Adorno and Criticism of Art - Term Paper Example

"Is Adorno being elitist when he criticises the culture industry?" It takes an elitist ‘to be an elitist’ in his or her criticism of art, culture and society. The post-renaissance period from 19th to 20th century in Europe was marked by the introduction of egalitarian values and mores, movement for the separation of the Church from the State, and creating mass awareness on the history of cultures through art, local languages and music. It was a period of re-inventing human values and enlightening the masses beyond the level of class and social differences. Most of the significant contributions towards these movements came from educated-in-elite-school-system Germans such as Schopenhauer, Martin Luther, Immanuel Kant, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Bach, Beethoven and Goethe. There was a point in time where the German elite formed the main part of the intelligentsia. “The Germans are literary people. The country is after all das Land der Dichter und Denker, the land of poets and thinkers.” (Wasser, 2006) Theodore Adorno’s position and influence on literay criticism To understand whether Theodore Adorno in his criticism of art, music and culture was guided by the moralist, egalitarian, capitalist or totalitarian stance, this paper will focus on Adorno’s biography and his contributions to the development of the culture industry as well as his critical views on music and popular culture. For the purpose of clarity and space, Adorno’s early works (1941-1941) will be used as reference to build the entire paper. a. Biography and Beliefs In 1903 in Frankfurt, Germany, Theodore Adorno opened his eyes to an affluent and educated family. Both “his mother and sister were accomplished musicians and it was from them that he received his initial training and encouragement in his life-long love for music” (Jay, 1973). His Jewish roots ultimately became the deciding factor in his philosophical writings and thoughts, especially after Hitler’s totalitarian regime and the Nazi Holocaust swept over Germany with millions of Jews persecuted under it. During this time, Adorno was forced into exile and spent the next 16 years of his life in England and the US before returning to Germany to complete his doctorate in Philosophy from Frankfurt University. b. His Writings Adorno’s position on culture and the music industry has managed to establish key influences in the domain of media studies. His ideas about these industries were critical and in some cases, pessimistic. Adorno analyses the dynamics of the culture industry in the context of ‘standardization’ underlining it as a fundamental characteristic of pop music. He quotes himself: “A clear judgment concerning the relation of serious music to popular music can be arrived at only by strict attention to the fundamental characteristic of popular music: standardization” (Adorno, 1941). Adorno utilizes the idea of ‘pseudo-individualization’ to describe its effects on the listeners. For instance, he uses two categories to establish his arguments for analysis: popular music and serious music. On popular music Adorno writes, “The whole structure of popular music is standardized, even where the attempt is made to circumvent standardization. Standardization extends from the most general features to the most specific ones. Best known is the rule that the chorus consists of thirty two bars and that the range is limited to one octave and one note. The general types of hits are also standardized: not only the dance types, the rigidity of whose pattern is understood, but also the "characters" such as mother songs, home songs, nonsense or "novelty" songs, pseudo-nursery rhymes, laments for a lost girl. Most important of all, the harmonic cornerstones of each hit — the beginning and the end of each part — must beat out the standard scheme. This scheme emphasizes the most primitive harmonic facts no matter what has harmonically intervened. Complications have no consequences. This inexorable device guarantees that regardless of what aberrations occur, the hit will lead back to the same familiar experience, and nothing fundamentally novel will be introduced” (Adorno, 1941). In comparison, this is how he critiques serious music: “Serious music, for comparative purposes, may be thus characterized: Every detail derives its musical sense from the concrete totality of the piece which, in turn, consists of the life relationship of the details and never of a mere enforcement of a musical scheme” (Adorno, 1941). To explain the characterization of serious music he uses Classical Musician Beethoven’s composition as an example. “In the introduction of the first movement of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony the second theme (in C-major) gets its true meaning only from the context. Only through the whole does it acquire its particular lyrical and expressive quality — that is, a whole built up of its very contrast with the cantus firmus-like character of the first theme. Taken in isolation the second theme would be disrobed to insignificance” (Adorno, 1941). Quoting another Beethoven composition, Adorno writes, “[it] may [also] be found in the beginning of the recapitulation over the pedal point of the first movement of Beethoven's "Appassionata". By following the preceding outburst it achieves the utmost dramatic momentum. By omitting the exposition and development and starting with this repetition, all is lost” (Adorno, 1941) Critique on Adorno’s Method From the German philosopher’s comparison and analysis of the two musical categories, the following questions arise: 1) Is Adorno’s approach towards popular music similar to that of a cynic who has not taken into account the post-colonial history and its effects on the evolution of contemporary music, particularly, after communities began migrating out of Europe to the newly discovered America? 2) Does Adorno believe popular music to be a by-product of capitalism? 3) Does Adorno’s emphasis on characterization of ‘serious music’ imply compositions of Classical Composers only? 4) If both of the above are true, is Adorno suffering from the ‘elite syndrome’ or plainly trying to revive the German classical sense of music? To address the second question first, an attempt will be made to understand Adorno’s use of ‘’standardization” for popular music. The Minnesota Admin – a business firm – defines standardization as “the process of defining and applying the conditions necessary to ensure that a given range of requirements can normally be met, with a minimum of variety, in a reproducible and economic manner based on the best current techniques” (Minnesota Admin). When compared with when Adorno laments - “standardization extends from the most general features to the most specific ones. The general types of hits are also standardized: not only the dance types, the rigidity of whose pattern is understood, but also the "characters" such as mother songs, home songs, nonsense or "novelty" songs, pseudo-nursery rhymes, laments for a lost girl” (Adorno, 1941) – it is evident that he not only is patronizing pop-culture but also inducing into the reader the banishment of appreciation for pop culture. His critique resonates more with emotion than reason, which is something to think about. Pop culture, it seems, brings out the elitist in Adorno. He resonates as an elitist who views pop culture to be a despicable commodity of the learned socialites. The popular culture, in particular, referred to by Adorno includes “film, horoscope, jazz, magazines, radio, soap operas and television serials” (Welty, 1984). Moving to answer the first question and elaborate on the second one, Welty challenges Adorno’s notion of pop culture to be a capitalist commodity. He writes: “As cultural objects become more interchangeable, each one declines in significance, lose its "aura," hence declines in monopolistic rent. Since the value of the cultural object is based on the monopolistic rent or, to a subordinate degree, on the object's utility, the value of the cultural object should decline as well. This doesn't occur under late capitalism, however” (Welty, 1984). Adorno’s Commodity Fetishism Referring to Horkheimer and Adorno’s sarcastic view on pop culture in their joint writing Dialektik der Aufklarung “what might be called use value in the reception of cultural commodities is replaced by exchange value," Welty calls it “Adorno’s and Horkheimer’s ‘commodity fetishism’. What he strongly argues about is that it is not logically possible for exchange value to gain autonomy in the sphere of cultural production unless done by means of widespread ‘fetishization’” (Welty, 1984). Furthermore, Adorno’s ‘reductionist approach’ on pop culture does not take into account the “pluralisation of culture into cultures” (Devadas, 2006) which has been paving way for contemporary art and music in the post-colonial era. He does not take into account the powerful elements of Diaspora and how they have led to create new forms of expressions in pop culture such as Jazz, Reggae, Bhangra etc. It is quite evident from the examples as well as ideas mentioned in the third question that while using the term “serious music” and describing it with poetic imagery, Adorno seems to believe that Classical Music is the only form of music that is ‘characterized’ in contrast to ‘standardised.’ Classical music to him has more depth. Although, it must also be noted that he spent 16 years of his life in England and the US – and has been one of the Germans to experience the evolution of pop culture – which is very similar in spirit to the Renaissance era of Europe. However, he seems to be deeply entrenched in the history of the Jewish experience with the Holocaust, and therefore, his obsession with Classics such as that of Beethoven. Adorno’s Flaws While critiquing J.F Lyotard essay on Adorno called “Adorno as the Devil” which is the reading of Thomas Mann’s Dr Faustaus (in which Adorno is said to be one of the faces of the Devil), Dan Webb argues in defense of Adorno that Lyotard mis-read Adorno through Dr Faustaus. He writes: “Lyotard's understanding of Adorno is flawed because he does not recognize the distinctly Jewish, albeit secularized, character of his thought” (Webb, 2009). Adorno, the master of ‘negative dialects’ gives his own verdict in Minima Moralia: Reflections from Damaged Life: “What philosophy once called life, has turned into the sphere of the private and then merely of consumption, which is dragged along as an addendum of the material production-process, without autonomy and without its own substance. Whoever wishes to experience the truth of immediate life, must investigate its alienated form, the objective powers, which determine the individual existence into its innermost recesses….The gaze at life has passed over into ideology, which conceals the fact that it no longer exists” (Adorno, 1951). Conclusion From the arguments and examples stated above, it is clear that Theodore Adorno is an elitist with a strong sense of criticism and ‘respectable dislike’ for the pop-culture. He served as the music director for the Radio Project in his US days and taught musicology when he went back to Germany. His final years were marked with entry into German politics underlying his vision for ‘political utopianism’ of history which dominates in his works such as Aesthetic Theory, Philosophy of New Music. Nevertheless, he has been an influential figure in history. ENDS Reference List 1. Wasser, Jeremy (2006), Spätzle Westerns, Retrieved from: http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,410135,00.html 2.  Jay, Martin (1973), The Dialectical Imagination (Boston: Little, Brown, 1973), p. 22 Retrieved from: http://www.moyak.com/papers/adorno-schoenberg-atonality.html#N_1_ 3. Adorno, W.,Theodor (1941), On popular music, Retrieved from: http://www.icce.rug.nl/~soundscapes/DATABASES/SWA/On_popular_music_1.shtml 4. Devadas, Vijay (2006), Postcolonial Contradictions, Ambiguities and Interventions. Retrieved from: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_6981/is_3_5/ai_n28457799/ 5. Welty, Gordon (1984), Theodore Adorno and the Culture Industry, Retrieved from: http://www.wright.edu/~gordon.welty/Adorno_84.htm 6. Admin Minnesota, Glossary of Common Terms: http://www.mmd.admin.state.mn.us/mn06008.htm 7. Adorno, W., Theodor (1951) Minima Moralia (Suhrkamp Verlag, 1951), p.15. 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