Category: Cultural and Literary in Modernity

According to Walter Benjamin in “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” which of the following is true ?

A. “Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be.”
B. “The feeling of strangeness that overcomes the actor before the camera, as Pirandello describes it, is basically of the same kind as the estrangement felt before one’s own image in the mirror.”
C. “All art work, even mass produced art, clearly links to an original referent that has a stable and knowable meaning.”
D. Both A and B

Which of the following descriptions of the “Avant-Garde Movement” is false ?

A. The avant-garde, a military term meaning “advanced guard,” was founded in France in the mid-19th century.
B. The term avant-garde itself means “advanced guard,” and the military role of the advanced guard and the role of the avantgarde art movement are much of the same.
C. The realist painter Gustave Courbet never considered himself a member of the avant-garde.
D. Both A and B

According to Theodor Adorno’s and Max Horkheimer’s “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception,” which of the following is true of the culture industry ?

A. The culture industry is classified by ruthless uniformity of all ideas.
B. The culture industry is the chief method by which technology brings true democracy to all.
C. The culture industry is a fundamental way to promote individuality.
D. The culture industry is chiefly intended to offer consumers the opportunity to classify wants and desires as well as corresponding production.