What Makes Mainstream Media Mainstream, Noam Chomsky. Z Magazine, 10.97

Chomsky answers the question he poses within the title of this writing What Makes Mainstream Media Mainstream, by first categorizing the different media types, associating them with intellectual contemporary institutions, and then historically referencing their emergence into the “whole intellectual culture”.

By deconstructing mainstream media, first through the idea that it is in of itself an institution to be hypothesized through a scientific method, he poses questions, to answer questions that slowly break down the purpose and product of such institutions. He then goes on to classify, based on the output target group, and private funding, of Mass Media versus Elite Media. The only difference between the two categories, Chomsky defines as mainstream, is the outlet they target and the large corporate funding backed by each. He classifies Mass Media, as sit-coms, reality television, sports programming, basically anything bastardized through Hollywood. Chomsky says these are created as a diversion tactic, taking people away from the things that really matter. This programming is set to target the masses, the Everyman.

On the reverse spectrum of communication sits the Elite Media, hidden from public view, for the most part, these organizations are much more powerful and manipulative than Mass Media. The Elite Media is supported monetarily through some of the wealthiest institutions found within the realms of the United States. These are large corporations set out to create an agenda, leading them to also be branded as the Agenda Setting Media. Run tyrannically, created for the privileged, having associations within the political arena, their full purpose is to “organize the way people think and look at things”. These institutions, which support the Elite Media, range from governmental organizations, other corporations within corporations, all the way to the scholastic Universities!

Chomsky reiterates over and over how within either of these institutions independent thought is not an option, ever. And if there were a possibility of a free thought it would get pummeled before it saw any light of day. There is in reality a forum of free flowing ideas, these which get censored, filtered and then reworked until they become part of the one massive set of ideologies that are the only agreed upon ideologies. There is no place for independence, true freedom of thought or a diversion for what is coined the “norm”.

Directing most of his blame within the university institution, an institution that prides it’s self on educating, Chomsky sites that such institutions are set to socialize to a predicted pattern and detour from freedom of thought. If taken off this predicted path, one is no longer part of such a system of learning. It is within this organization that the basic thought of “the general population (being) ignorant and meddlesome outsiders”, progresses and manifests to back-up the position that only the learned know what is really going on within society. Chomsky says this is a working example of Leninism, “we do things for you and we are doing it in the interest of everyone”. He believes this is connected to power, and who holds it. Whichever doctrine is more empowered is the one people will most likely be attracted to.

The evolution of this power structure, within the United States, surfaced during the First World War, and was sustained and encouraged within the second WW. It was through the propaganda machine of the British Ministry of Information that sought out the aide of the United States during WWI. The Ministry of Information “was mainly geared to send propaganda”, their intent was “geared to American intellectuals”, and whole purpose was to “control the thought of the entire world”. They believed the American intellectuals to be most “gullible and most likely to believe propaganda”. Which in turn is why the educational system is a great breeding ground for propaganda. Without the creation of propaganda aimed towards the Americans there would have been no way the British would have won the war.

It is within these internal mechanisms of thought that feed these inherent bred ideologies. The idea that the educated knows what’s best for everyone progresses these belief structures.

From Work to Frame, or, Is There Life After “ The Death of the Author”

“Death of the Author” ignites the perception of the artist as a “unique source of meaning”, without such acknowledgment the artist loses his appeal. An appeal which furthers his “mystique”, the mysticism of art and an expansion of its profits. It is because of this that Post-Modern art attempts to be a response of. Using Barthes beliefs that the author is dead protrudes the idea of focusing on the audience and all their possible interpretations. It is not within the art piece itself, nor within the artist as creator, but within it’s ending point, the frame. “The first, by focusing on location in which the work of art is encountered; the second, by insisting on the social nature of artistic production and reception.” The frame becomes the metaphor for institutional practices of framing, what is expected or was expected.

The writing continues with differing accounts of artists playing with the ideas of “framing” and some even breaking the frame. Along with “framing”, artists rebelled against containment for similar beliefs. Wanting to not be contained, artists made art in contradiction to the ideas of framing, and or being able to be contained. “The movements of deconstruction do not destroy structures from the outside. They are not possible and effective, nor can they take accurate aim, except by inhabiting those structures.” Moving into deconstruction, allows the artist’s work to not be appropriated, it is “impersonal”, anonymous. With this anonymity the artist no longer owns his own work, only by signing his work does it become his, and is transformed into a commodity. So by not taking responsibility for these actions, throws another layer onto a piece of art. Displacement is another construct used to disassociate the artist from the art piece. This is where “elements are either moved or removed from their ‘original’ contexts so that their contradictions can be examined”. By fragmenting certain ideas and beliefs this brings the ‘original’ elements more clearly into view. Post-modern practices are critical for artists, to step away from the art-machine, to not be apart of the institutions that continues their mystic. By doing this they can take ownership of their ideas, which aids and empowers them by breaking them out of the slavery that is within the art apparatus.

Death of the Author, Roland Barthes 1977,he Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism BY: Jonathan Lethem

“Writing is the destruction of every voice, of every point of origin. Writing is that neutral, composite, oblique space where our subject slips away, the negative where all identity is lost, starting with the very identity of the body of the writing.”

It is through “capitalist ideology” where the reoccurrence of placing emphasis within the power of the author, almost “tyrannically” occurs, asserts Roland Barthes in “Death of the Author”. Authors have always been viewed as creators, “persons” with identity whose presence was felt within their work, Barthes thinks differently of this initiative. Instead he breaks down these ideologies, to allow for a different look at the past belief system, the same system that has been is use for many years, mostly pre-modern texts. He cites that the relationship of the author to his text is like placing them side, by side on a bookshelf, the author is to the text as a father is to his son. It is before, and during the writing process the author is dead and has no identity within the writings he/she writes. The writing of the author has nothing to do with what he/she is writing, it is the writing that is the performance it is the language, which conveys the meaning.

With the author dead, and his identity superfluous this gives great power to the audience, to the reader, to those for whom the piece is written for. “The birth of the reader must be the at the cost of the death of the author”. This power is asserted through the plethora of meaning found within and or through language, linguistics, and vocabulary. “Language being system and the aim of the movement being, romantically, a direct subversion of codes- itself moreover illusory: a code cannot be destroyed, only played ‘off’” Barthes insinuates that “code” is language, and the author merely chooses the code to be deciphered by the audience. Each audience member could interpret the code differently, allowing for many flowing, perhaps unintentional meanings to occur within one piece. It is because of this multi-reading that allows each audience member to take away something differently from the exact same text and the other.

Barthes believes that the diminishing influence of the author to the text will correlate into writing and reading modern texts differently. For if the author is dead, then perhaps the text will expand, the reader will be the emphasis for the purpose of writing and the audience’s perception will be taken into account more so. This demotion of power comes from Barthes belief that there is nothing original. Language, text, ideas are not original, they have all been used before, they will continue to be used, it is through the use that makes text, language and ideas so meaningful. Opening his essay, Barthes cites correlations between past authorships, which have taken from others and expounded. He notices the absence of the narrator within modern texts, and the mentions the double meanings used within Greek tragedy. It is this multiplicity that gives the reader the power to take away which ever personal emphasis they choose from their perspective. “The reader is the space on which all the quotations that make up a writing are inscribed without any of them being lost; a text’s unity lies not in its origin but in its destination.”

The Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism BY: Jonathan Lethem

In an attempt to claim creative ideas, copyright laws are now in place to transfer art into property. Jonathan Lethem sees this as an unnecessary need to monopolize on what should be part of the “commons”. “Commons”, Lethem explains are everyone’s “right” he connects this “right” through the writings of Thomas Jefferson and in connection to the Constitution. An authority given to congress through “the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Rights to their respective Writings and Discoveries”, a power which ideally should be used to allow artists and scientist to have free range over expanding upon ideas, concepts, information, etc, from the past. Lethem cites that this discourse effects such work as medicine, finding cures for diseases which are obstructed because of genetic patents, through copyright laws securing ownership over scientific findings. Findings, with which if shared could further medical discoveries at a much faster rate. Our American tradition is held within the Constitution of the United States, which was written on the premise that it should and could always be amended. With such current copyright laws there will never be a possibility of drawing upon new ideas from the old without the use of such social “sharing”. To monopolize solely off of the rights of artistic creativity enables a generation to then rage against the machine, and work illegally to acquire information and art that should be a freedom to us all. How are we supposed to learn? How are we supposed to grow as a nation without such a freedom? Lethem even asks him readers to take advantage of his work after he has profited enough throughout the years, that’s how all-creative beings should be. For we would not be able to add to our own creativity without building upon the framework from the past, at least that what Barthes says.