Nostalgia and Memory Flashcards

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1
Q

According to Hobsbawm, the past is a model for what?

A

As a “model for reconstructing [the unsatisfactoy nature of the present] in a satisfactory form” 1997

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2
Q

What does Hobsbawm note about politcal movement and people worldwide?

A

That both groups tend to define Utopia as nostalgia

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3
Q

How can postmodernism be characterised?

A

1) Fragmantation, alienation, insecurity or the fleeting nature of contemporary experience
2) The blurring of the boundaries between reality and fiction (as outlined by Baudrillard)
3) The collapse of time and space, as history is no longer experienced as linear or a progression, but rather as singular events without context
4) Culture is intensified by the media and a thriving consumer context

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4
Q

How is the past seen as part of contemporary culture?

A

Nostalgia is embedded in the fabric of postmodern culture

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5
Q

What are potential reasons that nostalgia is thought to be embedded in the fabric of postmodern culture?

A

1) One theory is that it correlates to the collapse of the grand narratives
2) The invalidation or irrelevance of modern institutions once held in high regard, such as the monarchy, church or state
3) The past is a highly marketable entity, which leads to the exploitation of this fact by corporations
4) Acceleration of media and technology

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6
Q

Which level of simulation does Baudrillard view nostalgia as?

A

The third order - relating to the masking of the absence of a profound reality

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7
Q

What are some of the characteristics of nostalgia as a simulation?

A

1) Mediation of the past occurs. There is some slight reference to ‘the real’ but this is only through simulation
2) Historical signifiers can be found, but they are without any real reference (Tranquility - a North East simulation of the Wild West, obviously there are no real references within this)
3) The heritage industry presenting the past as a simulated experience. This can be tied to hyperreality, as it represents a world that does not have any real origin
4) Leads to the consumption of historical signs rather than learning or connecting to real history

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8
Q

How does Baudrillard view simulacra?

A

As being inspired by the real/an original, but creating and sustaining their own realities

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9
Q

What are historical simulacra?

A

Places that are supposed to represent the past that can be visited by people who want to ‘experience’ life in previous times. They can include tours, exhibitions, or shops containing goods that may be reproductions of goods at the time, or be of associated themes. There is also a belief that the consumption of images and products of this nature invoke a sense of historical memory. This memory could be ‘real’ or constructed, but would have equivocal meaning in the mind of the consumer

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10
Q

What is cultural schizophrenia?

A

A term that Jameson coined to describe the phenomenon of postmodern individuals being unable to engage with a linear temporality (perception of the past, present and future), instead experiencing a perpetual present.

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11
Q

What is the consequence of cultural schizophrenia?

A

Individuals are no longer able to relate to history in any other way than as a series of outmoded styles.

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12
Q

In the media-saturated world, history becomes what?

A

A sort of phantasy

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13
Q

What is Frederic Jameson’s definition of phantasy, in historical terms?

A

He sees history as being a construct, based on a series of mediated images from the past. These images are idealised, nostalgic and superficial, resulting in the fetishiised replacement of history

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14
Q

What is a good quote for Jameson’s view of history as phantasy?

A

“Our historical situation is one mediated by images”

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15
Q

What is a quote from Jameson to describe historicism?

A

“The random cannibalization of all the styles of the past, the play of random stylistic allusion”

In other words, the accumulation of different historical styles in order to symbolise and signify the past

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16
Q

What is Jameson’s key point on historicism?

A

That the postmodern individual doesn’t have a longing for an authentic past, and that the idea of historical style takes precedence over history itself.

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17
Q

What is evidence of the demand for the past?

A

Viewing figures for documentaries, re-enactments and lists of nostalgic events

The sales figures for antiques and memorabilia

Number of visitors to heritage sites and historical attractions

The proliferation of retro communities on the internet

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18
Q

What is a quote from Lowenthal that describes how we feel about the past?

A

“We feel quite sure that the past really happened… the airy and insubstantial future may never arrive… time as we know it might end. By contrast, the past is tangible and secure; people think of it as fixed, unalterable, indelibly recorded” - 1985

19
Q

What are some theories as to the public’s obsession with the past?

A

1) It could be a coping strategy for surviving a dislocated, fragmented and very fast paced consumer society - “In a period of rapid change, there seems to be a demand for fixed certainties” Sarup, 1996)
2) It could be viewed as a way of enhancing the present as a form of re-enactment

20
Q

How is nostalgia defined?

A

It is defined as a longing for something that is absent, whether whatever is perceived to be absent is real or imaged.

21
Q

What is the nostalgic state?

A

Not necessarily fixed on finding a past, but rather with yearning for it and (according to Lowenthal) celebrating it’s values

22
Q

What is the nostalgia industry?

A

Presenting the past as commodity, providing consumers with a tangible manifestation of the past.

23
Q

What is the issue with vintage consumerism?

A

It is a form of themed consumption that creates needs to which there is no guaranteed satisfaction. It only guarantees consumers options that result in more consumerism.

24
Q

What do historical signs attempt to do?

A

Invoke nostalgic (romantic or idealised) feelings of the past.

25
Q

What are sites of prosumption?

A

Sites where users can both consume and produce its content

26
Q

What is changing the way we store information and relate to the past?

A

The internet (Recuber)

27
Q

What do online memory banks dedicated to disasters provide users with?

A

1) A source for self-help
2) A place for spontaneous commemoration and therapeutic monuments (memorials were traditionally erected by the elite, the internet is democratising this process)

28
Q

How popular is the September 11th online archive?

A

Very - it holds more than 150,000 digital items, with 40,000 firsthand stories alone

29
Q

What are two significant elements of nostalgia and memory?

A

1) Relating to periods in time that we remember - the act of remembering in this case is highly personalised, and focuses on the individual experience rather than the collective. Online sites offer therapeutic catharsis to those who contribute messages to memory banks (Recuber, 2010)
2) Relates to periods in times that we do not and can not remember first-hand - memory is manufactured in this instance, with a collective idealised view of the past occurring. The collective memory is formed through the memory institution that is the media and education system

30
Q

What are retrophilic communities?

A

A number of sites which focus on different “golden ages” of the past. Provide a safe haven for like-minded people to connect and discuss their very specific views of the past

31
Q

Why does Gray feel as though online retro-communities are utopian?

A

Because the solidity offered by the past is safe, it has already happened and there is now no room for uncertainty or change

32
Q

What is Retrospective Magazine?

A

It is a site that uses signifiers to refer to the perceived utopian values of the past. The users view it in idealistic terms and see it as risk free, seen as there was no terrorism or crime (although, neglecting to mention the oppression of and crimes against women, races other than white and the LGBT community)

33
Q

What is historical simulation?

A

The consuming of histroical images and sounds

34
Q

What is different about online retro communities?

A

They’re not just online stores where nostalgia can be consumed, but rather a marketplace where dreams can be perpetuated and exchanged

35
Q

What are some characteristics of retro communities?

A

1) It is scripted and managed - people have an avatar and a vintage presence
2) There is common behaviour that users are expected to follow
3) Common themes include attitudes to values, or perceptions of how society should be structured through the construction of completely virtual towns
4) Creates a sense of us/them, where modern society is constantly shed in a negative light
5) Users often have very specific cut-off points relating to which year they stop idealising about the past (1963 is a favourite)

36
Q

What is a quote from Lowenthal on escape?

A

“Besides enhancing an acceptable present, the past offers alternatives to an unacceptable present.”

37
Q

What does the retrospective view offer?

A

1) Escape
2) Authenticity
3) Identity
4) Response/motivation

38
Q

What are the characteristics of the retrospective view of escape?

A

That is fulfills and anaesthetic function that protects us from the pain of the present. That it decelerates the pace of modern existence with indulging in what is percieved to be a simpler existence, and provides structure in a social environment that is becoming increasingly devoid of any sort of stability.

39
Q

What are the characteristics of the retrospective view of authenticity?

A

Relates to the urgency to find the genuine, even if the genuine is a mere reproduction. It may be a paradox, but in postmodern terms, the authentic and inauthentic are irrelevant.

Antique collection is also important to this theme, as artefacts that belong to the past help us in some way distance ourselves from the present and connect us directly to the past.

40
Q

What are the characteristics of the retrospective view of identity?

A

1) Does vintage fasion allow the ‘real’ identity to be externalised, or indulge the desire to be different?
2) Do people project a higher moral filter onto the past than actually existed?
3) Retrophiles rely heavily on the past in order to externalise a part of their identity
4) Jameson believes that individualism and personal identity is a thing of the past in this postmodern world, hence the retrophilic attempt to claim this identity back through their connection with the past

41
Q

What are the characteristics of the retrospective view of response and motivation?

A

There is too much consumer choice, the past is deemed to be less complicated, and overwhelmed consumers attempt to reconnect to it.
There is also the dialectical opposition created by the retrophile rejection of advanced consumerism, yet consuming products of the nostalgia industry in an attempt to travel back in time

42
Q

What is an example of the past as a simulation?

A

The House in the Spitalfields - work of artist Dennis Severs, who sought to restore a house in a way that would allow him to step back into the past. It is a post-materialist reconstruction of 18th century life. Uses various realism devices such as smells, noises and warm candle-lit rooms to recreate the experience of the past

43
Q

What is the House in the Spitalfields seen as?

A

An example of history as a spectacle, where a series of historical images, objects and signs refer to each-other, thereby creating their own reality. This results in the hyperreality of the 18th century.

44
Q

In what ways can the past be problematic?

A

1) By considering it to be a commodity - it exists via the nostalgia industry
2) By considering it to be an antidote to the elements of dissatisfaction in the present (created by perceived inauthenticity and too much choice)
3) By considering it to be a spectacle - the relentless consumption of images and signs that all relate to one another through empty signification