Fish Tank & WNTTAK: Ideology
Ideology:
- Films are believed to reflect fundamental beliefs of a society - Ideologies (Phillips, 2005)
- Ideology can be thought of as the main messages & values conveyed by a film as well as those which inform it
- Commonly mainstream cinema presents dominant ideologies that exist within society
- The teaching of ideology overlaps with the other specialist area
Starter Questions:
- What are the main messages & values of the film?
- How are these messages conveyed through the use of key elements of film form?
- Does the film reinforce, challenge or reject dominant attitudes within the society it is made in?
- Which characters are the spectators encouraged to align themselves with & what is their dominant belief system?
Critical approaches to Ideology:
- For purposes of the specification, should study films in relation to critical approaches to ideology
- Recommended either political or feminist critical approach studied in relation to these films
- From its content & context, the films will raise specific issues; these issues make clear how it needs to be interrogated
- Worth remembering an ideological critical approach can consider what is absent from the film, as well as what it contains
A political approach:
- All films are rooted in some kind of political reality & posit some kind of political position, either explicitly or implicitly
- E.g. a film may focus on poverty & the lives of people living on the margins of society
- A starting point would be to ask whether these lives are represented sympathetically
- If they are, then the film is likely to be taking a politically ideological position
- Another film may focus on the lives of powerful & privileged people & represent their lives as glamorous. This film too is taking a politically ideological position
- First example = explicit & deliberate
- Second example = implicit, the ideology 'taken for granted'
A Feminist approach:
- By looking at an avowedly feminist filmmaker who attempts to make a film that embodies/presents/uses any of the central tenets of feminist thought. Usually avant-garde works or genuine 'independent films' since to make something within mainstream cinema is to be confined by the patriarchal studio system. These films will have female protagonists & themes & will challenge representations & critique conventional attitudes.
- Approach adopted by feminist scholars in 'recuperating' or 're-validating' the women's picture, the family melodrama or the musical as films enjoyed by female audiences which also reveal important ideas about women's lives & their struggles within patriarchy (see work of Christine Gledhill or Jeanine Basinger)
- Approach by feminist scholars in studying genres & films by male directors which've been assumed to targeting men & to expose the contradictions in their underlying ideologies (see work of Anne E. Kaplan (Crime/Noir), Yvonne Tasker (Action), Barbara Creed (Horror) or Annette Kuhn (Science Fiction))
- Approach by some feminist scholars which focused on theory itself & produced specific theoretical insights such as Laura Mulvey's in relation to the 'male gaze'
- Something as simple as ideas or subversions that contemporary female filmmakers bring to their films
- Learners will be required to analyse usefulness of applying a critical approach
- Implication= film viewed somewhat innocently before being critically interrogated
- Result of interrogation = greater understanding & insight into the film's complexities
Ideology:
- What are the main messages & values of the film?
- How are these messages conveyed through the use of key elements of film form?
- Does the film reinforce, challenge or reject dominant attitudes within the society it is made in?
- Which character(s) are the spectators encouraged to align themselves with & what is their dominant belief system?
Guidance from exam board:
- In some exam questions, learners will be required to analyse usefulness of applying a critical approach
- Implication film was viewed somewhat innocently before being critically interrogated
- As a result of this interrogation the student is able to claim greater understanding & insight into the film's complexities.
Ideology: Feminism
A feminist approach to filmmaking;
- Find in films where an avowedly feminist filmmaker attempts to make a film that embodies/presents/uses central tenets of feminist thought
- Usually avant-garde works or genuine 'independent films', mainstream cinema confined in patriarchal studio system
- Female protagonists & themes, challenge representations & critique conventional attitudes
Laura Mulvey (1973)
- Visual representations of women are structured by patriarchal ideology
- Women relegated to subservient position within most narrative cinea
- Women predominantly appear 'coded for strong visual & erotic pleasure'
- Women are a kind of spectacle, valued only as a form of sexual display: 'to-be-looked-at-ness'
- Women are disproportionately portrayed as passive objects while men serve as active protagonists; viewer takes pleasure in this; 'voyeurism'
- 'The male gaze': male protagonist does the 'looking' just like the spectator in the cinema; therefore, the spectator identifies with the male protagonist
- Women are regularly devalued within the narrative by being reduced to stereotypical or peripheral roles
Mary Anne Doane (1982)
- Performed quality of femininity, like a masquerade
- 'Womanliness is a mask which can be worn or removed'
A Journal of Film: A 'Vision Apparent by Shock' - M Tamminga July 3rd 2012
- Vision of motherhood that runs counter to everything comfortable, sweet & cozy
- Her toddler, her child is a voracious monster, demanding food & then hurling it from him in a vicious attack upon her being & senses
- Her own ambivalence about motherhood, an ambivalence that was with her from her first-born (Kevin's) very conception, a moment imagined as maliciously dividing cancer cells
- Cognitive dissonance a woman might experience when her body/life/mind/self disrupted by birth of first born -> identity no longer her own but instantly & inextricably linked to another human being's. For the rest of her life. Motherhood.
- Her pregnancy is something she can't embrace as something she has chosen for herself - rather an alien imposition upon her very being
- Motherhood still a thing that's been thrusted upon her & drowns her, smiles are a drowning woman's desperation to stay afloat, not indication of a truly, happy, natural swimmer
- Kevin's assault with ink upon her map room is not primarily an indication of Kevin's evil: indication of Eva's perception of Kevin's assault upon her own being - personal
- Kevin invades her very physical self - her belly, her breasts, her body's need for sleep
- From Kevin's conception & through her pregnancy, Eva rejects motherhood & outwardly as much as she wants to show otherwise, she rejects Kevin as her son from his birth onwards
- The film is full of her fierce attempt to maintain her identity as a free agent & disassociate herself as far as possible from the emotional, physical & mental consuming thing that is motherhood
- Film about that violent wrench in her notion of herself, of her identity, the disconnect between her perception of who she is or was as opposed to the new identity that has engulfed her.
1. 'a vision of motherhood that runs counter to everything comfortable, sweet & cozy'
2. 'her own ambivalence about motherhood'
3. 'Cognitive dissonance a woman, any woman, might experience when her body/life/mind/self disrupted by birth of first born -> identity no longer her own but instantly & inextricably linked to another human being's. For the rest of her life. Motherhood.'
4. 'Her pregnancy is something she can't embrace as something she has chosen for herself - rather an alien imposition upon her very being'
5. 'Motherhood still a thing that's been thrusted upon her & drowns her, smiles are a drowning woman's desperation to stay afloat, not indication of a truly, happy, natural swimmer'
http://ajournaloffilm.blogspot.com/2012/07/we-need-to-talk-about-kevin-vision.html -> Article about We Need To Talk About Kevin
Representations of the Nuclear family
- Suggested we currently live in a fractured society
- 20 years ago: only 4 main UK TV channels, one household telephone & basic games consoles. Whole family gathered round the TV, especially at weekends, & everyone being together for an evening meal was commonplace.
- Today: so many TV channels/games consoles/handheld devices/websites/entertainment outlets & pressure on our time -> family rarely spend 'quality' time together even when in the same house. e.g. Mum might be watching TV, Dad on laptop, one child upstairs playing X-Box whilst other is messaging friends on mobile.
- WNTTAK challenges notion of ideal nuclear family & suggests lack of communication & failure to express feelings to one another may be part of cause of problems within the average family
Freud's Theories:
- 'Oedipus Complex', whereby children sexually desire the parent of the opposite sex. Results in castration anxiety & penis envy in men & women respectively
- Human beings repress their desires & are enacted through unconscious, affecting human behaviour
- Dreams may be viewed as wish fulfillments, expressions of the unconscious
- 'Uncanny' is a word strangely familiar, simultaneously attractive & repulsive
- Men may be afraid of female sexual desire
- Primitive & instinctive component of personality -> consists of all inherited (i.e. biological) components of personality present at birth, including the sex (life) instinct - Eros (which contains the libido) & the aggressive (death) instinct - Thanatos
- Impulsive & unconscious part of our psyche -> responds directly & immediately to the instincts. Personality of newborn child is all id & only later develops ego & super-ego
- Id remains infantile in its function throughout a person;s life & doesn't change with time or experience, not in touch with the external world. Id not affected by reality, logic or everyday world, operates within unconscious part of the mind
- Operates on pleasure principle (Freud, 1920) which is the idea every wishful impulse should be satisfied immediately, regardless of the consequences. When id achieves its demands, we experience pleasure, when it's denied we experience 'unpleasure' or tension
- Id engages in primary process thinking, which is primitive/illogical/irrational/fantasy orientated. Form of process thinking has no comprehension of objective reality, & is selfish & wishful in nature
Ego:
- Develops to mediate between unrealistic id & external real world. Decision-making component of personality. Ideally ego works by reason whereas id is chaotic & unreasonable
- Ego operates according to reality principle, working out realistic ways of satisfying id's demands, often compromising or postponing satisfaction to avoid negative consequences of society. Considers social realities & norms, etiquette & rules, in deciding how to behave
- Like the id, seeks pleasure (i.e. tension reduction) & avoids pain, but unlike id the ego is concerned with devising a realistic strategy to obtain pleasure. No concept of right or wrong, something is good if it simply achieves end of satisfying without causing harm to itself or the id
- Often ego is weak relative to headstrong id & the best the ego can do is stay on, pointing the id in the right direction & claiming some credit at the end as if the action were its own
- If ego fails in its attempt to use reality principle & anxiety is experienced, unconscious defence mechanisms are employed to help ward off unpleasant feelings or make good things feel better for the individual
- Ego engages in secondary process thinking, which is rational/realistic/orientated towards problem solving. If plan of action doesn't work, it's thought through again until solution found. Known as reality testing & enables person to control their impulses & demonstrate self-control, via mastery of ego
- Important feature of clinical & social work is to enhance ego functioning & help client test reality through assisting client to think through their options
Super-Ego:
- Incorporates values & morals of society learned from one's parents & others. Develops around 3-5 years old during the phallic stage of psychosexual development
- Function to control id's impulses, especially those which society forbids (e.g. sex & aggression). Also had function of persuading ego to turn to moralistic goals rather than simply realistic ones & to strive for perfection
- Consists of 2 systems: conscience & ideal self. Conscience can punish ego through causing feelings of guilt (e.g. if ego gives into id's demands, superego may make person feel bad through guilt). Ideal self (or ego-ideal) is an imaginary picture of how you ought to be & represents career aspirations, how to treat other people & how to behave as a member of society
- Behaviour which falls short of ideal self may be punished by superego through guilt. Super-ego can also reward us through ideal self when we behave 'properly' by making us feel proud
- If a person's ideal self is too high a standard then whatever the person does will represent failure. Ideal self & conscience are largely determined in childhood from parental values & how you were brought up
Ideology: Political
- Marxism
- Hegemony
- Reification
- Louis Althusser & ISAs
Louis Althusser Ideological State Apparatuses (e.g. family, religion, education, media) control the flow of information down to base structure. Establishes false consciousness in the ploletariat
False Consciousness:
- Social institutions like the mass media play key role in ensuring WC remains happy with their situation despite inherent unfairness of the system
- Marx described situation in which members of subordinate classes can't see they are being duped as 'false consciousness'
- In Marxist terms, ideology can ultimately be identified as lies/deceptions/misinformation given to working classes in order to maintain state of 'false consciousness'
Marx & False Consciousness:
- 'FC' is concept derived from Marxist Theory of social class
- Concept refers to systematic misrepresentation of dominant social relations in consciousness of subordinate classes
- Marx himself didn't use phrase 'false consciousness' but he paid extensive attention to related concepts of ideology & commodity fetishism
- Members of a subordinate class (workers, peasants, serfs) suffer from false consciousness in that their mental representations of the social relations around them systematically conceal or obscure the realities of subordination/exploitation/domination those relations embody
- Related concepts include mystification, ideology & fetishism
Dominant Ideologies:
- Capitalism: production of capital & consumption of surplus value as a life goal
- Male superiority: Men are more suited to positions of power & decision-making at work & home
- Marriage & family: 'Right way' to live is to marry an opposite-sex partner & have children
- Patriotism: Love, support & protect one's country + its people
Commodity:
- Something that's produced for purpose of exchanging for something else & as such, is the material form given to a fundamental social relation -> exchange of labour
- Marx saw commodity as 'cell' of bourgeois society (i.e. capitalism)
- For Marx, products of labour may be either goods or services, but in the way Marx understands the term, remain commodities provided only that they are produced for purpose of exchange
- Nor it's important whether they are foodstuffs/clothing/satisfying basic human needs/dealing with labour which meets more ephemeral needs (e.g. with designer labels, romantic movies or tarot-readings)
- Labour is a commodity, provided only producer works to meet needs of someone else, means to satisfy their own needs. Good or service produced for labourer's own immediate consumption may be a 'use-value' but it's not a commodity
- Likewise, if a woman produces a meal for consumption of her loved-ones, as part of a domestic contract, whether made before God, law or out of simple love, she produces not a commodity but labour directly to meet needs of another person, but not just so as to satisfy her own needs, not for payment
Reification:
- When the subject becomes object and object becomes subject
- Within a hegemonic capitalist society, humans (proletariat) lose agency. Commodities are fetishised -> given human qualities
- What Marx means with 'Verdinglichung' is the human interaction is removed from/invisible to transaction & that people are acting like cogs in the big industrial machine instead or encouraged to act like cogs in machine as otherwise the consequences would be losing their jobs, social ostracism etc
- Contradiction for sociologists to do both at same time, recognise human agency in structures we live within & recognise structures exist apart from any one individual's isolated power to change them. Central tension of sociology.
- Films are believed to reflect fundamental beliefs of a society - Ideologies (Phillips, 2005)
- Ideology can be thought of as the main messages & values conveyed by a film as well as those which inform it
- Commonly mainstream cinema presents dominant ideologies that exist within society
- The teaching of ideology overlaps with the other specialist area
Starter Questions:
- What are the main messages & values of the film?
- How are these messages conveyed through the use of key elements of film form?
- Does the film reinforce, challenge or reject dominant attitudes within the society it is made in?
- Which characters are the spectators encouraged to align themselves with & what is their dominant belief system?
Critical approaches to Ideology:
- For purposes of the specification, should study films in relation to critical approaches to ideology
- Recommended either political or feminist critical approach studied in relation to these films
- From its content & context, the films will raise specific issues; these issues make clear how it needs to be interrogated
- Worth remembering an ideological critical approach can consider what is absent from the film, as well as what it contains
A political approach:
- All films are rooted in some kind of political reality & posit some kind of political position, either explicitly or implicitly
- E.g. a film may focus on poverty & the lives of people living on the margins of society
- A starting point would be to ask whether these lives are represented sympathetically
- If they are, then the film is likely to be taking a politically ideological position
- Another film may focus on the lives of powerful & privileged people & represent their lives as glamorous. This film too is taking a politically ideological position
- First example = explicit & deliberate
- Second example = implicit, the ideology 'taken for granted'
A Feminist approach:
- By looking at an avowedly feminist filmmaker who attempts to make a film that embodies/presents/uses any of the central tenets of feminist thought. Usually avant-garde works or genuine 'independent films' since to make something within mainstream cinema is to be confined by the patriarchal studio system. These films will have female protagonists & themes & will challenge representations & critique conventional attitudes.
- Approach adopted by feminist scholars in 'recuperating' or 're-validating' the women's picture, the family melodrama or the musical as films enjoyed by female audiences which also reveal important ideas about women's lives & their struggles within patriarchy (see work of Christine Gledhill or Jeanine Basinger)
- Approach by feminist scholars in studying genres & films by male directors which've been assumed to targeting men & to expose the contradictions in their underlying ideologies (see work of Anne E. Kaplan (Crime/Noir), Yvonne Tasker (Action), Barbara Creed (Horror) or Annette Kuhn (Science Fiction))
- Approach by some feminist scholars which focused on theory itself & produced specific theoretical insights such as Laura Mulvey's in relation to the 'male gaze'
- Something as simple as ideas or subversions that contemporary female filmmakers bring to their films
- Learners will be required to analyse usefulness of applying a critical approach
- Implication= film viewed somewhat innocently before being critically interrogated
- Result of interrogation = greater understanding & insight into the film's complexities
Ideology:
- What are the main messages & values of the film?
- How are these messages conveyed through the use of key elements of film form?
- Does the film reinforce, challenge or reject dominant attitudes within the society it is made in?
- Which character(s) are the spectators encouraged to align themselves with & what is their dominant belief system?
Guidance from exam board:
- In some exam questions, learners will be required to analyse usefulness of applying a critical approach
- Implication film was viewed somewhat innocently before being critically interrogated
- As a result of this interrogation the student is able to claim greater understanding & insight into the film's complexities.
Ideology: Feminism
A feminist approach to filmmaking;
- Find in films where an avowedly feminist filmmaker attempts to make a film that embodies/presents/uses central tenets of feminist thought
- Usually avant-garde works or genuine 'independent films', mainstream cinema confined in patriarchal studio system
- Female protagonists & themes, challenge representations & critique conventional attitudes
Laura Mulvey (1973)
- Visual representations of women are structured by patriarchal ideology
- Women relegated to subservient position within most narrative cinea
- Women predominantly appear 'coded for strong visual & erotic pleasure'
- Women are a kind of spectacle, valued only as a form of sexual display: 'to-be-looked-at-ness'
- Women are disproportionately portrayed as passive objects while men serve as active protagonists; viewer takes pleasure in this; 'voyeurism'
- 'The male gaze': male protagonist does the 'looking' just like the spectator in the cinema; therefore, the spectator identifies with the male protagonist
- Women are regularly devalued within the narrative by being reduced to stereotypical or peripheral roles
Mary Anne Doane (1982)
- Performed quality of femininity, like a masquerade
- 'Womanliness is a mask which can be worn or removed'
A Journal of Film: A 'Vision Apparent by Shock' - M Tamminga July 3rd 2012
- Vision of motherhood that runs counter to everything comfortable, sweet & cozy
- Her toddler, her child is a voracious monster, demanding food & then hurling it from him in a vicious attack upon her being & senses
- Her own ambivalence about motherhood, an ambivalence that was with her from her first-born (Kevin's) very conception, a moment imagined as maliciously dividing cancer cells
- Cognitive dissonance a woman might experience when her body/life/mind/self disrupted by birth of first born -> identity no longer her own but instantly & inextricably linked to another human being's. For the rest of her life. Motherhood.
- Her pregnancy is something she can't embrace as something she has chosen for herself - rather an alien imposition upon her very being
- Motherhood still a thing that's been thrusted upon her & drowns her, smiles are a drowning woman's desperation to stay afloat, not indication of a truly, happy, natural swimmer
- Kevin's assault with ink upon her map room is not primarily an indication of Kevin's evil: indication of Eva's perception of Kevin's assault upon her own being - personal
- Kevin invades her very physical self - her belly, her breasts, her body's need for sleep
- From Kevin's conception & through her pregnancy, Eva rejects motherhood & outwardly as much as she wants to show otherwise, she rejects Kevin as her son from his birth onwards
- The film is full of her fierce attempt to maintain her identity as a free agent & disassociate herself as far as possible from the emotional, physical & mental consuming thing that is motherhood
- Film about that violent wrench in her notion of herself, of her identity, the disconnect between her perception of who she is or was as opposed to the new identity that has engulfed her.
1. 'a vision of motherhood that runs counter to everything comfortable, sweet & cozy'
2. 'her own ambivalence about motherhood'
3. 'Cognitive dissonance a woman, any woman, might experience when her body/life/mind/self disrupted by birth of first born -> identity no longer her own but instantly & inextricably linked to another human being's. For the rest of her life. Motherhood.'
4. 'Her pregnancy is something she can't embrace as something she has chosen for herself - rather an alien imposition upon her very being'
5. 'Motherhood still a thing that's been thrusted upon her & drowns her, smiles are a drowning woman's desperation to stay afloat, not indication of a truly, happy, natural swimmer'
http://ajournaloffilm.blogspot.com/2012/07/we-need-to-talk-about-kevin-vision.html -> Article about We Need To Talk About Kevin
Representations of the Nuclear family
- Suggested we currently live in a fractured society
- 20 years ago: only 4 main UK TV channels, one household telephone & basic games consoles. Whole family gathered round the TV, especially at weekends, & everyone being together for an evening meal was commonplace.
- Today: so many TV channels/games consoles/handheld devices/websites/entertainment outlets & pressure on our time -> family rarely spend 'quality' time together even when in the same house. e.g. Mum might be watching TV, Dad on laptop, one child upstairs playing X-Box whilst other is messaging friends on mobile.
- WNTTAK challenges notion of ideal nuclear family & suggests lack of communication & failure to express feelings to one another may be part of cause of problems within the average family
Freud's Theories:
- 'Oedipus Complex', whereby children sexually desire the parent of the opposite sex. Results in castration anxiety & penis envy in men & women respectively
- Human beings repress their desires & are enacted through unconscious, affecting human behaviour
- Dreams may be viewed as wish fulfillments, expressions of the unconscious
- 'Uncanny' is a word strangely familiar, simultaneously attractive & repulsive
- Men may be afraid of female sexual desire
- Id - Instincts
- Ego - Reality
- Superego - Morality
Freud's Tripartite:
- Freud's most enduring & important idea was human psyche (personality) has more than 1 aspect
- Freud (1923) saw psyche structured in three parts (i.e. tripartite -> id, ego, superego), all developing at different stages in our lives. These are systems, not parts of the brain or physical in any way
- According to Freud's model of the psyche, id is primitive & instinctual part of mind that contains sexual & aggressive drives & hidden memories, super-ego operates as moral conscience & ego is realistic part that mediates between desires of id & super-ego
- Although each part of personality comprises unique features, they interact to form a whole & each part makes a relative contribution to an individual's behaviour
The Id:
- Primitive & instinctive component of personality -> consists of all inherited (i.e. biological) components of personality present at birth, including the sex (life) instinct - Eros (which contains the libido) & the aggressive (death) instinct - Thanatos
- Impulsive & unconscious part of our psyche -> responds directly & immediately to the instincts. Personality of newborn child is all id & only later develops ego & super-ego
- Id remains infantile in its function throughout a person;s life & doesn't change with time or experience, not in touch with the external world. Id not affected by reality, logic or everyday world, operates within unconscious part of the mind
- Operates on pleasure principle (Freud, 1920) which is the idea every wishful impulse should be satisfied immediately, regardless of the consequences. When id achieves its demands, we experience pleasure, when it's denied we experience 'unpleasure' or tension
- Id engages in primary process thinking, which is primitive/illogical/irrational/fantasy orientated. Form of process thinking has no comprehension of objective reality, & is selfish & wishful in nature
Ego:
- Develops to mediate between unrealistic id & external real world. Decision-making component of personality. Ideally ego works by reason whereas id is chaotic & unreasonable
- Ego operates according to reality principle, working out realistic ways of satisfying id's demands, often compromising or postponing satisfaction to avoid negative consequences of society. Considers social realities & norms, etiquette & rules, in deciding how to behave
- Like the id, seeks pleasure (i.e. tension reduction) & avoids pain, but unlike id the ego is concerned with devising a realistic strategy to obtain pleasure. No concept of right or wrong, something is good if it simply achieves end of satisfying without causing harm to itself or the id
- Often ego is weak relative to headstrong id & the best the ego can do is stay on, pointing the id in the right direction & claiming some credit at the end as if the action were its own
- If ego fails in its attempt to use reality principle & anxiety is experienced, unconscious defence mechanisms are employed to help ward off unpleasant feelings or make good things feel better for the individual
- Ego engages in secondary process thinking, which is rational/realistic/orientated towards problem solving. If plan of action doesn't work, it's thought through again until solution found. Known as reality testing & enables person to control their impulses & demonstrate self-control, via mastery of ego
- Important feature of clinical & social work is to enhance ego functioning & help client test reality through assisting client to think through their options
Super-Ego:
- Incorporates values & morals of society learned from one's parents & others. Develops around 3-5 years old during the phallic stage of psychosexual development
- Function to control id's impulses, especially those which society forbids (e.g. sex & aggression). Also had function of persuading ego to turn to moralistic goals rather than simply realistic ones & to strive for perfection
- Consists of 2 systems: conscience & ideal self. Conscience can punish ego through causing feelings of guilt (e.g. if ego gives into id's demands, superego may make person feel bad through guilt). Ideal self (or ego-ideal) is an imaginary picture of how you ought to be & represents career aspirations, how to treat other people & how to behave as a member of society
- Behaviour which falls short of ideal self may be punished by superego through guilt. Super-ego can also reward us through ideal self when we behave 'properly' by making us feel proud
- If a person's ideal self is too high a standard then whatever the person does will represent failure. Ideal self & conscience are largely determined in childhood from parental values & how you were brought up
Ideology: Political
- Marxism
- Hegemony
- Reification
- Louis Althusser & ISAs
False Consciousness:
- Social institutions like the mass media play key role in ensuring WC remains happy with their situation despite inherent unfairness of the system
- Marx described situation in which members of subordinate classes can't see they are being duped as 'false consciousness'
- In Marxist terms, ideology can ultimately be identified as lies/deceptions/misinformation given to working classes in order to maintain state of 'false consciousness'
Marx & False Consciousness:
- 'FC' is concept derived from Marxist Theory of social class
- Concept refers to systematic misrepresentation of dominant social relations in consciousness of subordinate classes
- Marx himself didn't use phrase 'false consciousness' but he paid extensive attention to related concepts of ideology & commodity fetishism
- Members of a subordinate class (workers, peasants, serfs) suffer from false consciousness in that their mental representations of the social relations around them systematically conceal or obscure the realities of subordination/exploitation/domination those relations embody
- Related concepts include mystification, ideology & fetishism
Dominant Ideologies:
- Capitalism: production of capital & consumption of surplus value as a life goal
- Male superiority: Men are more suited to positions of power & decision-making at work & home
- Marriage & family: 'Right way' to live is to marry an opposite-sex partner & have children
- Patriotism: Love, support & protect one's country + its people
Commodity:
- Something that's produced for purpose of exchanging for something else & as such, is the material form given to a fundamental social relation -> exchange of labour
- Marx saw commodity as 'cell' of bourgeois society (i.e. capitalism)
- For Marx, products of labour may be either goods or services, but in the way Marx understands the term, remain commodities provided only that they are produced for purpose of exchange
- Nor it's important whether they are foodstuffs/clothing/satisfying basic human needs/dealing with labour which meets more ephemeral needs (e.g. with designer labels, romantic movies or tarot-readings)
- Labour is a commodity, provided only producer works to meet needs of someone else, means to satisfy their own needs. Good or service produced for labourer's own immediate consumption may be a 'use-value' but it's not a commodity
- Likewise, if a woman produces a meal for consumption of her loved-ones, as part of a domestic contract, whether made before God, law or out of simple love, she produces not a commodity but labour directly to meet needs of another person, but not just so as to satisfy her own needs, not for payment
Reification:
- When the subject becomes object and object becomes subject
- Within a hegemonic capitalist society, humans (proletariat) lose agency. Commodities are fetishised -> given human qualities
- What Marx means with 'Verdinglichung' is the human interaction is removed from/invisible to transaction & that people are acting like cogs in the big industrial machine instead or encouraged to act like cogs in machine as otherwise the consequences would be losing their jobs, social ostracism etc
- Contradiction for sociologists to do both at same time, recognise human agency in structures we live within & recognise structures exist apart from any one individual's isolated power to change them. Central tension of sociology.
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