www.ssoar.info Fabricating the absolute fake: America in contemporary pop culture Kooijman, Jaap Veröffentlichungsversion / Published Version Monographie / monograph Zur Verfügung gestellt in Kooperation mit / provided in cooperation with: OAPEN (Open Access Publishing in European Networks) Empfohlene Zitierung / Suggested Citation: Kooijman, J. (2008). Fabricating the absolute fake: America in contemporary pop culture. (American Studies). Amsterdam: Amsterdam Univ. Press. https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-318138 Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Dieser Text wird unter einer CC BY-NC-ND Lizenz This document is made available under a CC BY-NC-ND Licence (Namensnennung-Nicht-kommerziell-Keine Bearbeitung) zur (Attribution-Non Comercial-NoDerivatives). For more Information Verfügung gestellt. Nähere Auskünfte zu den CC-Lizenzen finden see: Sie hier: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed.de Fabricating the absolute Fabricating American pop culture – Hollywood cinema, television, pop music – dominates the rest of the world through its hegemonic presence. Does that make everyone a hybridized American, or do these elements find mediation within the other cultures that consume them? Fabricating the Absolute Fake applies concepts of postmodern theory – Baudrillard’s hyperreality and Eco’s “absolute fake,” among others – to this globally mediated American pop culture in order to examine both the phenomenon itself and its appropriation in the Netherlands, as evidenced by such diverse cultural icons as the Elvis-inspired crooner Lee Towers, the Moroccan-Dutch rapper Ali B, musical tributes to an assassinated politician, and the Dutch reality soap opera scene. Fabricating the Absolute Fake is a fascinating exploration of how global cultures struggle to create their own “America” within a post-9/11 media culture. F ake Jaap Kooijman is Associate Professor in Media & Culture and American Studies at the University of Amsterdam. “A brilliant, thoroughly enjoyable work of cultural critique, Fabricating the Absolute Fake takes seemingly exhausted concepts like ‘Americanization’ and turns them on their head. Refusing simple binaries between the fake and the authentic, or between cultural imperialism and native resistance, Kooijman demonstrates just how flexible the signifiers of Americanness can be when they circulate globally.” Anna McCarthy, Cinema Studies, New York University Jaap Kooijman “Most daring and persuasive is Kooijman’s ability to move between and connect the most delicious pop and the most searing political events (9/11, the murder of Pim Fortuyn), never evading the seriousness of entertainment nor the spectacle of politics. A book that is a pleasure for what it conveys of its subject and for its intellectual rigor, managing to be at once subtle and straightforward, complex and lucid.” Richard Dyer, Film Studies, King’s College London Fabricating “Fabricating the Absolute Fake shows that pop culture is more than ephemeral entertainment. When looked at with Kooijman’s the absolute Fake cosmopolitan eye, pop culture can be seen as a continuing ritual in celebration of national identities, America’s identity for sure, America in Contemporary Pop Culture but also, intriguingly, a Dutch or even European sense of self.” Rob Kroes, American Studies, University of Amsterdam Jaap Kooijman A U P A U P AUP_fabricating_def.indd 1 26-05-2008 13:48:31 fabricating the absolute fake ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 1 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:2816:52:28 ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 2 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:2916:52:29 Fabricating the Absolute Fake America in Contemporary Pop Culture Jaap Kooijman ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 3 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:2916:52:29 Cover photo: ‘Ice Cream Parlor’, 2004 © Erwin Olaf Cover: Neon, design and communications, Sabina Mannel, Amsterdam Lay-out: Prografi ci, Goes ISBN 9789053564929 E-ISBN 9789048506125 NUR 757 © Jaap Kooijman / Amsterdam University Press, 2008 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 4 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:2916:52:29 Table of Contents Acknowledgments 7 Introduction Fabricating the Absolute Fake 9 Chapter one We Are the World: 21 America’s Dominance in Global Pop Culture Chapter two The Oprahifi cation of 9/11: 41 America as Imagined Community Chapter three The Desert of the Real: 67 America as Hyperreality Chapter four Americans We Never Were: 93 Dutch Pop Culture as Karaoke Americanism Chapter fi ve The Dutch Dream: 119 Americanization, Pop Culture, and National Identity Conclusion Let’s Make Things Better 141 Notes 147 Bibliography 163 Index 171 ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 5 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:3016:52:30 ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 6 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:3016:52:30 Acknowledgments In his stand-up comedy show Delirious (HBO, 1983), Eddie Murphy does an amazing imitation of Stevie Wonder giving his acceptance speech after win- ning a Grammy Award. Stevie just cannot “shut the f*ck up” and is still saying “I want to thank…” when the credits of the televised Grammy Awards show are rolling. As a Dutch teenager, back in 1983, I loved Eddie Murphy and Stevie Wonder, not yet realizing that these American entertainers (and many others) helped to make “America” an integral part of my own culture. Now twenty-fi ve years later, as I write these acknowledgments, the image of Eddie Murphy “do- ing Stevie at the Grammy’s” keeps popping up in my mind. I want to thank the students who participated in the courses that I have taught on this subject. Since 2001, I teach the MA courses America in Global Media Culture and Images of America at the Media & Culture Department of the University of Amsterdam. In 2003, I taught the graduate course America in Media Abroad at the Cinema Studies Department of New York University. In 2006, I taught the MA course American Pop Culture as Hyperreality at the American Studies Department of the University of Amsterdam. Discussing the subject with the students has been invaluable for the writing of this book. I want to thank the organizers and the fellows of the two sessions of the Salzburg Seminar in American Studies that I attended: The Politics of American Popular Culture: Here, There, and Everywhere (October 2002) and American Culture in the U.S. and Abroad (September 2005). I want to thank Marty Gecek, Tilly de Groot, and the American Embassy in the Hague, the Netherlands, for making my participation possible. I want to thank Linda Berg-Cross, Jude Davies, Bart Eeckhout, Milena Katsarska, Carol Smith, and Reinhold Wagn- leitner for continuing our discussions at other occasions, including the confer- ences of the European Association for American Studies. I want to thank Kate Delaney and Ruud Janssens for commenting on parts of the manuscript that were published before in different form: “Bombs Bursting in Air: The Gulf War, 9/11, and the Super Bowl Performances of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ by Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey,” in Post-Cold War Europe, Post-Cold War America (Amsterdam: VU University Press, 2004), edited by Ruud Janssens and Rob Kroes, and “Let’s Make Things Better: Hyper- Americanness in Dutch Pop Culture,” in Over (T)here: Transatlantic Essays in Honor of Rob Kroes (Amsterdam, VU University Press, 2005), edited by Kate Delaney and Ruud Janssens. 7 ffabricating.inddabricating.indd 7 227-05-20087-05-2008 16:52:3016:52:30 I want to thank my colleagues at the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis, the Media & Culture Department, and the American Studies Depart- ment of the University of Amsterdam for the inspiring intellectual environ- ment. I want to thank Eloe Kingma for helping me to make research projects possible. I want to thank the members of The 9/11 Effect research group of the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis and the Institute for Culture and His- tory, and in particular my fellow initiators Marieke de Goede, Joyce Goggin, and Margriet Schavemaker. I want to thank Joke Hermes, Jeroen de Kloet, Tarja Laine, Ruth Oldenziel, Maarten Reesink, Marja Roholl, and Jan Teurlings for commenting on parts of the manuscript. I want to thank Sudeep Dasgupta and Wanda Strauven for their feedback at crucial moments. I want to thank José van Dijck, Richard Dyer, Rob Kroes, Giselinde Kuipers, Anna McCarthy, and the anonymous reviewers for reading the entire manuscript. I want to thank Thomas Elsaesser for letting me imitate his concept of karaoke Americanism and Chris Keulemans for letting me appropriate his con- cept of “the American I never was.” I want to thank Erwin Olaf and his team for granting me permission to use the “Ice Cream Parlor” photograph on the book’s cover. I want to thank Jeroen Sondervan, Christine Waslander, and the staff of Amsterdam University Press for turning the manuscript into a book. I want to thank Anniek Meinders for initiating this book project. I want to thank some of my friends who actively kept me from writing, either in Amsterdam, Berlin, New York, or Minneapolis: Christopher Clark, Rob van Duijn, José Freire, Daniel Gerdes and Tesseltje de Lange, Richard Gon- lag, Esther van der Hoeven, Theresa Kimm, Kenneth McRooy, Laura Minder- houd, Timon Moll, Donato Montanari, Francine Parling and John Stueland, Gus Reuchlin and Katinka Schreuder, Nelly Voorhuis and Sara van der Heide, my fellow players of the Amsterdam Tigers basketball team, and my fellow deejays of the Re-Disco-Very crew. I want to thank my (extended) family: my parents Aat Kooijman and Sonja Langeveld, my sister Annelies Kooijman, and my best friends Laura Copier and Maarten Vervaat.