Cultural Industries

The term cultural industry refers to the creation, production, and distribution of products of a cultural or artistic nature.

Hesmondhalgh identifies that the societies in which the cultural industries are highly profitable tend to be societies that support the conditions where large companies, and their political allies, make money.However, Hesmondhalgh also identifies that in contemporary societies the cultural industries often produce texts that do not support these conditions.

Some media products offer ideologies that challenge capitalism or inequalities in society because the cultural industry companies need to continuously compete with each other to secure audience members. As such, companies outdo each other to try and satisfy audience desires for the shocking, profane or rebellious. There are also longstanding social expectations about what art and entertainment should do, and challenging the various institutions of society is one of those expectations.

Hesmondhalgh considers the way the cultural industries distribute and organise symbolic creativity (i.e. texts audiences consume) reflects extreme inequalities and injustices evident in capitalist societies. For instance, there are vast differences in terms of access to cultural industries in society, in terms of your level of wealth, gender or ethnicity. There are also inequalities in the ways symbol creators are treated. Even those who succeed in their work being accepted and widely circulated are often treated badly



The problems that Hesmondhalgh identifies with regards to the cultural industries:Risky business,Creativity versus commerce,High production costs and low reproduction costs
Semi-public goods and the need to create scarcity



The media shouldn't be all about the profit as we as an audience rely on the news to give us true information about whats going on around the world. The films that are being produced now days are more about the money making then actually leaving an impact on people or to send a message across.


8) I agree that the way the cultural industries operate reflects the inequalities and injustices of wider society.Those who put in the most efforts are definitely not rewarded nor credited enough for their labours. For example, in Hollywood, actors get paid 10 times as much as producers of content and directors. This is a great injustice, as actors take advantage of their own star value and demand the most amount of money than anyone else in the industry, despite putting in some of the lesser efforts. 

10) Commodification involves the transforming of objects and services into commodities.

11) I agree with the argument that while there are a huge number of media texts created, they fail to reflect the diversity of people or opinion in wider society. I believe this may be because it is easier to agree with what the majority believe in order to win over their loyalty to the media product. This means that most of the time, there is a lack of diverse representation so that the product is aligned with the status quo.

12)Hesmondhalgh suggests the cultural industries have changed as: Cultural industries are no longer seen as second to the ‘real’economy, ownership and organisation of cultural industries is now much broader, digitalisation, and many more.