Distortion and Consumption of Identity, from Rousseau to Adorno

This paper examines how production and consumption models of the 1920s determined cultural obsession with authenticity. From the analysis made by Benjamin, Adorno and Kracauer, this article discusses how cultural industry fosters aesthetic identification with the stars of the so-called mass society. next, it also explores why the origin of this reality is to be found in Rousseau's literary and political project and in the way he, while restoring novel in the literary institution, merged moral virtue with natural passion.