Marcuse’s account of self-recognition in commodities prefigures the postmodern structure of feeling

Evidence

Marcuse calls this ”the rational character of its [society’s] irrationality” (9). In a passage remarkable for its indeterminate tone poised between denunciation and grudging admiration, Marcuse describes what is in fact postmodernity: ”its [advanced industrial civilization’s] productivity and efficiency, its capacity to increase and spread comforts, to turn waste into need, and destruction into construction, the extent to which this civilization transforms the object world into an extension of man’s mind and body makes the very notion of alienation questionable. The people recognize themselves in the commodities; they find their soul in their automobile, hi-fi set, split-level home, kitchen equipment. The very mechanism which ties the individual to his society has changed, and social control is anchored in the new needs which it has produced” (9). Marcuse comes very close here to defining the postmodern structure of feeling, where the classical alienation produced by earlier versions of capitalism, in which a reified state of existence is fully opposed by the potential for a genuine, unalienated state of existence, no longer obtains. — Marianne DeKoven, Utopia Limited, 148

Categorization

• XREF: Recall ch3 on Williams’s ‘structure of feeling’ — DeKoven explicitly claims Marcuse nearly defines the same thing decades before. — connects to: Williams coined ‘structure of feeling’ to bridge the social-personal split — Marianne DeKoven, Utopia Limited: The Sixties and the…, 88; Postmodernity erases the boundary between commodity and its image — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 605; Showing oneself as a self online begins the manufacturing of the self as commodity — Grant Bollmer, Katherine Guinness, The Influencer Factory: A Marxist…, 61 (+3 more)
• QUESTION: Whether Marcuse genuinely anticipates postmodern usages of ‘alienation’ versus cultural-studies readings of commodity identification is worth chasing.

Broader Connections

• Postmodernity erases the boundary between commodity and its image #corroborates (0.75) — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 605
• Showing oneself as a self online begins the manufacturing of the self as commodity #exemplifies (0.75) — Grant Bollmer, Katherine Guinness, The Influencer Factory, 61