Countering the forces of capitalism to keep culture alive?
The other day I heard someone say, the forces of capitalism are essentially at odds with study of the humanities. This was a humanities professor, giving a lecture, and so I didn’t have a chance to ask him to elaborate.
At the same time that he said this, he kind of insinuated that the “the forces of capitalism” favor the study of science, of economics, of psychology. In effect, areas of study that can produce capital directly. What use, after all, is an anthropologist to someone trying to turn a profit? What use is literature? In a pure profit-seeking society, everything gets parred down to what sells to most people, from nail-clippers, to culture, to food. Things that have value beyond money have essentially no value in a world that doesn’t have a way to counter “the forces of capitalism.”
First of all, how solid is this assumption that the forces of capitalism are ultimately at odds with culture?
If you think “pretty damn solid”, then my next question is:
How does a society counter, or perhaps even channel, the forces of capitalism in order to sustain the integrity of knowledge for knowledges’ sake, truth for truths’ sake, and beauty for beautys’ sake?
