MIGRAIN: Hesmondhalgh - The Cultural Industries
Read the Factsheet and complete the following questions/tasks:
1) What does the term 'Cultural Industries' actually refer to?
The sheet refers to it as "the creation, production and distribution of products of a cultural or artistic nature."
2) What does Hesmondhalgh identify regarding the societies in which the cultural industries are highly profitable?
When the societies that support the conditions where large companies and their political allies both make money together.
3) Why do some media products offer ideologies that challenge capitalism or inequalities in society?
Because they need to be constantly competing with each other in order to secure an audience, they need to keep their audience active the same way they are being active, in a way they need to shock their audience by opposing these societal ideaologies.
4) Look at page 2 of the factsheet. What are the problems that Hesmondhalgh identifies with regards to the cultural industries?
-Risky Business
-Creativity vs commerce
-High production costs and low reproduction costs
-Semi-public goods: need to create scarcity
5) Why are so many cultural industries a 'risky business' for the companies involved?
The risky business is a way that companies will use in order to get some sort result to gain a reaction from the audience, however it does sometimes go against cultural and societal beliefs which make audiences either disagree or agree depending on where they stand in their opinion.
6) What is your opinion on the creativity v commerce debate? Should the media be all about profit or are media products a form of artistic expression that play an important role in society?
I think that media is supposed to be in an artistic expression as if it was mainly made for money then the artistic value is no where to be seen, I also think that if it is made for money purposes then it may bring the value and intention of the main art piece as it isn't made for what it is but how it was made to make money.
7) How do cultural industry companies minimise their risks and maximise their profits? (Clue: your work on Industries - Ownership and control will help here)
Companies such as conglomerates will buy other subsidiaries that is similar in their own field or even distribute it through other means of media forms, this allows them to have a more diverse audience.
8) Do you agree that the way the cultural industries operate reflects the inequalities and injustices of wider society? Should the content creators, the creative minds behind media products, be better rewarded for their work?
I think that that people who actually think of the ideas and then work on them to make them a reality, should be actually paid for their work as they have contributed manual labour/work to their goal.
9) Listen and read the transcript to the opening 9 minutes of the Freakonomics podcast - No Hollywood Ending for the Visual-Effects Industry. Why has the visual effects industry suffered despite the huge budgets for most Hollywood movies?
The visual effects cost a lot of money but the Hollywood studio does not pay them enough for them to keep going.
10) What is commodification?
The changing of social significance of the cultural industries such as making objects and people in a form of money or profit.
11) Do you agree with the argument that while there are a huge number of media texts created, they fail to reflect the diversity of people or opinion in wider society?
I think that is true as there are multiple posts, blogs, videos and such however a selected amount of people are the only ones getting recognised by many people, others? Not as much, but the main people such as influencers get a lot of attention.
12) How does Hesmondhalgh suggest the cultural industries have changed? Identify the three most significant developments and explain why you think they are the most important.
5) Why are so many cultural industries a 'risky business' for the companies involved?
The risky business is a way that companies will use in order to get some sort result to gain a reaction from the audience, however it does sometimes go against cultural and societal beliefs which make audiences either disagree or agree depending on where they stand in their opinion.
6) What is your opinion on the creativity v commerce debate? Should the media be all about profit or are media products a form of artistic expression that play an important role in society?
I think that media is supposed to be in an artistic expression as if it was mainly made for money then the artistic value is no where to be seen, I also think that if it is made for money purposes then it may bring the value and intention of the main art piece as it isn't made for what it is but how it was made to make money.
7) How do cultural industry companies minimise their risks and maximise their profits? (Clue: your work on Industries - Ownership and control will help here)
Companies such as conglomerates will buy other subsidiaries that is similar in their own field or even distribute it through other means of media forms, this allows them to have a more diverse audience.
8) Do you agree that the way the cultural industries operate reflects the inequalities and injustices of wider society? Should the content creators, the creative minds behind media products, be better rewarded for their work?
I think that that people who actually think of the ideas and then work on them to make them a reality, should be actually paid for their work as they have contributed manual labour/work to their goal.
9) Listen and read the transcript to the opening 9 minutes of the Freakonomics podcast - No Hollywood Ending for the Visual-Effects Industry. Why has the visual effects industry suffered despite the huge budgets for most Hollywood movies?
The visual effects cost a lot of money but the Hollywood studio does not pay them enough for them to keep going.
10) What is commodification?
The changing of social significance of the cultural industries such as making objects and people in a form of money or profit.
11) Do you agree with the argument that while there are a huge number of media texts created, they fail to reflect the diversity of people or opinion in wider society?
I think that is true as there are multiple posts, blogs, videos and such however a selected amount of people are the only ones getting recognised by many people, others? Not as much, but the main people such as influencers get a lot of attention.
12) How does Hesmondhalgh suggest the cultural industries have changed? Identify the three most significant developments and explain why you think they are the most important.
-Powerful IT technology companies
-Visual effects teams
-globalisation of cultural industries
These are important as they are pretty much a part of many things in everyday life such as the media we consume and use.
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