The following passage is from Media and Cultural Studies:
"[Antonio Gramsci] proposed developing a critique of [hegemonic] institutions and the ideologies that legitimate them, accompanied by development of counterinstitutions and ideas that would produce alternatives to the existing systems."
To me, this is a philosophy that could not be truer to CMC. Being a critical media and cultural studies student/scholar has two equally important parts. The first is the critique, just as Gramsci says. Taking the time to research and properly analysis a system of power or an institution is easier said than done, but being able to look critically at the world around us becomes more and more important every day. As college students, those of us with the privilege to have access to an education that gives us the tools to better understand culture, it is our responsibility to hold hegemony responsible and speak truth to power. But institutions don't gain control out of nowhere, there are, as the book says, ideologies that give them this power. Being able to make the connection of how things are and why is equal parts important as the identification of the system.
The second part of the quote, the part that doesn't always get as much time in a classroom discussion, is the section that talks about taking action. We can sit around a table all day and talk about where the world needs to improve, but without formulating a plan and proposing new solutions, all our research is in vain. Developing alternatives, as the book words it, is a call to action that we can't ignore if we really stand by the ideals we're developing academically. A critical perspective is only half the battle towards change.
Though time has passed since Gramsci was writing, his idea of structuring critiques and what to look for is still relevant. Many of the institutions he called out, such as the press, the church, schools, and other large scale associations and groups are still hegemonic in today's society. His critical writing about these systems in his time are still applicable to the same systems today.
"[Antonio Gramsci] proposed developing a critique of [hegemonic] institutions and the ideologies that legitimate them, accompanied by development of counterinstitutions and ideas that would produce alternatives to the existing systems."
To me, this is a philosophy that could not be truer to CMC. Being a critical media and cultural studies student/scholar has two equally important parts. The first is the critique, just as Gramsci says. Taking the time to research and properly analysis a system of power or an institution is easier said than done, but being able to look critically at the world around us becomes more and more important every day. As college students, those of us with the privilege to have access to an education that gives us the tools to better understand culture, it is our responsibility to hold hegemony responsible and speak truth to power. But institutions don't gain control out of nowhere, there are, as the book says, ideologies that give them this power. Being able to make the connection of how things are and why is equal parts important as the identification of the system.
The second part of the quote, the part that doesn't always get as much time in a classroom discussion, is the section that talks about taking action. We can sit around a table all day and talk about where the world needs to improve, but without formulating a plan and proposing new solutions, all our research is in vain. Developing alternatives, as the book words it, is a call to action that we can't ignore if we really stand by the ideals we're developing academically. A critical perspective is only half the battle towards change.
Though time has passed since Gramsci was writing, his idea of structuring critiques and what to look for is still relevant. Many of the institutions he called out, such as the press, the church, schools, and other large scale associations and groups are still hegemonic in today's society. His critical writing about these systems in his time are still applicable to the same systems today.
ReplyDelete(Pre-Class Blog, Benjamin)
Your ideas on this quote and how it relates to our major were validating to read as a CMC student. It made me realize that the work we are doing is part of a branch of study/theory that was put into motion generations ago. Reading this quote was originally hard for me to understand, but the way you broke it down into two parts—1) academic discourse, and 2) the action that we are inspired to take as CMC students—helped me to interpret it.
After reading the introduction to the first chapter of Media and Cultural Studies Keyworks and "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” by Walter Benjamin, I think that Benjamin would agree with this quote. He would have supported Gramsci's critique because he believes in questioning any popular ideology that is not fostering of social change. Benjamin studied film in addition to other mediums, and he “wished to promote a radical cultural and media politics concerned with the development of alternative oppositional cultures” (Durham & Kellner, 28).
Benjamin was not interested in the glamor of Hollywood, although he predicted that the national influence and resulting boom of money behind Hollywood would occur. He writes about an actor becoming nervous behind the camera because of “the artificial build-up of the ‘personality’ outside the studio. The cult of the movie star, fostered by the money of the film industry, preserves not the unique aura of the person but the ‘spell of the personality,’ the phony spell of a commodity” (Benjamin, 43). Benjamin was not interested in commodity. Alternatively, he wanted to promote social change. He and Brecht, a German artist, “attempted to utilize the media as organs of social change” (Durham & Kellner, 28).
The article attached to the link below shows how far the ‘cult of the movie star’ has come in our world today. We have a whole news website dedicated to movie stars/celebrities and (mostly) useless information about them that people only care about because these individuals are seen on the big screen and have become commodified.
https://www.eonline.com/news/969611/why-kristen-bell-vapes-weed-around-dax-shepard-even-though-he-s-sober