Music technologies and AirPods: Considering Theodor Adorno as media ecologist

When new technologies emerge, they inevitably bring to mind many of the same questions that media scholars have been asking for decades. In this study, we will analyse Apple AirPods through a theoretical framework based in the writings of media ecologists like Harold Innis, Marshall McLuhan and Neil Postman, as well as media theorist Theodor W. Adorno. Adorno is included here because very few articles in media ecology scholarship discuss his contributions to media research. The exclusion of Adorno from media ecology appears to relate to his different ontological assumptions about media. While Innis, McLuhan and Postman contribute to the ‘structures and patterns narrative’ of medium theory, Adorno clearly fits into the ‘power and resistance narrative’ of critical/cultural studies. However, there are more significant connections between Adorno and the field of media ecology than have been previously acknowledged. In particular, there is a confluence between Adorno’s writings and others by media ecology scholars like Postman and Lewis Mumford, particularly in Adorno’s arguments about technology and music. In this article, we consider the question: can Adorno’s writings on technology be considered appropriate for inclusion in the media ecology canon? In this article, we will explore representative essays from Adorno’s extensive body of work on music reproduction technologies and discuss the parallels between his arguments and those made by others in media ecology.