In Packer and Wiley’s
reading on the materialist turn in social theory, they list and discuss a few distinct
strategies for how to think materiality functions within the field of
communications. However, I found one of these strategies particularly
interesting. The distinct strategy is technology and how it acts as a method of
communicating power relations throughout society from conglomerates and
superstructures. It acts as a way that governs people’s behaviours and allows
for new ways of mobility and convergence. When I started to think about it, it
can be related to Manuel Castells theory on how these technologies are emerging
rapidly in relation to materialism, and at the same time giving political power
to the businesses who control the people who own them. When thinking about
this, it reminds me of the boomerang effect due to biopolitcs and bipower. With
materialism functioning with the production of commodities, large corporations
such as Apple have manipulated society and governed their actions. Due to
society having control over artifacts as they are durable, it allows for
material capitalism to function. People continually invest in Apple products
because they want to use certain features that are IPhone specific and because
most people they know have the same phone. For example, people do not do webcam
calls as often now because they have the ability to Facetime which acts as a
space based medium. Due to materialism, technology is able to govern people’s
actions and how they communicate in day to day life. Do you think that
materialism is negative because governs peoples relations through political
power or do you think it is enhancing society by enforcing hegemony.
This is a link that talks about how Apple is
dominating the market and how their growth has significantly grown (92%).
https://mises.org/library/does-capitalism-make-us-more-materialistic
In the article in the second link, they quotation, "an advancing market economy satisfies more and more of people's desires for exchangeable goods".
It seems to be explanatory for material capitalism. Do you agree?
I read the article that you have provided, I do think the quotation does in fact seem to be explanatory for material capitalism. One can most definitely see alongside Castells theory, that the emergence of technologies provide political powers to the businesses who control the people who own them. Further, technology most definitely controls the way that people are able to interact with one another. Although, it is important to note that people do have control over their choice in the investment they want to make. I think as the subjects to these corporations, that at the end of the day it is our conscious decision to make these purchases. In the article you have provided it claims it depends what we find more value in, “those of alienable goods (transferred to others), or inalienable goods (acquired one their own). The author then states that materialism diminishes in some way as we gain a kind of goods, and moves us to acquisition of another kind of goods. This would be the nonmaterial such as social ties, relations, our own goals, and our experiences of wealth through technology. To answer your question in regards to hegemony, I do think that that materialism enhances society by enforcing hegemony on our own terms. In accordance to Alice E. Marwick, she reveals we can transfer our own wealth upon use of certain social technologies. I think as consumers we can make use of it in ways that benefit us and in many ways find personal wealth on social media. This may be far fetched, but in the case of Twitter one gain find personal wealth through achieving recognition upon certain ideas that we publish. As users our goal is to gain the attention of others and show others how many responses one has. In this case, the inalienable goods on Twitter would be the “likes” or “retweets” and our personal wealth would be our satisfaction in recognition of our ideas. In this case, materialism can be positive in a way that we can enhance personal hegemony by using technologies in ways that benefit us i.e. enhancing our personal wealth.
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