ABSTRACT
For this chapter our contention is this: In the academy there have been no promises kept in regard to promoting a democratic society, because many academics have treated popular culture, or that which people value, with suspicion at best and abrupt dismissal at worst. To make our claim we want to draw on the work of three central figures in the Western academic tradition: Plato, Theodor Adorno, and Max Horkheimer. Much of Western criticism of popular culture is indebted to these three figures. In fact, it is easy to make the assertion that it is from Plato that the liberal arts curriculum, or the foundational basis of a traditional Western education, is developed, and it is from Adorno and Horkheimer (along with Marcuse and Benjamin) that leftists garner much of their moral authority to comment on popular culture. This is true, but both traditions are suspicious of popular culture and view it as the antithesis to a healthy society. For Plato, popular culture, especially that which is mimetic, represents the rule of the masses rather than the naturally ordained guardians. For Adorno and Horkheimer (1998), their suspicion is based on two sources. First, they saw how easily Nazis were able to manipulate popular images in order to garner mass support for their anti-Semitic and eugenic policies. Second, Adorno and Horkheimer constructed the “masses” as manipulable and gullible victims of the “culture industry.” While we find the first source of suspicion a vital and understandable point to address, the second source prevents academics from exploring the massive and complex impact of popular culture in/on people’s lives.
