The Commodification of Culture

So what have you got against commercial culture? Is it the Nike tattoo? According to the University of Illinois’ Communications Department, culture in its broadest sense is cultivated behaviour; that is, the totality of a person's learned, accumulated experience which is socially transmitted - or more briefly - behaviour through social learning. This definition is based on Edward T. Hall’s axiom: “culture is communication and communication is culture.” The confluence of culture and communication are undeniable in today’s image-laden world of media. Mass media have changed the way we cultivate behaviour, and while not all the changes are negative, überculture believes that when profit is the prime motive for mass media production and dissemination, the process, and the deep penetrating cultural inheritance gained by those of us who interact with media, is ultimately pejorative. Because most mass media is predominantly motivated by the need to make and increase profit for it’s owners, “necessary illusions” (Chomsky) are created within a cultural context in which information is first corporately, then socially transmitted in a limited, and static form in order to entertain and coerce the mass audience rather than inform and engage. This process makes corporate sense, when one considers such “culture industry” is manufacturing within the framework of modern neo-liberal capitalism, and therefore the mass media’s raison d’etre is to sell, and consequently protect that vision vis-a-vis cultural imperialism and market deregulation. This profit-driven fantasy factory is articulated in the form of extreme and continued media ownership concentration. As you read this it is probable more mergers are being discussed. Nine corporations now control and own the majority of mass media production in the world. Deregulation is increasing as the neo-liberal economic vision of global regulatory bodies like the WTO, the IMF and World Bank “encourage” national laws on media and its operations be “relaxed.” All this begs the questions: “What are the pracitioners of mass media trying to sell the mass audience?” and, “Is it really a bad thing for culture, or merely the natural progression of consumer-based society?” It is in fact, readily evident that the business elite are selling specific products, but they are also selling lifestyle and ideology in order to then sell more products and shape culture and cultivate a society where entertainment and consumption are secondary to elucidation and community. The cultural costs the present-day culture industries have on our society can be measured in terms of loss of personal and collective freedoms and expression, as well as the subsequent diminishment of a culture of individuals concerned for one another’s welfare - a culture based on co-operation rather than competition. Another cultural cost absorbed by consumer-based society is the systemic dismantling of “traditional” or “public” culture, in order for the new culture industry’s building and maintenance of a global “commercial culture.” überculture is concerned with the damaging displacement of humanist cultural expression, which is increasingly making room for an international commercial culture based on greed and profit. Therefore, überculture remains dedicated to the pursuit of public reclamation of the cultural sphere. We feel especially strong about the role art has to play in this struggle for diversity, difference and community. ezra winton is a co-founder of überculture. He is currently pursuing a Master's degree in Media Studies at Concordia University.