Mass Everything
Mass society can be defined as a modern society that is characterized by a breakdown of community, individuation, loneliness, and powerlessness. The traditional social ties became weak since the industrial revolution created a culture industry where people were interested in capitalism and the elite concern was based on forming a centralized government (Spielvogel, 511). The period of the 19th century marked the second industrial revolution that was characterized by material prosperity, industrial production, scientific development, and technological growth. The industrial revolution led to the creation of mass society- a society where people encountered positive life changes such as voting rights, a higher standard of living, and new form of transportation, new governmental roles, and political democracy (Spielvogel, 512). The industrial production was characterized by new social structures, mass leisure, gender issues, population growth, and urbanization. These factors were responsible for the creation of a mass society where due to the changes in the standard of living, division of labor, technology advances, people become detached and the social bonds became weak.
Mass society, mass transportation, and mass consumerism led to the creation of social structures such as the elite, the middle classes and lower classes. Among the three classes, the middle class consists the largest group of people who were professionals, industrialists, lawyers, architects, white-collar workers, traders, engineers and more (Spielvogel, 518). Since the mass society was characterized by large-scale society, technological changes and the growth of the economy, there was a high level of mass employment and positive living conditions. The industrial expansion gave rise to the middle-class workers who worked in white collar jobs. As the middle class entered in the industrial revolution, they improved their standard of living and enjoyed new activities such as eating high-quality food, taking a vacation, attending theater festival, living in cities, afford amenities and living a comfortable life (Spielvogel, 519). In general, middle-class people focused on advancing education to increase literacy and enjoyed the mass leisure such as attending athletic events, beaches, dance halls and more. All class in the industrial revolution enjoyed the age of progress but the middle-class people benefited most since they could make higher earnings from well-paying jobs.
Work cited
Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization: A Brief History. Boston: Wadsworth/Cengage Learning, 2014.
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