267 – Smythe reminds us the importance of Marx in analyzing
capitalism critically
267 – Critical theory and political economy are complimentary
and should be combined
271 – “Cultural Studies has to turn into or at least take up
aspects of Critical Political Economy in order to adequately understand
contemporary capitalism and the role of media and communication.”
271 – Mosco, 2009 – PE has given attention to the
commodification of content and audiences, labour spatialization, class, gender,
race, social movements, hegemony, and ideology
272 – economy has always been relevant to the study of
culture, communication, the media, and information…but CS has increasingly
ignored the economy because of CS’ turn away from Marxism
273 – Smythe’s approach can be characterized as Marxist
Communication Studies, which means “a unity of theoretical/philosophical,
empirical, and ethical studies of media and communication.” – focusing on
contradictions, structures of domination, exploitation, struggles, ideologies,
alternatives to capitalism in media.
273 – Like Marx, Smythe wasn’t content with simply analyzing
political economy of media, but trying to change the structures of media.
(transformative practice through critique)
276 – “in recent years, there has been a revival of interest
in Dallas Smythe’s works, especially in relation to the question: are users of
commercial social media workers and
are they exploited?” (emphasis in original)
276- discusses the eroding walls of the factory to 24/7
276 – Facebook is an indicative phase of capitalism and
exploitation of labor – all-ubiquitous factory – mobile media has lifted the
factory confines of the living room
276 – factory and workplace surveillance is omnipresent
277 – smythe more concerned with surplus value generated by
media than the ideological effects of message content.
277 – Garnham shares Smythe’s opinion – shift away from
media as ideological apparatuses and focus more on generating surplus value and
advertising.
277 – however, ideology and PE are not mutually exclusive
and require one another
278 – Murdock and Golding (1974) – media organizations
distribute commodities that disseminate ideology and sell “explanations of
social order and structured inequality (Murdock, 1978, 469). Also see Artz, 2008, 64.
278 – Smythe understands ideology as “a system of beliefs,
attitudes, and ideas.” (Smythe, 1981, 171).
278 – For Smythe (1994, 250) – consciousness industry is to
make people buy commodities and pay taxes… it also promotes values that favor
capitalism (251-3)
279 – Critical theory and PE should be complementary to each
other
279 – media in capitalism are two forms of cultural
commodities: cultural commodity that is purchased by consumers (dvds, mobile
devices, etc). and audience/users as cultural
commodities where users/consumers are sold to media companies (Twitter,
Facebook)
280 – advertising makes “humans instruments for economic
accumulation” and ideology “aims at instilling the belief in the system of
capital and commodities into human’s subjectivity”
280 – (capitialistic media) ideology “encompasses strategies
and attempts to make human subjects instrumental in the reproduction of
domination and exploitation”
281 – accumulation and ideology go hand in hand – case and
point: social media
Social media was accompanied by a “techno-optimistic
ideology” that Web 2.0 would lead to better democracy and new forms of
political struggle (new forms of participation)
281 – ideology was necessary for users to support the social
media capital accumulation model
281 – Smythe had a more balanced view of audience as
compared to that of PE and the Frankfurt
school which focused on false consciousness and passive audience manipulation –
Smythe recognized that capital would attempt to control audiences, but they
also had the power to resist (Smythe, 1981, 270)
****But
what about direct marketing and T-Commerce?
Harder to resist?****
282 – Hesmondhalgh (2010, 280): Smythe too
reductionist…& Caraway (2011, 296): Smythe one sided, audience commodity
fetishism, and then Caraway agrees with Jenkins on page 706 – creative energy
in new media environment – Jenkins, 2006, 133…Jenkins’ “participatory culture”
283 – Fuchs: Smythe instead calls for the overthrow of
capitalist media system to humanize media
