The survival of the aesthetic and epistemic principles of the cultural industry in the era of networked communication

Abstract

This article will discuss the relevance of the concept of the culture industry as theorized by Adorno and Horkheimer. In this conceptual review, questions related to aesthetics and epistemology will be central, as they will connect to the contemporary crisis denounced by Byung-Chul Han when identifying the degeneration of democracy into an infocracy. To update this debate, we will examine Jenkins’ diagnosis of the culture of connection and the new guise adopted by the culture industry within a new logic of content production and dissemination. This will provide a clear understanding of the lack of a critical perspective on contemporary communication theory and the importance of problematizing the modes of aesthetic and epistemic construction in contemporary times and how they explain the current concept of brain rot.