Adorno and Lazarsfeld: An encounter of the apocalyptic and the integrated - On studies of radio broadcasted classical music in the framework of Lazarsfeld's ''Princeton Radio Research Project''

Journal/Book: Sociol Cas. 1999; 35: Jilska 1, 110 00 Prague 1, Czechoslovakia. Sociologicky Casopis. 181-191.

Abstract: This is a theoretical essay which explores the contribution of Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno to Paul Lazarsfeld's ''Princeton Radio Project'' - one of the 'archetypal' empirical research endeavours in the field of media studies. The essay reviews a series of conflicts between Adorno and Lazarsfeld, discrepancies between their style of work and the abrupt termination of Adorno's co-operation with Lazarsfeld at the beginning of 1941. The principal point is the search for the reasons of conflict between Adorno and Lazarsfeld. A clash of attitudes towards the role of social science in society is described as the main reason along with paradigmatical differences and psychological features of Adorno's distinguished but problematic personality. Adorno's devotion to the social criticism of the Frankfurt School and its requirement that social science is a persistent threat to the status clue (with media as an important part of it) and Lazarsfeld's devotion to empirical media research as a tool of improving functions of the social system are highlighted as the main reason of their conflict, also referred to as a controversy between the critical (Adorno) and the administrative (Lazarsfeld) approach. Adorno's and Lazarsfeld's dispute is then recognised as an anticipation of conceptual conflict between 'the apocalyptics and the integrated', two basic groups of media scholars defined by Umberto Eco twenty-five years later.

Note: Article Reifova I, Charles Univ, Fak Socialnich, Katedra Masove Komunikace, Smetanovo Nabrezi 6, Prague 11001 1, CZECH REPUBLIC

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