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Professor Kammen shows how the post-traditional popular culture that flourished after the 1880s became full-blown mass culture after World War II, in an era of unprecedented affluence and travel. He charts the influence of advertising and opinion polling; the development of standardized products, shopping centers, and mass-marketing; the separation of youth and adult culture; the gradual repudiation of the genteel tradition; and the commercialization of organized entertainment. He stresses the significance of television in the shaping of mass culture, and of consumerism in its reconfiguration over the past two decades.
Focusing on our own time, Kammen discusses the use of the fluid nature of cultural taste to enlarge audiences and increase revenues, and reveals how the public role of intellectuals and cultural critics has declined as the power of corporate sponsors and promoters has risen. As a result of this diminution of cultural authority, he says, definitive pronouncements have been replaced by divergent points of view, and there is, as well, a tendency to blur fact and fiction, reality and illusion.
An important commentary on the often conflicting ways Americans have understood, defined, and talked about their changing culture in the twentieth century.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
October 3, 2012 -
Formats
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Kindle Book
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OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9780307827715
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EPUB ebook
- ISBN: 9780307827715
- File size: 4111 KB
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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August 1, 1999
The prize-winning Kammen (American history, Cornell; Mystic Chords of Memory) is first among equals of academics devoted to American intellectual and cultural history. In his 15th book, he considers the rise of popular culture in the last century and how it has been created, received, and altered by consumers, producers, and opinion-makers. He rejects conservative jeremiads against popular culture--which he distinguishes from mass culture, though not always with great clarity--by such contemporary figures as Hilton Kramer but is equally troubled by neo-Marxist condemnations influenced by the late Herbert Marcuse. Though the writing is surprisingly dry at times, given Kammen's long record of accessible scholarship, he casts a wide net in his consideration of popular culture. In the end, Kammen's liberal reasonableness counts as a new contribution to the school of consensus, an unfashionable approach in American historiography for decades. Recommended for public libraries and required for academic collections.--Scott H. Silverman, Bryn Mawr Coll. Lib., PACopyright 1999 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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August 1, 1999
%% This is a multi-book review. SEE the title "The Oxford Book of Work" for next imprint and review text. %% ((Reviewed August 1999))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1999, American Library Association.)
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