Corporate Authorship

Corporate authorship hires artists, musicians, writers (etc.) to create projects in keeping with an overarching corporate agenda. In the past, it could be said that the Roman Catholic Church participated in corporate authorship by hiring architects and artists to design, construct and adorn its houses of worship, echoing and supporting the church’s values and image. During the Hollywood studio system, individual studios would hire individuals on every tier of film production to create movies which were hopefully going to turn a profit for the studio, in keeping with its overall image and ethos.

How corporate authorship is similar to traditional concepts of authorship is that the products can still be purchased and enjoyed by many, many people. How it is different is that virtually all of the decisions made are by committee and maintain an eye on the over all corporate goal at all times.

One way cultural authorship can differ from cultural intermediaries discussed last week is that sometimes intermediaries stumble upon a product that’s already created outside of its existence, yet try to adapt to it in order to benefit from it. The work of David Mamet, for instance was what it was outside of the marketer’s hands, but they had to work with each of Mamet’s financial successes or failures in order to market the next piece. The Beatles already was an act before manager Brian Epstein came along and worked on their image. Epstein didn’t have a corporate entity originally set up before he managed The Beatles; the group’s basic talent was already there, their goals were in place yet Brian Epstein approached them to change their image from more rough-and-tumble to suits. Once however, Epstein had achieved success through The Beatles, subsequent acts he booked followed “suit.”

Sammond’s book about the corporate manufacturing of the ideal American child is a very interesting idea, as I think these notions feed directly into the era that I am most interested in--the 60’s. I really think that a lot of adult Americans were broadsided by what happened during the mid to late 60s because they must have believed this image of the ideal child and didn’t expect a rebellion from it. Social conformity was so important at this time because the atomic bomb and communism were looming on the horizon and superficial conformity made it easier for patriotic Americans to spot those who didn’t agree.

I think that corporate authorship is found everywhere-- in academic settings, scientific communities, religious denominations, political parties, private corporations and anywhere unity is needed for furthering of power and/or sustainability.