A review on

“The Adventures of ‘Culture’: Exploring Cultural Theory in Three Traditions”

Daniel Franklin Pilario, in his article “The Adventures of ‘Culture’: Exploring Cultural Theory in
Three Traditions,”1 tackles the different understanding of culture. He uses the “historical
semantics” framework of Raymond Williams—a study of the community of writers and
philosophers through time—in the brief yet concise discussion of prevailing thinkers and their
concept of culture. This paper review is limited only to the first 32 pages of the article of Pilario
which tracks the understanding of culture in the traditions of utilitarianism and culturalism.2
Culture comes from the Latin cultura (colore as root word) which means “to cultivate, to
inhabit, to protect, to honor with worship.”3 These words can be understood as “culture as a
process”4 but has later been changed to “culture as an abstraction” 5 because of one main factor:
Industrial Revolution.6 We see this very true in the Utilitarian tradition: utilitarianism developed
with capitalism and utilitarianism developed with democracy.
David Hume’s (1711-1776) understanding of our moral actions lies under “utility”: we do
what we see is useful for society. Claude Adrien Helvetius (1715-1771) sees utility as two-fold:
“government’s concern for the ‘happiness’ of all and each members’ concern for the welfare of
the whole.”7
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) is most famous for his saying, “It is the greatest happiness
of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.” 8 This is not to be confused with
siding with the majority, but he emphasizes community over individual interests. But again, a
point of contention is that who’s voices are listened to in a community? We go now to the one
who refined the idea of Bentham, John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) who is set in the period where
the middle class is rising and that they too possessed their own rights amidst a then-dual-class
society (rich and poor). Mill puts “excellence of character” that each middle-class citizen should
possess in order for him to reach happiness.
Now enters capitalism with Adam Smith who contended that “human being’s moral
action is motivated by ‘sentiments and feelings,’ not by reason or self-love.” 9 This is to point out
that his policy of free trade is aware of the abuses and possibly corruption that go with it. In that

1
. Daniel Franklin Pilario, “The Adventures of ‘Culture’: Exploring Cultural Theory in Three Traditions.”
Class reading. Henceforth, this reading will be identified as “The Adventures of ‘Culture’.”
2
. Ibid., 1.
3
. Williams cited in “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 2.
4
. The Adventures of ‘Culture’, 2.
5
. Ibid.
6
. Ibid., 2-3.
7
. Ibid., 9. Helvetius was reacting to the wide gap he was seeing between the rich and the poor in 18th
century Europe.
8
. Bentham cited in “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 9.
9
. “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 14.
period where the revolution has swept the foundations of society, comes out from the middle-
class: the businessman becomes the “leader and voice of the new economic and political order.”10
In the prevailing utilitarian way of life, art was not spared: it has excluded those skill sets
which not been found useful for a capitalist economic producing society. A skilled worker is
only an artisan, but a painter or sculptor is the artist. Art and culture have become a “state of
mind closely associated with ‘human perfection.’”11
In the Romantic period, artists, particularly poets, protested using their art: Wordsworth
and Shelley with their pamphlets, Blake tried for sedition, Coleridge and his socio-politico
philosophy, and Southey’s political comments.12 Such literature “were considered ‘subversive’ to
the guardians of the status quo and provided fundamental critique to the cultural process.”13
These reactors proved that art and culture are part of humanity and society and not simply
a commodity. But history showed us that literary works later became a trade, a profession.
Consequently, art has become an imitation. The aesthetic criteria of the Romantic art have
faded.14
The British society was shaken by the passing of the Reform Bill of 1867 15 and for
Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) culture was that key for the individual man to arrive at his
perfection. And this love for perfection, found in the remnant16, will be the remnant’s ultimate
mission to society: “communicate the ‘best of what has been thought and said’ through education
in order to awaken the ‘best self’ which is dormant in all humanity.” 17 However, the problem lies
with the premise of the remnant: that in order for them to pursue the mission of education, they
too must be educated and listened to. And who else in the society is educated and listened to? It
goes back again to the bourgeois society.
T.S. Eliot (1888-1965) saw that culture should be examined in relation to society
(contrary to Arnold’s individual pursuit); culture now moves from a pursuit of human perfection
(seen in Arnold) to a culture as a whole way of life. 18 It now transcends to every facet of life, to
the “ordinary culture.”19 The problem with this is that the hierarchy or classes are still permanent
that glues the society together. Such egalitarian society is still a utopia. Eliot acknowledges, “this
maintenance of a particular level of culture is to the benefit, not merely of the class which

10
. Roll cited in “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 15.
11
. “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 22.
12
. Cf. Ibid., 20.
13
. Ibid.
14
. Cf. Ibid., 19. Three criteria are identified: imagination, nature, and symbol and myth.
15
. Effected more voters primarily from the working class.
16
. Cf. Ibid., 24. The remnant is the minority coming from the three classes (Barbarians, Philistines, and
Populace) Arnold identified.
17
. Ibid.
18
. Cf. Ibid., 27.
19
. Ibid.
maintains it, but of the society as a whole.” 20 More so is the problem that those in the higher
classes are led to believe “that they are doing real service to society.”21
F. R. Leavis (1895-1978) influenced by Eliot saw that the Industrial Revolution swept the
organic community and replaced it with the organized modern state. 22 He called for the citizens
to “be educated to resist and to be critical.” 23 For Leavis, this educated citizens are the minority,
who are “in touch with the ‘language’ and the ‘Great Tradition’ of English literature.” 24
However, this literary protectors might lead to “becoming an exclusive club of literary
intellectuals whose preoccupation, in the end, is just to review each other’s books, forgetting
about ‘the whole way of life.’”25
This first part (of the assigned reading) ended with Williams and his discussion on the
need for an extra edge of consciousness. This ability to welcome and criticize changes in our
way of life (as Williams would define culture).
From this material we have traversed, we have seen that history is a story of “struggle
and resistance.”26 We have seen from these thinkers and philosophers how the Industrial
Revolution has shaped their understanding of Culture (and utility). How it tried to “[free] from
the clutches of the tyranny of medieval metaphysics and religion.”27 To a utility that finds what is
for good of the whole community. From a utility that reacts to the dominant capitalist society to a
utility that sympathizes for a more favorable free trade policy. From a whole new understanding
of art as a commodity brought about by the capitalist society. And to a culture that seeks
perfection from individual pursuits to community-wide processes, and to a seeing education to
safeguard language and tradition. Fast forward today, we are faced with the problems brought
about by heightened materialism and consumerism. What matters is today is that the latest Apple
product is bought, or the latest Marvel movie is watched. And this is where that extra edge of
consciousness is truly needed. In the face of tempting objects, “[o]ur responsibility as audience
members is to be careful about what we sensationalize and popularize. We should seek not only
to be entertained, but also to be educated. Not necessarily in a scholarly way, but rather, in a
compassionate way that would make us see the world in a clearer and better light.” 28 In the words
of Pope Francis, probably this extra edge of consciousness is what he calls kindness. And those
people, need not be vanguards or protectors against dominant capitalist or whatever markets, but
only “stars shining in the midst of darkness.”29

20
. “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 28.
21
. Ibid., 29.
22
. Cf. “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 29.
23
. Ibid.
24
. Ibid., 30.
25
. Day cited in “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 31.
26
. Roberto del Valle Alcalá, “Unworking community: cultural imaginaries, common life, and the politics of
division,” Journal for Cultural Research 24, no. 2 (2020): 113-125,
https://doi.org/10.1080/14797585.2020.1776456.
27
. “The Adventures of ‘Culture’”, 16.
28
. Michael Baylosis, “Why pop culture matters,” Inquirer, May 3, 2019,
https://opinion.inquirer.net/121109/why-pop-culture-matters.
29
. Francis, Fratelli Tutti §222.
-Eris Zeus C. Boquiron