Untitled - Memorial University's Digital Archives Initiative

With this in mind. I would like to conclude this literature review by idemil):ing
the central themes and ideas that link together the ...."Orks discussed above. With the
exception of Power Misses, each ofthe reviewed texts anempts to ....Test the focus of
cultural studies away from the larger macroeconomic and productive context in which
culture is formed and to train it on the micro-level interactions between consumers.
commodities. and the industry personnel that mediate the exchanges. Dick Hebdige is
interested in how subcultures make use ofsigns and S)mbols: Angela McRobbie wonders
how underpaid artists are faring in the new. post-Fordist economy: Simon Frith ruminates
on the diversity of musical judgements and meanings: Keith Negus concerns himself with
the front-line record industry personnel who try to read and respond to consumer
demands: however. all ofthese writers are united in their misgh'ings about efforts to
analyse Cullural objects in terms of the capitalist mode ofproduction by which they are
generated. Whether Hebdige's silent resignation. McRobbic·s impatience ....ith
intractable theoretical questions. or Frith and Negus's rejection of reductive Marxist
explanations. the reader in each case is being encouraged 10 tum his or her gaze away
from the overarching structures. institutions. and power relations of market society. It is
interesting that enthusiasm for macro-structural analysis was greatest in the period ofour
history when humanity in great numbers retained a faith in a coming socialist utopia. At
that time. dissecting the structure ofcapitalism was a means ofdefining the alternative.
pointing to a way beyond. Now. with all such alternatives having disappeared from the
horizon ofhistorical progress. capitalism becomes a kind ofMedusa. into whose face we
do not dare look for fear ofbecoming paralysed ....ith despair.
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