Citation

Nederman CJ, Goulding JW. Sociol. Relig. 1981; 42(4): 325-332.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1981, Association for the Sociology of Religion)

DOI

10.2307/3711544

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In recent years, the purveyors of the popular occult have flooded the marketplace with a plethora of books, magazines, movies, games and similar commodities, perhaps the most common of which is the astrology column syndicated in most daily newspapers. By resuscitating Theodor Adorno's brilliant but neglected critique of astrology and the occult, this paper examines some popular manifestations of occultism in terms of their deviation from occultism's original opposition to the status quo and their affirmation of commodity relations. The authors claim that popular occultism fosters "pseudo-individualization" and a "metaphysic of the dopes" which serves to stifle self-reflection. Hence, popular occultism achieves what traditional organized religion could not: the complete internalization of domination. As a distortion of consciousness which conceals material conditions, popular occultism legitimates the irrational contradictions of industrial society by guiding its followers to maintain the values of liberal-capitalism despite the inequalities of everyday life.