The Culture Industry: Selected Essays on Mass Culture by Theodor W. Adorno

Author:Theodor W. Adorno
Format: epub
Tags: Education, Politics & IR, Sociology & Social Policy
ISBN: 0-203-99606-2
Publisher: ROUTLEDGE

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CULTURE AND ADMINISTRATION

Whoever speaks of culture speaks of administration as well, whether this is his intention or not. The combination of so many things lacking a common denominator – such as philosophy and religion, science and art, forms of conduct and mores – and finally the inclusion of the objective spirit of an age in the single word ‘culture’ betrays from the outset the administrative view, the task of which, looking down from on high, is to assemble, distribute, evaluate and organize. The word culture itself, in its specific use, is scarcely older than Kant, and its beloved adversary, civilization, did not establish itself – at least in Germany – until the nineteenth century; it was then elevated to the level of a slogan by Spengler. In any case, the present-day proximity of the concepts ‘culture’ and ‘administration’ is easily detected within the practices of language, which in radio broadcasting attach the title ‘The Cultural World’ to a province where everything possible is encountered, in so far as it corresponds to a more or less precise idea of niveau and cultivation – in contrast to the sphere of entertainment – that province of administration, in other words, which is reserved for a spirit which is not spirit at all, but rather a service to listeners, devoted to light music along with its literary and dramatic pendants.

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