What's Left of Philosophy
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101 | Free Time Under Capitalism
🕑 Added 2024-11-18 10:03:17 +0000 UTCIn this episode, we discuss Theodor Adorno’s essay “Free Time”, in which the critical theorist really lets his cantankerous old man flag fly. He argues that how our subjectivities are shaped by capitalist culture and work discipline makes it very difficult—maybe even impossible—to use our time off the clock in genuinely meaningful ways. Certainly we waste a lot of our precious hours consuming pointless, artless slop and participating in activities just because we feel like we’re supposed to, but is it really the case that everything we do is just unfree pseudo-activity, at best blowing off steam before helplessly getting back to work? We broadly come down on the side of low culture and hobbies, but Marvel movies and Disney adults are definitely cause for concern.
References:
Theodor Adorno, “Free Time”, trans. Gordon Finlayson and Nicholas Walker, in The Culture Industry: Selected Essays on Mass Culture, ed. J.M. Bernstein (New York: Routledge, 2001).
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Comments
benabu
Honestly I like Adorno quite a bit, for lots of reasons, just I started my first ever degree at the age of 38 and my urge to speedrun undergrad drove me to avoid anything that was gonna send me spiralling. Or at least, spiralling any more than does the genuinely deranged decision to take out a student loan in middle age.
VJ
Illmatic was the first album I ever bought, and I always wondered what white Europeans found in music from Queensbridge—Lillian giving voice to an explanation scratches that itch!
Anushka Sen
Not the response I expected but I did lol
Colton Greene
Can we get an Adorno tote from this episode?? I need to show all these fucks that their lives and hobbies are bunk so I can show them perfect forms
benabu
He would have fucking hated it like he fucking hated everything. I thought I was a miserable cunt before I got into Adorno but jfc.
Anushka Sen
It makes me really sad that I'll never get to know Adorno's thoughts on what I think is the best TV show of all time which is also a surprisingly joyful commentary on the inanity of work: Taskmaster
Cold Material Handler
This essay was really interesting! For some reason, the discussion in this episode reminded me of Byung-Chul Han’s “The Burnout Society”… trying to live the sort of overserious life in the face of modern capitalism just gets turned into auto-exploitation, but then again, so does a lot of hobbyist activities.
Tommaso Caprotti
Great episode guys!
