Summary of two articles - Essay Example

The authors note the fact that what has in fact happened under the modern construct of cultural development is a mass standardization. Whereas before no unifying cultural interpretation existed, a false construct has been born out of this void and integrates with the individual on nearly every level of daily life. Moreover, this “false” form of culture, as the authors describes it, was originally born out of the supposed needs of the consumer (Horkheimer 1972). Such a process in and of itself is not inherently bad; however, the fact of the matter was that in order for the “needs” of the consumer to be met, a type of stereotypicalization and least common denominator had to be found.

It is this process of the false culture seeking to find the least common denominator that the author’s claim is the greatest single reason why our current cultural interpretation is so misinformed, warped, and non-indicative of what would otherwise likely naturally exist in its place. The second article which will herein be reviewed is entitled, “Cultural Consumption as Manipulation”. This article deals with the more sinister ways in which the false ideas of culture that continue to be manifest to the individual are in fact highly developed tools which can affect a number of ulterior goals upon the consumer.

As has been noted in the analysis, governments and corporations can both make ample use of culture as a platform to affect the given needs that they feel would best benefit their own particular interests in a given matter. As a means of discussing such a research interest, the authors break the ultimate question down into an analysis of both contemporary and past cultural historians and the means by which they have understood the unique paradigm that has grown and currently manifests itself within the global system of cultural interpretation.

By analyzing both past representations as well as current realities of cultural conveyance, the authors seek to draw a level of inference upon the way that individuals embrace, identify with, and ultimately create a false reality within the constructs of the cultural material they are being fed on a daily basis. In short, what the authors present is something of a self fulfilling prophecy that takes place regardless of the particular cultural paradigm that is being studied. For instance, if one is met with the understanding and eventuality that what they are seeing, hearing, and otherwise experiencing is in fact a type of cultural reality, they are all the more likely to reflect this understanding back to the media and to the culture by closely mirroring the behavior that has been learned.

In this way types of socio-cultural and psychological factors of mimicry and mirroring of what has been integrated into the mind of the collective consciousness is in fact what drives the interpretation and derivation of culture within the context of the given article’s point of view. Although this view is perhaps more cynical of the two articles that have been reviewed within this short analysis, the fact of the matter is that there is no clear divorce between culture, perception, and its exhibition within reality.

Although the method by which this information is presented to the reader is disquieting, due in large part to the fact that the reader beings to see and understand the level of mirroring that takes place within the current system and within his/her