Arendt & Benjamin

According to Hannah Arendt, an intellectual can fulfill a damaging role in the maintenance of mass culture. Mass culture has a somewhat complex definition, as it comes with negative connotations because it is the product of the masses, rather than the wealthy and educated stratus of society. There is more than one kind of intellectual, and it is the intellectual responsible for manufacturing mass culture, who can also be blamed for its gradual decay. The entertainment industry is perhaps a necessary component of society as it fills the ever-growing spaces between work and labor, Arendt writes, "The products needed for entertainment serve the life processes of society...they serve...to while away time...Vacant time which entertainment is supposed to fill is a hiatus in the biologically conditioned cycle of labour..." (Arendt 281-282). She believes that entertainment is not dangerous to culture until it starts to modify cultural objects or works in a way that degrades, or even changes them from their original intent (that is, to last through interminable changes in mass culture).

I must say that I felt that some of Arendt's thoughts were quite pretentious; she seemed to be appalled at the idea of others lifting themselves into higher social circles of society through "cheap" learning. Though I agree that learning about culturally significant works of literature or art merely for the sake of gaining social prestige is not admirable, I also do not find it to be a particularly heinous crime. In fact, it seems that learning about these items (no matter the motivation) is better than not learning it at all.

I am also unsure whether or not Arendt believes intellectuals are capable of reestablishing a form of mass culture that do not corrupt past works. She does state that intellectuals now are either 1) responsible for the gradual decay through the manufacturing of mass culture or 2) suffering from a 'malaise in mass culture' because he is surrounded by these manufacturers and has since become indistinguishable from them (283-284). Maybe the intellectual is the one who can understand that changing or abridging works for their popular consumption is harmful, but how is that an important role in society if they still do nothing?

Benjamin identifies intellectuals as a social group, not a particular branch of individuals who may be superior in education or ability, etc. He believes their import is based on their position in production, not particularly how they contribute to contemporary cultural values (88). While Arendt mentioned class in order to separate past contributors to culture to today's much larger population that influences 'mass culture,' Benjamin focused much more on the proletariat versus the bourgeois. While the bourgeois can provide education and means of production to intellectuals and writers, "important writers provide the most factual foundation for solidarity with the proletariat (91). Arendt seems to believe strongly in the preservation of original cultural works, while Benjamin states that those that matter in a society are able to adapt and produce with improved mechanisms, more capable of meeting their contemporary society's demands.

Generally, I interpret Arendt's views on the intellectual in society and mass culture as  idealistic. Entertainment is not harmful as long as it does not encroach on past cultural events, which I think is quite difficult. Of course, 'dumbing down' culturally historic works of literature or music or art is not preferable, but it is a realistic means of spreading it to a much wider audience. Benjamin's views were harder for me to understand, though I believe he found value in the intellectual aligning themselves with the proletariat. Arendt does not argue against this, but her ideas seem to support the values of the bourgeois and the higher education necessary to understand beauty and culture.