We explain what mass culture is, what its characteristics are and its relationship with globalization. Also, how was its origin.
What is mass culture?
mass culture It is the cultural perspective developed by mass society or consumer society a worldview typical of industrial capitalist society, whose main actors are the mass media and large cultural industries, which produce goods and information intended for the consumption of the greatest possible number of people. In other words: just as food industries produce tons of food, cultural and communication industries do the same with culture.
The term “mass culture” usually has a negative connotation, since it is contrasted with the traditional idea of culture, that is, with art and thought in their highest and, from a certain point of view, elitist forms, intended for a more cultured and demanding public. However, it is not correct to equate mass culture with popular culture, since the latter is carried out by people and folklore traditions, while mass culture It is eminently urban, modern and industrial.
Hence, Marxist thinkers of the 20th century identified it with the culture of the bourgeoisie and the capitalist class, and also warned that mass culture has the task of ideologically supporting the status quo of contemporary capitalist society. This is because mass culture tends to link consumption with happiness and personal fulfillment, at the same time that it is offered as just another product on the market, intended to entertain, without proposing deep questions.
The great pillars of mass culture tend to be consumption, technology and quick satisfaction of individual desires, and fulfills these tasks through the production of serial, stereotyped, repetitive cultural goods. Thus, there is a tendency to standardize products for different consumers, and to understand the media and art forms as activities with commercial purposes, that is, as industries.
See also: Consumerism
Origin of mass culture
Somehow, Mass culture is the consequence of the construction of mass society. This occurred after the fall of the Old Regime and the emergence of the bourgeoisie as the dominant social class, that is, with the advent of capitalism and the modern industrialized world. In fact, since the 19th century, the term “mass society” has been used to describe the nascent world of mass production and the emergence of the great mass media: the press, radio, television and finally Internet.
Mass society, thus, was born after the construction of a social and political model no longer focused on aristocratic values and the rural world, but on the more egalitarian model of the bourgeoisie, in which the concepts of citizen and consumer intermingle.
Characteristics of mass culture
Mass culture is characterized by the following:
- Centralizes political and economic power in the capitalist class that is, in the owners of the means of production of goods and services (factories, companies, corporations, for example).
- It makes the notions of consumer and citizen indistinguishable and in doing so builds an anonymous, homogeneous, multitudinous model of society.
- Produces cultural goods that are little differentiated from each other that is, repetitive and homogeneous, which are nevertheless consumed by large crowds.
- Promotes the urban, modern and industrial model of life and places production and commerce at the center of life.
- It is sustained by the action of the media, mass advertising and cultural industries (such as the film industry and the publishing industry, or the production of merchandising).
- Distances itself from traditional elitist culture of the aristocratic past, promoting democratization in terms of consumption. Therefore, it is a culture typical of industrial capitalism.
- It is perceived as a network of conservative ideologies by the progressive and revolutionary sectors of society.
Mass culture and globalization
Globalization is perceived by many as the triumph of mass culture on a global scale especially through the so-called ICT (Information and Communications Technologies) that have revolutionized the way of socializing, working and marketing since the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st.
This is because New technologies have allowed, among other things, a certain concentration and cultural homogenization which is perceived by different sectors as a threat and a form of acculturation, that is, the imposition of certain cultural values on others, specifically those values typical of the industrial powers of the West over those of other peoples and nations.
Seen this way, globalization would have the effect of transforming mass culture into a planetary phenomenon, which gives rise to a global culture typical of globalized capitalism in which commercial transactions and information flow freely, and the main economic and social actors are no longer States, but large financial, technological and commercial corporations.
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References
- “Mass culture” on Wikipedia.
- “Mass society” on Wikipedia.
- “Mass society, mass culture and mass communication” at the University of Murcia (Spain).
- “Mass Culture” at the National Library of Chile.
