28-09-2011

During today's lesson we acted as the X factor. We looked at the different auditions form different age groups and people and judged on how we thought they would do in the market from their first audition as if we were professionals in the music industry. We were learning about Adorno and Horkheimer and how they adopted the term 'culture industry' to argue that the way in which cultural items were produced was analogous (comparable) to how other industries manufactured vast quantities of consumer goods. We used the X factor as a way to understand this term as much as possible. We learnt that the X factor is a capitalist show which changes the artist to get more money. It helped me understand a bit more about why Adorno and Horkheimer fought against the idea of the 'culture industry'. We learnt about the process that The X Factor takes people through and how they change them to fit in with what they want the artist to be like and so they fit in with the area of music that they want them to. This can be attached to how the 'culture industry' operated. Acting as judges in the X factor whilst looking at the unique auditions from each person made us realise how the X Factor changes all the contestants to how they want them to be after looking at the first auditions and seeing how the presvious winners turn out the same with similar types of songs, we also looked at examples of previous contestants that are now making songs in the music industry and are still making successes from being on the show.