wrestling, expressive arts and many more.
Volosinov argues that sign is the arena of the class struggle. Is a Mohawk a sign in that sense? Since none of the subcultures previously mentioned are associated with a certain class, I don’t think the Mohawk is a sign of the arena of class struggle. I think the Mercedes-Benz vs. GM example does a better job at that. If anything, the Mohawk represents youthful generations as compared to socioeconomic class.
Super!Geek, 3/22, Post-Class, Ideology
Ideology seemed to be the featured theme of the week, and it definitely made for interesting discussion. In CMC 100, I'm pretty sure most of us encountered Althusser and the idea of RSAs and ISAs, but gave a deeper weight and meaning to the ideas. For the most part, we function is a society dominated largely by ISAs, but I was a little disappointed as to how easily we discarded the relevance of RSAs role in some American's lives. I think for those outside the hegemonic population, RSAs can play a very visible role in a minority community. Take into account the percentage of Blacks within the prison population. 1 in 8 black men will likely see jail/prison time within their life, as opposed to the 1 in 100 for white men. A large percentage of those individuals will see jail time for drug related offenses, like heroin and crack abuse. These particular drugs hold heavy time, yet possession of the same amount of prescription narcotics or cocaine hold a much more lenient punishment. Even the possession of meth holds a slight lesser sentence. To put it plainly, drugs that are considered to be consumed largely by African-Americans hold a heavier sentence than those considered to be used by mostly whites. In that alone, a clear repressive state apparatus can be observed, but there is other observable oppression as well, via treatment by the police, etc. INTERSESSION 2009 ARTS AND SCIENCES SCHEDULE OF COURSES Such experiences should not be so easily discredited as issues of the past. Though the Rodney King case only occurred 17 years ago, the case Timothy Stansbury, Jr. only occurred less than five years ago. We need to continue to be cognizant of all apparatuses that influence our lives, so not to let an ideological state devolve into a more repressive one.
In a further, mildly off-topic point, I think I might have had that fabled "aha" moment Dr. Rog spoke of at the beginning of the semester. I went to see a film called Knowing this weekend (believe me it was against my will; and spoilers are about to be posted so look away if you must). It was a pretty horrid film, which I was expecting, but one of the final scenes features the destruction of earth, and I remember watching it thinking, "This is miserable! Zizek would have a field day with this film!" I then spent the remaining period of the film imagining what Zizek, and then Benjamin popped into my head, and I kept thinking about how perverse it is that we receive such pleasure from our own aesthetic destruction. It was both a horrifying and exciting moment, mainly because I realized any hopes of being a passive media consumer have pretty much been chucked. Needless to say, I've been unable to force myself to watch the telly since.
It's Better Not Knowing!
In a further, mildly off-topic point, I think I might have had that fabled "aha" moment Dr. Rog spoke of at the beginning of the semester. I went to see a film called Knowing this weekend (believe me it was against my will; and spoilers are about to be posted so look away if you must). It was a pretty horrid film, which I was expecting, but one of the final scenes features the destruction of earth, and I remember watching it thinking, "This is miserable! Zizek would have a field day with this film!" I then spent the remaining period of the film imagining what Zizek, and then Benjamin popped into my head, and I kept thinking about how perverse it is that we receive such pleasure from our own aesthetic destruction. It was both a horrifying and exciting moment, mainly because I realized any hopes of being a passive media consumer have pretty much been chucked. Needless to say, I've been unable to force myself to watch the telly since.
It's Better Not Knowing!
Weezy27/3-22
During class this passed week we talked a lot about different ideologies in today’s society. One quote really stood out to me by Louis Althusser: “Those who are in ideology believe themselves by definition outside ideology.” I thought this quote was interesting because it is so true. For example, we see people everyday that dye their hair a crazy color and wear outrageous clothing because they want to “step out of the norm.” Those people may be stepping outside of what they think is considered normal, yet they are walking right into another ideology consumed with people attempting to stray away from the normal. This concept brought me back to Benjamin’s idea of authenticity. If everyone is consumed in these different ideologies, is anything considered original or individual?
Along with Althusser we also talked a lot about Karl Marx. Marx spoke about the power of the ruling class. While discussing Marx’s ideas we talked about division within society. We said that societies can be divided under different labels; however, in times of destruction or even competition those divisions can come together as one. The example given in class was that in the United States there are Democrats and Republicans; however during 9/11 we all came together as Americans.
In today’s society we are controlled by different ideologies as well as the power of the ruling class. We make the majority of our decisions based on these ideologies and in the same token these ideologies control our decisions.
Along with Althusser we also talked a lot about Karl Marx. Marx spoke about the power of the ruling class. While discussing Marx’s ideas we talked about division within society. We said that societies can be divided under different labels; however, in times of destruction or even competition those divisions can come together as one. The example given in class was that in the United States there are Democrats and Republicans; however during 9/11 we all came together as Americans.
In today’s society we are controlled by different ideologies as well as the power of the ruling class. We make the majority of our decisions based on these ideologies and in the same token these ideologies control our decisions.
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