In her attempt to capture the links between The Motown Recording Company, the city of Detroit and ultimately black America, Suzanne S. Smith relies on the words of another cultural theorist, Raymond Williams, since he refused to see art and society as two opposing poles on the cultural continuum. Her case study of Motown’s relationship to Detroit’s African-American community during the 1960s and early 1970s offers contemporary readers, on all sides of the racial, ethnic or religious, or even national divide, a broader way of looking at the historical, social, and political forces engaged behind the cultural formation and production of Motown’s “sound”. After carefully reading Smith’s cultural historiography, I have been thinking about a number of things, which may or may not be explicitly connected to the work she presented. Since I am an outsider to American culture, or American cultures, so to speak, and as such an already displaced observer who has been exposed to American culture products through ‘translation’ or ‘transliteration’, I was wondering about the meaning(s) behind art’s reception.
Can an artistic product from one particular culture, community, be received by those in another one, still carrying across its original meaning? How do we foster such receptions? Do we support them at all?
Also, while I felt drawn to Smith’s articulation of the almost symbiotic relationship between the African-American community in Detroit and their involvement in the cultural production of Motown Records, I was thinking about the social responsibilities that art produced by White America has or renders on that population.
Does art produced by white Americans speak for their share of the American cultural milieu? Does it abide by the same/similar social code as black art does?
As a student and admirer of American culture products, I have always found comfort in the belief that art transcends the pettiness of map lines or time slots; however, Smith’s resonance of Williams’ cultural theory leads me to re-examine my laissez-faire view of art and its appeal with diverse communities. Smith’s unique spin on Williams’ and C. Wright Mills’ theoretical postulates could be employed in the better understanding of one’s culture identification with certain symbolical representations, such as, for example, a national anthem. Does it really celebrate the spirit of one people, American of otherwise? Does it unify a culture’s past, present and future while linking its formation to its existence/endurance/growth?
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