Adorno saw quantifying culture as the reification typical of mass culture

Evidence

What caused Adorno particular distress was the unmediated way in which cultural phenomena were transformed by his new American colleagues into quantitative data. The very equation of culture with measurable quantities seemed to him a prime example of the reification characteristic of mass culture. “When I was confronted with the demand to ‘measure culture,’ ” he later recalled, “I reflected that culture might be precisely that condition that excludes a mentality capable of measuring it.” — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 664

Categorization

• XREF: Directly connects to Lukács’s concept of reification and the critique of commodity fetishism central to the Frankfurt School’s earlier theoretical work. — connects to: Adorno saw mass art as reconciling audiences to the status quo, unlike Benjamin. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 630; Mass culture literalizes reification by making living people resemble objects — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry: Selected Essays…, 137; Adorno held that productive forces raised living standards while perfecting dehumanization through reification — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 668 (+4 more)
• SEED: The aphorism ‘culture is precisely the condition that excludes a mentality capable of measuring it’ could anchor an essay on the incommensurability between quantitative social science and humanistic objects of study.

Broader Connections

• Mass culture literalizes reification by making living people resemble objects #expands (0.82) — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 137
• Adorno rejected measuring audience reactions apart from cultural content’s objectivity #expands (0.80) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 663
• Adorno held that productive forces raised living standards while perfecting dehumanization through reification #expands (0.78) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 668
• Culture means suspending objectification, yet criticism re-objectifies what it studies #qualifies (0.75)